At 30 yrs, am I too late to start a pension?

Useless_but_trying!

Hi. Im 30 and to my embarrassment have done nothing to date to think about any retirement planning. Is it too late to go for a pension? Perhaps there is a different kind of savings plan I should go for? My husband has this thing about pensions, saying that they arent worth doing (he was scared off them by someone years ago). Anyway, one way or another, Im sure we should be doing something but I dont know what. Any help or advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks. Janet x

dunstonh

You are never too late to start saving.

Everything you save will be there for you to spend when you are older. If you dont save, you wont be able to spend it.

My husband has this thing about pensions, saying that they arent worth doing (he was scared off them by someone years ago).

For some people he would be right, for others he wouldnt be. Where he is right, it is probably for the wrong reason. A lot of people have been put off by the media or the stockmarket crash which hit returns for some people. However, the media issues relate to one particular type of pension which most people are not in and the stockmarket crash is just a short term event which in the long term is a great opportunity for investors.

The most common mistake is for people to say pensions are rubbish and that they started an ISA and thats made a load more. What they dont realise is that pensions and ISAs invest in exactly the same areas and have exactly the same funds. However, pension went through stockmarket crash and ISA started after.

Anyway, before i go really off topic, yes you should start investing for retirement and the two most common methods are pensions and ISAs. Which is best depends on your circumstances and both have pros and cons (often a combination is best as discussed in recent threads over the last month or two... or more). Remember, by saving/investing for your retirement, only you will gain from this. By not doing it, only you will lose out.

EdInvestor

Start by getting a state pension forecast which will tell you how much you should get from the 2 state pensions.

Then if you're basic rate taxpayer open a maxi ISA (7k a year) and invest it in good quality funds.

It usually best to open the ISA with a discount broker, eg Squaregain, Hargreaves Landsdown, Chartwell which will rebate the charges on the funds when you invest in them and offer a good selection of the best ones.

Cutting charges is just as importnat as finding quality funds to invest in these days.

annie-c

Hello 'Trying'

(It seems rude to shorten your username to 'Useless'...)

I am not an expert but am someone who started my pension fund at about 25, a few years later than i could have.

My personal advice is don't waste any more time! 30 isn't too old and actually, given the likelihood that many of us now in our 30s are likely to be working until at least 65 and possibly beyond, you have actually got a significant time ahead of you to be making savings towards your future.

The fact is that these days people are living much longer than ever before and so the period of time that they are alive and drawing a pension is getting longer - and therefore more costly to the government. The government is wrestling right now with ideas about how to cope with us all in our old age, and that is why we are getting bombarded with warnings and encouragement to start making preparation for our retirement, if we want to get more than a basic state pension at the end of our working lives.

If you retire at 65 and live another 20 years, then that's a long time to be scratching around for pennies to buy basics like food and clothing, and in my opinion, a sad waste of what could potentially be the free-est, most fulfilling time of your life in terms of the way you'll have developed as a person and the life-experience and time that you may want to put into leisure and other pursuits.

No disrespect to this site, but I don't want to be scratching around here in 30years' time, for tips on how to eak out my old age pension - in an ideal scenario I want to be travelling the world and having the time of my life; at the very least I want to be able to afford a comfortable home and a healthy lifestyle - which is why I am here now, learning as much as I can while I still have an opportunity to take control over my future.


There -that's my two pennorth.. I'll leave the rest to the financial experts.

All the best

Annie