Best fund to invest in @ £50 a month?

EagerLearner

Thanks, a bit confused but will have a look at Hargreaves and see what's available. Initially I want to go for the safest thing and then see how things go after a year or so.

nrsql

From Fidelity web site

To start saving monthly outside an ISA, simply make your choice from the options listed below, then print and post the completed application form to the address detailed on the document. You can start from £50 per month for each fund.

To buy a monthly savings ISA, please select the link below and complete the resulting online application form. The final step is to print and post the form to the address detailed on the document.

You can start from £50 per month for each fund. You can choose from any of the funds on FundsNetwork.

Maybe the £20 is for their own funds not via fundsnetwork. Not sure that they have many decent funds apart from the tracker now.

Note fo rthis amount it's not necessary to do it in an ISA but you may as well if there's no reason not to.

SeanW

There is another page somewhere that states £20, I asked them why they have conflicting information and was told that if you apply online they allow £20 by direct debit.

If you also go down the route of applying online, the page where you choose funds states at the top £20 minimum.

EagerLearner

I have found the Fidelity page - it's at:

http://www.fidelity.co.uk/direct/buy/isa/monthly.html

So is this the best £50 a month option, or can anyone direct me to links for others?

I have a cash ISA with First Direct, but presume this £50 a month option will be part of maxi-isa?

SeanW

Hargreaves Lansdown are best: https://www.h-l.co.uk

dunstonh

nrsql wrote: »

>> Are you sure it was fund of funds and not manager of manager funds they were talking about?
Don't think so - by manager of manager funds I assume you mean funds managed by the same company? Edit - dang, you have me doubting my memory now. I included a comment about it in a reasearch doc, I'll have to see if I can find it again. I vaguely remember having to do a bit of digging to find what they were talking about.

Anyway it's all a matter of opinion.
(As to the risk - there are a lot of different types of risk and some people think that high risk is good over the long term as the up's will be larger in comparison to the down's. Just looking at risk ratings isn't very useful unless you understand how that risk is calculated or to what it refers)

I am almost positive you mean manager of manager funds (or multi-manager). There has been a lot of coverage on those not beating any benchmarks in general and costing more.

Fund of funds havent had any bad coverage and have much lower TERs. After all its hard to criticise a FoF that invests 20 or so funds such as Inv Perp High Income, Artemis Income etc

I have found the Fidelity page - it's at:

http://www.fidelity.co.uk/direct/buy/isa/monthly.html

So is this the best £50 a month option, or can anyone direct me to links for others?

You may as well use an IFA is you are going to do that as it will charge you on the same basis.

I have a cash ISA with First Direct, but presume this £50 a month option will be part of maxi-isa?

No, it will be a mini ISA as well. You cannot contribute to a cash mini ISA and a MAXI ISA in the same tax year. Plus, if you arent going to exceed £4000 a year then you shouldnt go MAXI.

Initially I want to go for the safest thing and then see how things go after a year or so.

You certainly dont want a tracker then. Trackers are medium/high risk. They lost 40% in the last crash. You comments suggest something in the cautious end of the scale. I really do think a cautious fund of funds should be your first point of call.

nrsql

Be careful about cautious fund of funds. They may have a large proprtion held as cash and your cash ISA will probably be doing better than that so there's no point.

>> You certainly dont want a tracker then. Trackers are medium/high risk. They lost 40% in the last crash.

That's a bit simplistic. You need to look at your aims. Losing 40% is not a problem if it recovers before you want to realise gains/losses - with a regular saving it could be a good thing. If you look a t product with steady growth versus one that loses 40% then recovers to the same point by steady growth you will do a lot better with the supposedly more risky product.
Have a look at the fund performances on
http://www.citywire.co.uk/Funds/Home.aspx
Trackers tend to come slightly higher than the middle over the short term, over longer terms do much better even when a market downturn is included.

If a temporary loss would be a problem then probably you shouldn't be considering the market.

Here's the h-l isa faqs
http://www.h-l.co.uk/our_services/isa_faq.hl
and the application link
http://www.h-l.co.uk/our_services/isa_apply.hl

h-l will probably be cheaper than Fidelity (or I assume than an IFA).

save-a-lot

dunstonh wrote: »

No, it will be a mini ISA as well. You cannot contribute to a cash mini ISA and a MAXI ISA in the same tax year. Plus, if you arent going to exceed £4000 a year then you shouldnt go MAXI.

I thought you could. I believed that after your £3000 cash mini allowance you were still eligible to take on a shares Maxi ISA with the £4000 allowance.

EagerLearner

Thanks, will look at HL. I presume I tell them I have a cash ISA with First Direct and I apply for a mini ISA with HL, which is the remaining £4k allowance for stocks & shares. I have never had one before.

There doesn't seem to be any info @ HL about this £50 a month option, only how to apply for an ISA? Can I choose which fund the £50 goes into or do HL decide that?

nrsql

save-a-lot wrote: »

I thought you could. I believed that after your £3000 cash mini allowance you were still eligible to take on a shares Maxi ISA with the £4000 allowance.

No - you can have a maxi isa (7K)
or
mini cash isa (3k)
mini share isa (4k)

The distinction is beeing removed next year (I think) and you will be able to save cash and shares under the same ISA and move cash into shares in the same account. At the moment you can hold cash in a maxi isa but not at a good rate.