Lifetime ISAs are only available to people between the ages of 18 and 40. Unlike standard ISAs, LISAs come with a HMRC top-up. If you invest £4,000, the tax man will add £1,000 to it. So, the limit is £5,000 and this uses up part of the annual ISA annual allowance of £20,000. It is […]
Should I Buy My Adult Child a Lifetime ISA? Read More »
The state pension is rapidly becoming a very nice bedrock income for retirement (we dealt with the issues here). On track to be £12,000 per year, a married couple can enjoy £2,000 per month of untaxed income before needing to dip in to any other capital resources. It is not a base income we would
The Best Investment You Can Make – State Pension Top-Ups Read More »
Financial Planning just became a lot harder from April 2027. Prior to that date (and since April 2015) pensions are still exempt from IHT. This means that we have been able to work with clients’ non-pension assets to provide them with tax efficient capital withdrawals to fund their lifestyle. The aim was to spend that
Planning Needs to Get More Precise Read More »
Most mornings I drive my daughter to the train station near to our office, to catch the train to school. We have a habit of listening to Capital Radio and our 10-minute commute lines up nicely with the breakfast show’s Bong Game. The concept is simple, a man reads out a rising series of numbers
The Power of Regret Read More »
My family carry a genetic timebomb called Christmas Disease. Whoever named this particular disease had a black sense of humour because it sounds like the best of diseases to have but the reality is brutal *1. Sufferers lack Factor 9 in their blood which is the lesser-known clotting agent sister, to the more commonly known
One of my godsons recently turned 21. Time had come to give him the cash that we had been saving for him since he was a baby and we first met him. I am sure he was happy with the results which came from diligently setting aside cash of £50 every birthday. He is turning
Gift When They Are Young Read More »
Now that the dust has settled on Rachel Reeves first budget, we thought some guidance about what actions to take might be more helpful than just a summary of the changes. This blog post won’t cover all of the changes, there are plenty out there that do that. We will try to cover the direction of
Post Budget What do I need to do? Read More »
The third quarter of 2024 was more volatile than the first half of the year, as investors tried to make sense of conflicting economic data, central bank messaging and the deteriorating situation in the Middle East.
Q3 Investment Update – Burn After Reading Read More »
We have a lot of clients that need their cash proactively managed. Most advice firms won’t do this as it doesn’t pay the adviser to actively manage cash. Instead they will try to persuade their clients to invest all of their cash above an emergency reserve. In reality people can have multiple reasons why they
How Do You Manage Your Cash? Read More »
For decades the state pension was allowed to fall in real terms to such an extent that the UK had a real problem with pensioner poverty. Now as we head into 2025, the basic state pension is due to rise to £11,963 which is a huge increase. So much so that 340,000 pensioners will now
State Pension = Extra Work Read More »
