New to investing, help please
Discussion
I am in the fortunate position of having recently inherited a significant amount of money. At our advanced stage of life wife and myself are ok financially so are not sure what is the best course of action to safeguard this extra money. We are planning to give sums to our two grown up children and start a stocks and shares ISA for 6yr old grandson.
We are looking to start with two stocks and shares ISAs , putting 20k max in each and we want to split holdings between shares and funds
Not knowing who to trust with our money i am looking for ideas.
I was all set for useing Ii who sponsor this section but was surprised at the report on their poor service in Sundays Telegraph.
Any thoughts would help.
We are looking to start with two stocks and shares ISAs , putting 20k max in each and we want to split holdings between shares and funds
Not knowing who to trust with our money i am looking for ideas.
I was all set for useing Ii who sponsor this section but was surprised at the report on their poor service in Sundays Telegraph.
Any thoughts would help.
If you have lots of money can I just make the suggestion to do something today? Eg open an account with Hargreaves Lansdown (good service, quite expensive) and fund it via a debit card to take advantage of this year’s Isa allowance? Otherwise that’s £40k of opportunity you have lost.
Here's the Hagreaves Lansdown page to open a S&S ISA today; you only have a few hours to get £40k invested (you & your wife) & make use of this year's allowance:
https://www.hl.co.uk/investment-services/isa/apply...
Once it's done you can move it elsewhere if you don't want to stay with HL. You don't have to decide which funds to invest in today; it can just sit as cash in the ISA. Note you may get tripped up by Anti-Money Laundering flags if your bank is suspicious of the transfer.
https://www.hl.co.uk/investment-services/isa/apply...
Once it's done you can move it elsewhere if you don't want to stay with HL. You don't have to decide which funds to invest in today; it can just sit as cash in the ISA. Note you may get tripped up by Anti-Money Laundering flags if your bank is suspicious of the transfer.
Thanks for your reply.
I am the executor for my late mother and am fighting to get large sums out of the banks and NS&I.
Despite promises and confirming they have all correct paperwork they just refuse to payout.
they blame Covid but thats a poor excuse.
With regard to Hargreaves, didn't they keep advising people to put money with Woodford, even when he was in trouble.?
Having waited this long to inherit I am being very ,very cautious.
I am the executor for my late mother and am fighting to get large sums out of the banks and NS&I.
Despite promises and confirming they have all correct paperwork they just refuse to payout.
they blame Covid but thats a poor excuse.
With regard to Hargreaves, didn't they keep advising people to put money with Woodford, even when he was in trouble.?
Having waited this long to inherit I am being very ,very cautious.
The time critical thing would be to if possible make use of this year's ISA allowance.
You can choose what you do with the money once it is in the ISA wrapper at your leisure(see discussion here https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
It is possible (not necessarily quick, but perfectly possible to move money between ISA providers at a later date (I've done it several times) ).
iWeb will also let you open an ISA this afternoon/evening.- https://www.iweb-sharedealing.co.uk if you don't trust Hargreaves.
In either/any case, don't rush to invest it, just to get it paid in to the ISA - the only reason to hurry is to not "waste" this year's ISA allowance. The attractiveness of this is two fold - you don't have to pay as much tax, and possibly equally attractively you stop having to think about tax forms for CGT and tax on dividends sooner.
You can choose what you do with the money once it is in the ISA wrapper at your leisure(see discussion here https://www.pistonheads.com/gassing/topic.asp?h=0&...
It is possible (not necessarily quick, but perfectly possible to move money between ISA providers at a later date (I've done it several times) ).
iWeb will also let you open an ISA this afternoon/evening.- https://www.iweb-sharedealing.co.uk if you don't trust Hargreaves.
In either/any case, don't rush to invest it, just to get it paid in to the ISA - the only reason to hurry is to not "waste" this year's ISA allowance. The attractiveness of this is two fold - you don't have to pay as much tax, and possibly equally attractively you stop having to think about tax forms for CGT and tax on dividends sooner.
mikyman said:
Thanks for your reply.
I am the executor for my late mother and am fighting to get large sums out of the banks and NS&I.
Despite promises and confirming they have all correct paperwork they just refuse to payout.
they blame Covid but thats a poor excuse.
