Neil Hopcroft

A digital misfit

I’ve been pondering trying to consolidate my pension provision (I have about five little pensions, each representing something around two years of contributions, none of which are really worth anything on their own), so I’m trying to figure out what I should do…I’m tempted by the concept of SIPP, but I don’t think the pot is big enough yet, but what about everyone else? What are your plans? What do you think I should do? [0]

[0] investments, like yoyos, can go up as well as down…etc,etc, I know the score.


Categories: Memories.

/ 8 Comments

8 comments

  1. digitaljunky

    Go for a high interest savings plan (look overseas for better deals, but make sure you know the risks), then wait four years for property prices to hit another low, then invest in bricks and mortar*

    *usual disclaimers apply.

    Reply
    • neilh

      Clearly now isn’t a good time for property….and I’m not sure I’m liquid enough to be able to move that way right now, but certainly its a possibility once the crash has happened…

      Reply
  2. crazyscot

    Wasn’t sure whether to tick SIPP or personal, but I’m putting in 3% from my salary on top of work’s 6%. Standard pension scheme blah blah, with luck by the time I retire the stock market might actually have grown appreciably, but they’re definitely not a short-term investment vehicle.

    I’d suggest that consolidating your current pension provision is probably worthwhile for the sake of reduced hassle.

    Reply
    • neilh

      Is that SIPP, AVC, group-personal or company? Theres a whole bunch of different ways that can go, I’d not realised quite what AVC meant before investigating this time around and I think I’m glad I never made such contributions.

      Of course, I’m opted out of SERPS too, which is another scheme, tied to one of my personal plans.

      Consolidation is probably a good idea, except that I’ll probably fold them all down to two funds, since one has considerable non-protected rights but will also take quite a share off anything transferred in. Just wondering if I can scrape together enough to make a SIPP the right way to go.

      Reply
      • crazyscot

        Group-personal, organised by the company, and entirely voluntary and additional to the 6% they put in regardless, although it’s being invested along the same proportions as the company contribution.

        That reminds me, must pester our pensions guy; he was going to get me the SERPS-out paperwork but has so far failed to do so.

        Reply
  3. neilh

    Sure, I’m a little worried about where the economy is heading, and always have been, but that doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t think about what happens in my future. Indeed, at some level, buying out of consumerism early is going to get you closer to where you need to be when the whole thing pops. I’m currently weening myself off the lifestyle I got used to when I moved to Oxford, thats been a long process but worthwhile, I think. Ditching the gogglebox helps.

    Reply
    • neilh

      Self Invested Pension Plan.

      Basically its a way for you to take control of the investments made by your pension plan. It means you can do things like buying commercial property or derivatives, or whatever floats your boat (or indeed the boat itself). If you think you can do better than a fund manager (and most reasonably sophisticated investors can, its not that hard) this is the kind of thing you want.

      The downside is that they’re not cheap to run, at around 500 a year, so you’ve got to be doing that much better than a fund manager to make it worthwhile. Which’ll be kinda difficult to do with a pot of 10k, that much easier with 100k.

      Of course, there might be some other upside (beyond wresting back control from the financial system), since I’m now running a (small) company which could rent a commercial premises from the pension fund that could easily be a good way to increase the growth of the fund with rent that can be offset against profit for tax purposes. But I’ll need some advice on exactly how to go about that.

      Reply

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