What is the best way to invest ?

drive007

Hi everyone.

I have £100k to invest over a period of about 15 years.
I want to use it towards my retirement.
This money is currently sat in building societies in my non tax paying wifes name, and the remainder in mine.
My wife and I both have a isa each.
The question is can I do anything to get a better return over the 15 year period, to exceed the building society rate, without risking the capital.
Can anyone also please tell me the advantage, if any, of using offshore accounts, and what sort of rate of return to expect from these.

Many Thanks to you all

deemy2004

Are you a higher rate tax payer ?

If so you can get 2% interest + 5% tax relief which equates to a return of more than 8%, Basic rates would equate to about 6%.

See tridos.co.uk community investor account.

dunstonh

dont rule out pensions. The tax relief on the contributions and potential increase in tax credits (if you have children) can make these very attractive.

cheerfulcat

Hi, there,

£100,000 kept in a building society account over 15 years is not going to make you an awful lot of money - in fact, it will keep you barely ahead of inflation. If you have other sources of retirement income that may be ok, but if you are relying on this to increase your income to a comfortable level, you really need to consider putting at least some of it into shares. BTW, the risk with investing in the stock market is not so much that of losing all your money ( unless you are speculating ), as that the investment tends to be volatile; some people can't bear the sight of their capital fluctuating in value! But over a 15 year span this should not pose a problem.

Have a look at the High Yield Portfolio board on the Motley Fool site. The HYP approach involves investing money in high-yield shares and reinvesting the dividends. It is a reasonably safe approach to investing.

The High Yield Portfolio explained ( RH side )

http://www.fool.co.uk/valuehome.htm

and the discussion board -

http://boards.fool.co.uk/Messages.asp?mid=9031974&bid=51166

If you are too busy/not interested enough to invest directly in shares, consider a FTSE all-share tracker. This is not ideal, but it is a cheap and easy way to get some stock market exposure, and should still return more than a building society account.

HTH

Cheerfulcat