Vanguard Life Strategy

black_taxi_2

stock/shares isa (100%)

Vanguard Life Strategy 60% Equity GBP Accumulation
Bonds(36.2%)
Equity(53.8%)
BlackRock Global Property Secs. Eq. Tracker Class A
Accumulation(5%)
Vanguard Global Small-Cap Index Offshore GBP Accumulation(5%)

Sanoffo

I dropped 15k in the 80% Accum earlier this year and it is finally in the positive. Yay.

Can anyone explain how dividends work and what sort of dividend you can expect from one of these funds? Never understood these.

black_taxi_2

its in the price H-L

A_Flock_Of_Sheep

Sanoffo wrote: »

I dropped 15k in the 80% Accum earlier this year and it is finally in the positive. Yay.

Can anyone explain how dividends work and what sort of dividend you can expect from one of these funds? Never understood these.

It's in the price but on the Life Strategy products it's barely worth asking about. Like 1.2% or something.

Sanoffo

Oh, the "HL Annual saving"?

It's 0.00% - awesome.

thechief1979

Hi,

We are expecting our first child this January and would like to start saving a little each month for the University fees in 18 years time!

i'm looking into the vanguard Life Strategy 80 as this seems a good low cost option but, as money is sure to be tight with a new mouth to feed, i'm a little put off by the minimum £50 p.m. required.

The only fund I can find with lower monthly payments (looking at a SO of around £25 p.m. ideally) is the Virgin FTSE 100 All-tracker however I've read that this is one of the more expensive to manage so would my investment be eaten away with the charges?

so I guess my question is, are we better off finding the £50 for VLS or paying the fat cats at Virgin, or even something totally different? i'm a noob at all this so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

many thanks

black_taxi_2

u could put £25 into a saving account an buy lump sums

JohnRo

thechief1979 wrote: »

Hi,

We are expecting our first child this January and would like to start saving a little each month for the University fees in 18 years time!

i'm looking into the vanguard Life Strategy 80 as this seems a good low cost option but, as money is sure to be tight with a new mouth to feed, i'm a little put off by the minimum £50 p.m. required.

The only fund I can find with lower monthly payments (looking at a SO of around £25 p.m. ideally) is the Virgin FTSE 100 All-tracker however I've read that this is one of the more expensive to manage so would my investment be eaten away with the charges?

so I guess my question is, are we better off finding the £50 for VLS or paying the fat cats at Virgin, or even something totally different? i'm a noob at all this so any advice would be greatly appreciated.

many thanks

Fees and costs are everything on an index tracker. You need to do everything possible to ensure they are and will remain as small as possible.

If you've got the self discipline and won't be tempted to just dib in now and again, then just open a savings account with money specifically for investment and to be used for that alone, let it build up until it hits £50+ and then purchase a chunk of your chosen VLS.

Charles Stanley (minimum £50 purchase) is currently cheapest, afaik, for single fund smaller sums up to £800 if you really wanted to try screwing every last penny out of the process, they're also set up and ready for post-RDR where the problem still exists with a few of the currently cheaper platforms for slightly larger sums that they haven't yet declared their post-RDR pricing.

Jevvers

I have had a FTSE All Share tracker for 12 years, which I have been drip-feeding monthly. It's to pay off an interest-free mortgage in 12 years' time. I realise I should diversify for safety's sake (and hopefully growth!) so am interested in VLS. However because I already have a large amount in the FTSE would a VLS not be suitable as I will be gaining further FTSE exposure?

bowlhead99

Wondering if you mean "interest only", rather than "interest free"

At the moment you have 100% in UK all-share. The VLS 100% (if you want to stay equities only, they do have options with different proportions of bonds in them) is only 35% in UK all-share.

If you have 50k in your existing UK all-share and then add 50k of VLS, you will have total 50k+17.5k in UK all-share. So, total 67.5% of your new larger 100k pot, in UK. The UK exposure has been reduced.

Alternatively, just exit the existing UK tracker and buy the VLS and keep feeding the VLS going forwards instead of the UK - then you'll just have 35% in the UK which is enough for many people. If you've realised the UK tracker is not suitable and are trying to re-plan your portfolio, you don't have to think "hmm what do I need to add to the UK tracker to make it diversified". Just kick the UK tracker out and start from scratch.

Of course, as it's a UK house you're buying, perhaps it's fine to have a larger % in the UK whether equities or bonds. Though a massive proportion of FTSE all-share is FTSE100, which is quite an international-facing set of shares anyway and you might like to tweak it by having a FTSE 250 tracker or some small-cap fund to make it a bit more 'domestic' UK.