With regard to Hargreaves, didn't they keep advising people to put money with Woodford, even when he was in trouble.?
Having waited this long to inherit I am being very ,very cautious.
Ok, if it's not burning hole in your pocket then there's less urgency. It's true that HL have an issue with promoting certain funds & their charges can be rather high but they have a slick website which is easy to navigate.I am the executor for my late mother and am fighting to get large sums out of the banks and NS&I.
Despite promises and confirming they have all correct paperwork they just refuse to payout.
they blame Covid but thats a poor excuse.
With regard to Hargreaves, didn't they keep advising people to put money with Woodford, even when he was in trouble.?
Having waited this long to inherit I am being very ,very cautious.
One question is how much fund selection you want to do? If you are happy picking individual funds then sites like II, Fidelity, AJBell or HL are fine, you just need to look at the charges involved. If however you prefer to leave the detail to the institution then somewhere like Vanguard or IM have a smaller number of funds with varying levels or risk/return. You might like to look at the IM sticky at the top of the forum & consider talking to Nik; he can talk over all sorts of issues like tax & IHt as well & won't be trying to sell you anything.
Ah well if you haven't got the money yet there's not much you can do to open that ISA today. FWIW I was able to open an S&S ISA with First Direct fairly instantly, but then I bank with them. Normally I think you'd probably get a £40K lump sum blocked as mentioned above, which would knacker you for a day or two.
I don't use HL but you can probably just use them as a platform, rather than take advice which is a different ballgame. The cheaper the platform the less service you can expect, not unreasonably. £250K+ will get you into Fidelity 'Wealth' where for 0.2%pa you can ring somebody up and get intelligent noises.
If the banks etc have a death cert, Will and your ID they should stump up. Badger remorselessly
I don't use HL but you can probably just use them as a platform, rather than take advice which is a different ballgame. The cheaper the platform the less service you can expect, not unreasonably. £250K+ will get you into Fidelity 'Wealth' where for 0.2%pa you can ring somebody up and get intelligent noises.
If the banks etc have a death cert, Will and your ID they should stump up. Badger remorselessly
mikyman said:
I am in the fortunate position of having recently inherited a significant amount of money.
I am the executor for my late mother and am fighting to get large sums out of the banks and NS&I.
We are planning to give sums to our two grown up children and start a stocks and shares ISA for 6yr old grandson.
I am the executor for my late mother and am fighting to get large sums out of the banks and NS&I.
We are planning to give sums to our two grown up children and start a stocks and shares ISA for 6yr old grandson.
These three sentences together sound a lot of alarm bells. Who are your advisers/solicitors, if any? In the situation you've describing you really do need to get decent advice if you're not up to speed yourself.
If it's not too late it looks as though you'd be much better off varying the Will than receiving the cash and then making gifts. This could enable you to sidestep a whole world of potential future IHT (Inheritance Tax).
As regards any actual investments,
- Definitely look at ISA x2 and also pension (SIPP) x2 if possible.
- Keep the costs & charges down.
- Make sure you understand what investment risk you're going to run, and why.
- Probably avoid shares and stick to funds.
- Keep the investments well diversified.
mikyman said:
Having waited this long to inherit I am being very ,very cautious.
Do you actually know what you want to do with this money? On the one hand you seem to be very worried about who you invest with, and yet on the other hand you want a S+S ISA which carries with an amount of risk. Hargrees, Intelligent Money etc are all just platforms, all are protected by the FSCS, and are all (in terms of how safe/secure they are) much of a much-ness. Your funds will be held in client accounts, and the shares you own are yours, so really not too much to worry about. And yet on the other hand, you want to invest in a S+S ISA with (seemingly) little knowledge about what to invest in.
You might be wise to spend a little more on the platform and get some professional investment advice, depending how big this sum of money is.
mikyman said:
I am in the fortunate position of having recently inherited a significant amount of money. At our advanced stage of life wife and myself are ok financially so are not sure what is the best course of action to safeguard this extra money. We are planning to give sums to our two grown up children and start a stocks and shares ISA for 6yr old grandson.
