Worth seeing an IFA?

dunstonh

anyway, you think the police monitor this site for back alley financial advisors?

The FSA do employ staff to monitor websites and the regulator has taken action (albeit advisory) on internet discussions in the past.

fairleads

jamesd wrote: »

I have used:

1. Living well below my means, investing more than 60% of my net income plus gross pension contributions. A very unusually high level of financial commitment, and a sufficiently high income to be able to do it and still live.
2. ISAs.
3. Pensions.
4. Investing outside any tax wrapper.
5. Borrowing from credit cards to invest. Balance transfer fees in the thousands would discourage many people. This borrowing was only possible because I had previously paid attention to my credit rating and worked on building it up.
6. Timing. I started learning far enough in advance of the events of 2008 and 2009 to know how to exploit them. Only a couple or three years but that was enough.
7. A high risk tolerance.
8. A minimum income target that is well below what many people would like, but which is sufficient to live comfortably, still well above benefit levels.
9. Knowing that investment returns make investing the cheaper way to repay a mortgage and using that knowledge. Then knowing that pensions make that even more efficient and acting on that as well. Pairing this with an appropriate risk tolerance to exploit it.

These approaches aren't for everyone. It's an unusually high degree of commitment, fortunate market timing, and a willingness to take risk to exploit that good fortune of doing a lot of investing during a market bust.

A key factor was starting to learn about investing far enough in advance of the events of 2008 and 2009 to be able to use that knowledge to act during those years. Learning about investing is a good move for anyone who has a defined contribution pension in their life. And that's just about everyone outside the public sector who works and many within it.

I've been far from perfect but perfection isn't required, just good enough.

Pass the salt

fairleads

jamesd wrote: »

See post 10, where I used 0.5% trail commission, not a fee, and 26, 27, 30, 34.

Lets ignore for the moment FSA monitoring and libel per se and go back to basics of polite discussion: saying that someone is breaking the law and what a person who did so unintentionally should do when they find out that they did so. I don't know about you, but my inclination is to promptly recant and apologise if I was to discover I'd done that.

It's no problem at all initially to think that I was an IFA and could legally charge a fee, but once that misunderstanding is corrected and the person is aware that it was a suggestion of illegality the appropriate action seems clear enough.

Spade, hole, deeper

fairleads

Lokolo wrote: »

You'd be surprised at who monitors these forums. Bank staff have been sacked for contributing on this forum.

Probably because they've been doing it in company time.

browniej

jamesd wrote: »

It's no problem at all initially to think that I was an IFA and could legally charge a fee, but once that misunderstanding is corrected and the person is aware that it was a suggestion of illegality the appropriate action seems clear enough.

Have to agree with you james. Fairleads thought you were an IFA. I have seen him make a similar "misunderstanding" with another poster in the pension board.

jamesd

Yes, and the same approach to discussions. My posts to the person and discussing their actions were not useful to davidmt83 so I've now deleted all of my related posts in this topic except this one. Sorry for the disruption to the past post IDs.

gadgetmind

fairleads wrote: »

Believe jd's stated investment period was around 4 years

Well, the years since late 2008 have been very favourable. I "went shopping" at about this time, via both ISAs and unwrapped investments, and other than a constant CGT problem, life is good!

gadgetmind

jamesd wrote: »

investing more than 60% of my net income plus gross pension contributions. A very unusually high level of financial commitment

This is also roughly my approach, but ...

Borrowing from credit cards to invest.

I *don't* do this, never have, never will. Gearing to invest is high-risk and I even avoid ITs that use what I regard as being too much gearing.

I have only recommended (not "advised", can't use that word here!) borrowing to invest in one scenario and that's to invest in a company sharesave scheme,

jamesd

Yes, gearing increases risk. For me it was OK and within my risk tolerance but it's definitely not for everyone. It did add a nice bit to my gains and might again. Not sure if I'll use it again this year or not. Don't seem to be at the point of peak fear yet anyway. Refrained last year because the opportunities weren't sufficiently one-sided to make the risk balance look good.

fairleads

jamesd wrote: »

Yes, gearing increases risk. For me it was OK and within my risk tolerance but it's definitely not for everyone. It did add a nice bit to my gains and might again. Not sure if I'll use it again this year or not. Don't seem to be at the point of peak fear yet anyway. Refrained last year because the opportunities weren't sufficiently one-sided to make the risk balance look good.

Nice one Jd - rather wait until the benefits of hindsight are apparent and then post date the prediction as per your previous missive, the one I took with a pinch of salt.