Professional IFA HELP needed for £80,000

EdInvestor

Hi again JG

Jake'sGran wrote:

EdInvestor wrote:

I was reading about Smaller Companies funds recently and believe that the Artemis one I have is not performing well so I am at present looking for an alternative.

Quick look at the Citywire lists suggests Marlborough Special Situations and Merrill Lynch UK Smaller Caps are worth a look.

I believe I lost out by not investing in commercial property but don't think it's a "way to go" now. What do you think?

I'm a fan, have had a number of different funds/ITs for some years. The performance has been excellent, but I'll be unsurporised if there isn't a quite period now due: not least because the yelds are getting to low for what are basically income investments.

The funds that invest in overseas property may be worth a look - but are higher risk than the Uk bricks and mortar ones.

EdInvestor

jamesd wrote:

EdInvestor, could I possibly tempt you to put together a HYP comparison fund selection using the fund leaderboards at the time one of the HYPs started, with fees and asset reallocation taken into account?

Have a look at some of the better performers in the UK Equity Income funds sector. Of course yields will be much lower reflecting the charges, which kind of misses the point when what you are interested in is the income.

Very little if any asset reallocation is required, thus charges are frequently in the order of 0.1% or even less after the first year.

dunstonh

2-8% is the 2007 anticipated return. However, they said the same back in 2005 about 2006. Its coming but its just a case of when.

EdInvestor

prudryden wrote:

Commercial property is the way to go. With the new UK REITS and Germany's REITS coming soon - there will so much money looking for a home, prices will go thru the roof.

Not sure UK REITS will make much difference - IMHO most investors have bought in over the past couple of years already, my Land Secs shares went up nearly 200% over the period

IFAs won't flog REITs because they are basically investment trusts which don't pay any commission.

Maybe if someone constructs a REITs fund.....

dunstonh

no maybe about it. REIT funds already exist and more to come. It is expected that reit funds will be the most common retail method.

rory41444

prudryden wrote:

Difficult to believe. IFA'S always always always hedge themselves by recommending asset allocation among 20 or 30 different markets. If one goes down, the other goes up, therefore, your portfolio generally stays range bound and you can't complain about losing money.

Aberdeen Tech Fund, Invesco Japan Smaller Cos. Fund, Duncan Lawrie Smaller Cos. Fund, Hendersons Global Tech Fund, HSBC Footsie Tracker - all lost big time and all advised by my so called IFA. Only consolation was I wasn't alone. Once bitten, twice shy!

wongseefu

WOW that is a pretty risky portfolio full of investing into alot of tech companies.

Sorry to hear that....

REgards,

See Fu

dunstonh

or it sounds like someone that said they were high risk, got what they said and it didnt pay off and now blames the IFA. A spread like that would result in an upheld complaint unless the risk profile documentation pointed to such high risk.

Two of those funds are in surplus had you invested 5 years ago. Two are tech stocks and the other isnt showing up on Lipper on a quick search. You cant have lost all your money. The fund spread is poor as there is no asset allocation and it seems a bit random.

Chrismaths

Ouch, that's dreadful. I assume that IFA is now recommending commodities and property funds...

EdInvestor

prudryden wrote:

Quite often, you can buy an Investment Trust that has a similar portfolio to a fund at a substantial discount to its NAV.

I have a few of them too, but they have been trading at a small premium for the last few years because of the huge global demand for yield (which ain't gonna get any smaller when you think of all those babyboomers coming up to retirement, combined with the recent disappointments and apparent increased risk in the bond market).

This "wall of money" factor could be the thing that causes commercial property values to continue to increase, though they do need a breather - much as the wall of money into BTL has propped up the bottom end of the residential property market in recent years.

There's no doubt the last 10 years have been "interesting times" with a lot of unexpected winners and losers emerging from a major change in economic and financial fundamentals.