First thing is relax and focus on the hassles of actually getting it which I know from secondhand experience can be a long slog.Then you have basic safeguards you can do, the Isa's are fine, you can put some in NS&I products, I would advocate having another main bank current account too. You need to look at the total sum and then the projection limits on accounts. In the short term then you can relax even more safe (almost) in the knowledge it's not going to get taken from you.
It's potentially unwise to do nothing with it as there are no longer any reasonable totally safe ways to get an income stream from it, but I also don't see the need to be hasty with say buying a house to rent or investing in X Y or Z. Treat yourself on top of your plans for the other generations, take the time out to discuss things you might want to do, your risk appetite etc.
Thankyou to every one for your posts and input.
A poster mentioned First Direct.I bank with them so will investigate their service,also thought A JBell seemed ok
With regards giving family 100k, i'm not bothered about redoing wills etc, i understand that i have to live for 7 years for there to be no tax liability.
This i will do my best to do.
When i finally get all money due i will put it in various deposit accounts and take time to re assess the situation.
Again thanks for all your thoughts and suggestions.
Any one who is a regulated personal finance advisor ,please feel free to contact me.
A poster mentioned First Direct.I bank with them so will investigate their service,also thought A JBell seemed ok
With regards giving family 100k, i'm not bothered about redoing wills etc, i understand that i have to live for 7 years for there to be no tax liability.
This i will do my best to do.
When i finally get all money due i will put it in various deposit accounts and take time to re assess the situation.
Again thanks for all your thoughts and suggestions.
Any one who is a regulated personal finance advisor ,please feel free to contact me.
mikyman said:
I was all set for useing Ii who sponsor this section but was surprised at the report on their poor service in Sundays Telegraph.
Not sure who li are, IM Intelligent Money sponsor this section and have been brilliant with a very personal and reactive service.Not sure of the sums involved but sounds like you need one advice. Having said that alongside the IM sticky there are loads of threads in this section.
Just don’t go Mickey Mouse or some obscure investment. Personally if not IM I would go Vanguard Life strategy.
Depending on estate size and how funds can be distributed, the safest estate holding is trust with ns&i, as you can cover up to £1mill.
After it ends up beneficiary side, ns&i pbs, lots of building society accounts up to £85,000, and start moving into ISAs ASAP so you can remove tax liability.
I still think not using advice at the executor side is a bad idea.
No one expects to die, but you’re just possibly giving HMRC £40,000 in IHT if you’re gonna gift £100k to family, vs varying the will.
That strikes me as silly. £40,000 life insurance payout to cover that for example, would cost way more than the solicitors time/advice to do it.
After it ends up beneficiary side, ns&i pbs, lots of building society accounts up to £85,000, and start moving into ISAs ASAP so you can remove tax liability.
I still think not using advice at the executor side is a bad idea.
No one expects to die, but you’re just possibly giving HMRC £40,000 in IHT if you’re gonna gift £100k to family, vs varying the will.
That strikes me as silly. £40,000 life insurance payout to cover that for example, would cost way more than the solicitors time/advice to do it.
The company that I referred to in the article is' Intelligent Investor.'
Funds have now started to be released from the various accounts that mother had and over the next few weeks I will need to have some serious discussions on its future.
How do I choose a investment company ,is there some sort of 'beauty parade' where they set out their pitch?
O r do I, like backing horses, draw up a list ,close my eyes and stick a pin in the list.
Can anyone advise me how they chose their company they have entrusted their savings to.?
Intelligent money on here seem to be offering to help, any unbiased comments please on their service.
Funds have now started to be released from the various accounts that mother had and over the next few weeks I will need to have some serious discussions on its future.
How do I choose a investment company ,is there some sort of 'beauty parade' where they set out their pitch?
O r do I, like backing horses, draw up a list ,close my eyes and stick a pin in the list.
Can anyone advise me how they chose their company they have entrusted their savings to.?
Intelligent money on here seem to be offering to help, any unbiased comments please on their service.
I set up a few accounts with A J Bell around 10 years ago. I started with little knowledge of the various platforms that were available and did a lot of research, read reviews and articles on the subject of investing in SIPPs and ISAs.
My choice basically came down to transaction charges and ongoing costs. I didn't want advice and, having enquired about HL's offering, when they started bombarding me with mailshots, newsletters etc, I ruled them out. I knew I wanted to invest in index trackers and so started small with A J Bell to see how the process worked. It was surprisingly easy to navigate their site and I gradually built up sums with each transaction until I had the spread I required. I now use their app and find it very user friendly. In fact, in all this time, I've only had to speak to them once on the phone.
