Vanguard Life Strategy

Dav1970

Good morning everyone,


This is my first ever post regarding investing, so please be soft and gentle, kidding, give it to me the hard way, best way to learn I feel.

Actually, I'm not sure whether I should have started a new thread...



Anyway a little background, my other-half (not married) and I are both in our mid-forties, both working and renting (super low rent that is why we are renting).

We have no pension plans but a fair amount of savings. We have approx. £600.000 in Bonds and 50.000 cash in a super high interest account with Aldermore, kidding, the rate is poor but better than nothing.



We would like to invest £200.000 of our £600.000 pot into stocks and shares for the long term (20 to 30 years).



Apart from the research I have been doing (including the 60 odd pages of this thread) and read “The Intelligent Investor - Benjamin Graham” we do not have much knowledge of the Stock market and no interest in it either, so would make us passive investors. I feel, following the book’s advice, that index funds are the way to go for our situation.



They are so many Index funds to choose from that I am a little lost as to which one should I choose. From looking around it seems as if VanguardLS would be a good contender, well this one or another I thought no particular reason only that I read good things about it.


Since we should still be earning for the next 15 to 20 years or so we’d be quite willing to take some mild risks. Well by that I mean to go for the VLS 100% equity for myself and 80% for my other-half. One point which is not properly understood is: If we already have £400.000 in bonds is it pointless to also have a bond part in our VLS, or is it different?


I feel that a good strategy would be to drip feed over the course of one or two years the total (£100.000 each), so that would mean either £16.666 each going in every month if we chose the one year approach or £8333 each going in every month over a 2 years period, I could perhaps make my payments every 1st and my other-half's every 15th of the month to vary the chances?



We are thinking of taking the ACC version of the fund but then again we feel that perhaps we should make the most of the Capital gain allowance and go for the INC version but not too sure on this option at this stage!?


We were thinking of going with [FONT=&quot]Hargreaves[/FONT] Lansdown's as we already have our annual ISA/shares allowance with them (into the VLS 100% and 80%) but I read that they might be some more interesting choices for such an amount, but since we want to drip-feed the options are not as plentiful as if we were buying in one go, like the likes of IWeb, but please, please correct me if I’m wrong.



Anecdote or not: As I was talking to [FONT=&quot]Hargreaves[/FONT] Lansdown's about the possibility of drip feeding £200.000 over the case of a year or two they proposed to leave the full balance with them ? But why would I do that if I can set up a direct debit and have the rest of the money in a saving account or even a 6 month or 1 year bond in the meanwhile? I know they are a business but I would have thought that such an obvious thing would have been revealed by HL. (reading myself I do not seem to have put my point across very well), so in a nutshell, why would I leave my money with HL not earning anything while waiting to be dripped fed if I can make some kind of return by just sitting in a bank account??? Am I missing something???


So this is where we are at.



Any opinion, criticism is welcome.


Thank you for reading,


Dav1970

le_loup

Yes. Put it in a new thread and delete this post.

Dav1970

Somewhere in this thread, someone was advising not to get into properties to rent because and because but can not find the post anywhere.

He/she was listing all the disadvantages and hassle of renting...

Is there any way to search in a thread?

ktk

Click the forum search, then go to advanced search.

Dav1970

ktk wrote: »

Click the forum search, then go to advanced search.

Thanks but it does not let you search within a particular thread though!

Or am I missing something???

ColdIron

Dav1970 wrote: »

Thanks but it does not let you search within a particular thread though!

Or am I missing something???

It does if you use the Search this Thread link

takesyourchances

Hope everyone is getting on well with their investing

After the tax year starting and a few lump sums I am back to drip feeding with the aim of raising my VLS 60% core to 70%, at present around another 9% to go to get there so that should be reached in the next few months.

With my side funds, there has been a bit of pulling back in my First State Asia Pacific Leaders and First State Emerging markets funds and a drop off in my Standard Life Global Smaller Companies fund, that was sitting on a steady 15% gain for a while and has now revered back to nearly 0%. I will carry on my drip feeding as normal.

So I am seeing how the markets are pulling back and forth in various directions with my First State Asian Pacific leaders pulling back from around a -9% loss to now +3% gain.

I am comfortable with these market movements and have been drip feeding during drops etc and see the very long term approach nearly a year and a half into my S&S ISA.

It has been interesting with the VLS 60% core and the 6 satellite funds adding various tilts.

Just a bit of an update on things

guitarman001

Bump (so I can read this later)

guitarman001

Just spent 3 hours poring over ETFs, ITs, funds...
There's just SO much out there, it is absolutely overwhelming.

Other than the fact that the annual management fee with Hargreaves is capped at £45 if you trade only ETFs, why buy an ETF over the same fund? They're basically the same thing but with different costs, right?

ITs... I keep hearing that these are great and a well-kept secret... but they look more expensive than my Vanguard fund and I'd be slightly wary of the gearing used. Basically, I don't know enough about them yet. And even if I did, would find it hard to pick one over another.

Now I remember why I chose Vanguard Lifestyle 100% acc... simply buy, tuck it away and forget about it - easy to understand and low costs (other than Hargreaves' new %age charge per annum). In addition to this I have some Rolls Royce, and do place the odd spread-bet (£1 at a time - more chance making a tenner out of this than the lottery).

I will have ~£10-15k to put into my ISA in July and I want to use it wisely. I feel I should buy things other than the Vanguard fund I'm in, but what? It's pretty-well diversified as-is, and relatively cheap. If I had a LOT of cash I'd be tempted to get the ETF instead due to the lower charges at Hargreaves, but that isn't a major factor right now. I feel I should keep reading up on investment trusts.

Information overload! EDIT: I found this good article:
http://monevator.com/low-cost-index-trackers/

How many of you invest in a SIPP as opposed to just an ISA? I'm 29 and have considered it - the tax savings would be large for me, but I don't know when I would need the money.

The charges on some of the new trackers are REALLY low, like 0.09%.... even bettering Vanguard's range!

gadgetmind

I put as much as I can into a SIPP, as much as I can after that into ISAs, and have some unwrapped holdings too.

If you get the tax savings, and can leave the money untouched until age 55, then use a SIPP.