My choice basically came down to transaction charges and ongoing costs. I didn't want advice and, having enquired about HL's offering, when they started bombarding me with mailshots, newsletters etc, I ruled them out. I knew I wanted to invest in index trackers and so started small with A J Bell to see how the process worked. It was surprisingly easy to navigate their site and I gradually built up sums with each transaction until I had the spread I required. I now use their app and find it very user friendly. In fact, in all this time, I've only had to speak to them once on the phone.
For what it’s worth, I signed up with Intelligent Money, from this site about 10 months ago, and I’ve been very happy with them. I have nothing but praise for the team there. I’d vouch for them in a heartbeat.
I don’t have the big bucks some will have with them - but they do seem to be upfront and clear with what they can offer and what it costs. When I looked at the likes of HL - there were so many fund choices I felt overwhelmed and layers of charges which added up.
If it were me, I’d spread my risk between institutions and accessibility- depending on the sums involved, premium bonds - they can be bought for grand children too, or simply look on Martin Lewis’s site for the best savings bank accounts currently being offered - although they’re all pretty poor at the moment.
With intelligent money I just leave it to them, I don’t have to watch the stock market daily, I don’t have to pick the companies who are likely to do well - they do the clever stuff and I just log in every so often and cheer myself up seeing it going up more than it ever would have in a regular savings account.
I don’t have the big bucks some will have with them - but they do seem to be upfront and clear with what they can offer and what it costs. When I looked at the likes of HL - there were so many fund choices I felt overwhelmed and layers of charges which added up.
If it were me, I’d spread my risk between institutions and accessibility- depending on the sums involved, premium bonds - they can be bought for grand children too, or simply look on Martin Lewis’s site for the best savings bank accounts currently being offered - although they’re all pretty poor at the moment.
With intelligent money I just leave it to them, I don’t have to watch the stock market daily, I don’t have to pick the companies who are likely to do well - they do the clever stuff and I just log in every so often and cheer myself up seeing it going up more than it ever would have in a regular savings account.
mikyman said:
The company that I referred to in the article is' Intelligent Investor.'
Funds have now started to be released from the various accounts that mother had and over the next few weeks I will need to have some serious discussions on its future.
How do I choose a investment company ,is there some sort of 'beauty parade' where they set out their pitch?
O r do I, like backing horses, draw up a list ,close my eyes and stick a pin in the list.
Can anyone advise me how they chose their company they have entrusted their savings to.?
Intelligent money on here seem to be offering to help, any unbiased comments please on their service.
Firstly - to check, you're clear on the difference between a platform/broker and a Fund/Investment Trust?Funds have now started to be released from the various accounts that mother had and over the next few weeks I will need to have some serious discussions on its future.
How do I choose a investment company ,is there some sort of 'beauty parade' where they set out their pitch?
O r do I, like backing horses, draw up a list ,close my eyes and stick a pin in the list.
Can anyone advise me how they chose their company they have entrusted their savings to.?
Intelligent money on here seem to be offering to help, any unbiased comments please on their service.
They all advertise, and there are various league tables for both. As rockin said above, minimisation of fees is important, but not at the expense of a service that doesn't do what you need/want. Roughly speaking, equities (shares) average say an 8% return. Losing say 2% a year in fees (split between platform, financial adviser and fund manager) is a significant part of hoped for return, you'd want to have a reason to pay it.
You may find https://www.flipsnack.com/langcat/the-lang-cat-gui... useful - it gives a summary of costs for platforms with different scenarios (size of account and if you want to make regular investments or not).
Generally the goal is to work out if your requirements are most economically met by a fixed fee structure, or a % fee structure, and then work out what level of frills (fancy web site, possibly more informed staff, perhaps you want investment advice) you are prepared/need to pay for. Once you've made a decision, check that your expectations of fees match what the firm is currently doing.
For example, I trade very infrequently, have a significant but not huge portfolio and I'm very tightfisted, so I use iWeb as I'm not that concerned about paying for a pretty web site or hand holding and am not interested in a phone app., Their fee structure is based around charging £5/trade - I pay perhaps £50 a year total as the fee for ~10 trades.
Something you'll need to think about when you consider what assets to buy is risk appetite. Everyone wants a "safe" investment with great returns. They don't exist.
There are (to me at least) two significant kinds of risk.
Firstly losing all your money. I mitigate this by tending to pick collective investments (either funds/OEICs or Investment Trusts) which contain several (typically a minimum of 30) companies. If one of those firms goes bust, you've lost say 3% of your investment, which isn't the end of the world. Typically these collective investments have a web site, which explains their goals, how they're trying to achieve them, and what they currently hold.
Partly depending if the management approach is active (e.g. https://www.fundsmith.co.uk/fund-factsheet,https://www.bailliegifford.com/en/uk/individual-in... or passive (e.g. https://investor.vanguard.com/mutual-funds/lifestr... they can charge a fee between perhaps 1.5% and 0.1%. Don't think that a larger fee automatically means better performance. Note how the actively managed funds have flashier web sites - they're trying to sell you something - it's a very nuanced debate as to if it is sensible to buy it.
The second risk (and the one that seems to be associated with the term more often by finance professionals) is volatility - for example does the investment typically increase in value by say 4(+/-3)%/year over the past 5 years, or if I look at the figures it is down 20% one year, up 40% the next, up 15% the next and then down 5%, that kind of thing.
The longer your investment horizon (and a good rule of thumb is that if you want the money in 3 years or less don't invest it at all), the less of an issue the second kind of volatility is - there's more time for the figure to average out, and if the average is higher than the figure a less volatile investment would give, then that may be attractive to you. If on the other hand that initial 20% loss would see you pull the money out in terror then you've crystallised that loss - you'd have been better off starting with the less volatile investment in the first place. Know yourself.
mikyman said:
Any one who is a regulated personal finance advisor ,please feel free to contact me.
Yep, given you have a significant amount involved, I would suggest this path for the legal protection. For any meetings, first check with any advisor / any firm you use as to whether they are regulated to provide financial advice (or just guidance which is not regulated). Why you may ask? If for any reasons you were given unsuitable regulated financial advice and say you incurred a financial loss 5 years down the line from this duff advice, you have legal protection against the advisor / firm i. e. Escalate with financial ombudsmen, sue the advisor etc.. . If you received guidance (non regulated), your legal protection is much reduced as you are deemed to have decided on the products / investment yourself. mikyman said:
The company that I referred to in the article is' Intelligent Investor.'
Funds have now started to be released from the various accounts that mother had and over the next few weeks I will need to have some serious discussions on its future.
How do I choose a investment company ,is there some sort of 'beauty parade' where they set out their pitch?
O r do I, like backing horses, draw up a list ,close my eyes and stick a pin in the list.
Can anyone advise me how they chose their company they have entrusted their savings to.?
Intelligent money on here seem to be offering to help, any unbiased comments please on their service.
I think we need to be clear that PH Finance sponsor "Intelligent Money" is not "intelligent investor", whoever they are.Funds have now started to be released from the various accounts that mother had and over the next few weeks I will need to have some serious discussions on its future.
How do I choose a investment company ,is there some sort of 'beauty parade' where they set out their pitch?
O r do I, like backing horses, draw up a list ,close my eyes and stick a pin in the list.
Can anyone advise me how they chose their company they have entrusted their savings to.?
Intelligent money on here seem to be offering to help, any unbiased comments please on their service.
It's unfair to say that IM were slated by the Telegraph when it's a different company.
I've been an IM customer for the best part of a year (pensions, ISAs) and they've been nothing short of fantastic.
I don't think you would get better service anywhere because I don't know how much more anyone could do in terms of customer service.
As an example, the CEO (Julian) sent me an email personally on a Saturday afternoon, just to help clear up a minor query about something I didn't understand properly, which could have easily waited until the week after.
The responses are always timely from the various functions and they do what they say they'll do when they say they'll do it. They've always acted upon my requests swiftly and with good communication.
The only thing I need to think about myself is which funds to invest in (IM are not IFAs) which has taken some thought recently given that the brilliant performance of the PHR fund in particular has resulted in some hefty profits to reinvest.
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