Daydream thread... without the rose-tinted specs

alfie_1

evening all.

i have just had a long chat with DS with regards the firebrigade pensions. gov say they gotta wait 40yrs to get thier full pension [which has decreased in value] instead of the 30yrs it was. the lump payout will half too. we have done our sums and what he pays per month would pay his household bills if he was paying a morgage. if he bought a flat and payed off morgage in 25yrs he would have more of an investment than his pension. he thinks if he bought a flat, later met someone,bought a house and let his flat [his pension] he would be better off to pull out of pension system and reap benefits now. gov keep moving the goal posts so cant garuntee anything at the end anyway. the issue at the moment is actually about those that were told 30yrs and are now being told 40yrs !! so not actually gonna benefit my sons situation.
hope that makes sense !!
either way voting for strikes is iminent and he is stuck on the fence..
if he strikes, he loses pay and could be amongst the cuts.
if he doesnt strike, will he be blacklegged.?
hes only young and doesnt feel he wants to get embroiled in a situ that the only affects a few.
we will see !

lostinrates

alfie_1 wrote: »

evening all.

i have just had a long chat with DS with regards the firebrigade pensions. gov say they gotta wait 40yrs to get thier full pension [which has decreased in value] instead of the 30yrs it was. the lump payout will half too. we have done our sums and what he pays per month would pay his household bills if he was paying a morgage. if he bought a flat and payed off morgage in 25yrs he would have more of an investment than his pension. he thinks if he bought a flat, later met someone,bought a house and let his flat [his pension] he would be better off to pull out of pension system and reap benefits now. gov keep moving the goal posts so cant garuntee anything at the end anyway. the issue at the moment is actually about those that were told 30yrs and are now being told 40yrs !! so not actually gonna benefit my sons situation.
hope that makes sense !!
either way voting for strikes is iminent and he is stuck on the fence..
if he strikes, he loses pay and could be amongst the cuts.
if he doesnt strike, will he be blacklegged.?
hes only young and doesnt feel he wants to get embroiled in a situ that the only affects a few.
we will see !

I think that pensions have been a very poor deal for a lot of us.

However, I would not be happy to be going into retirement planning with the option of having some in the planing and having none.

When I was younger I was told that the idea was a balance between pension, property and portfolio. While property, despite the slump, has still done well I still see th e logic for the economy in this balance, I cannot help feeling that at some point some sort of fiscal address will have to be made to start a rebalancing. Maybe not. That's the point, We cannot guess the future really.

alfie_1

i did suggest he take out a private pension plan plus "do his thing" but its finding a SAFE pension fund !!!

Rummer

The pension situation is such a worry for so many people. I pay into one however I am very much aware that I need to look at alternative ways of funding retirement in the future as one thing can not be relied upon, mainly because they keep changing the age and conditions on which you receive it. Currently I will be 68 and I am pretty certain that will change and I will be even older

I agree with LIR that spreading your options is a good idea, even in a small way. We have our house which has lost value since we bought it (as have many)however it should balance out over time and we both have pensions however where we are lacking is in the savings/investments which will address as and when we can. Even saving little and often will add up over the years we have remaining in work.

It is hard to think of the long term when so many are struggling to get through on a day to day basis with little or nothing to spare.

choille

We don't have pensions. All our spare cash, what little there is, goes into the build, hence the slowness of it. We have a friend who put such a big % of his income into pensions & lost a lot of it. The only thing that is safe as an investment apart from gold maybe, is land &/or buildings.

Everything seems geared to scaring the shoite out of ordinary folks. Invest in this & that for your old age, ( and then we'll make your scrimping & scraping disappear) you can't retire until yer dead nowadays that's how it used to be & how it's getting - work till your muscle bound....or dead.

Ranting over...

lostinrates

choille wrote: »

We don't have pensions. All our spare cash, what little there is, goes into the build, hence the slowness of it. We have a friend who put such a big % of his income into pensions & lost a lot of it. The only thing that is safe as an investment apart from gold maybe, is land &/or buildings.

Everything seems geared to scaring the shoite out of ordinary folks. Invest in this & that for your old age, ( and then we'll make your scrimping & scraping disappear) you can't retire until yer dead nowadays that's how it used to be & how it's getting - work till your muscle bound....or dead.

Ranting over...

Land locally has done staggeringly well in the last few years since crunch. Property,...meh, ours would be the same or less. We had a valuation recently and had to argue even the value of the work we'd had done. Property does go up over the years, and in my adult life in my corner of the country astoundingly so, but not sure its necessarily that realisable in a useful way as savings for retirement in many cases.

Fwiw, I have no pension plan either, we were told I wouldn't need one, I'm meant to be dead by now. We're wondering if. Should start one after all, lol.

choille

Well if I had loads of money I'd buy/build holidoid lets. Some here get £1,500 @ week high season & Christmas/New Year. The up to date ones that are smartly decorated & fitted out get 40+ week lets a year. You aint gonna get much better return on an investment than that really.

Davesnave

Thanks for all your kind words about Daisy.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/35108297@N03/9613748534/

I have the holy grail of pensions in my index-linked, final salary jobbie, but having gone P/T to help look after my Dad when I was 53, it isn't all it might be.:( I wouldn't have continued full time past about 55 anyway, so maybe not a huge loss, but taking it at 58 was a mistake.

This place has to be our other pension pot. If we did no major improvements, we could afford to sit here and lose money steadily for the next 10 years or so, but I prefer the riskier option of doing it up, so it'll be nicer to live in and easier to shift to a cash buyer when the time comes. I think that could well be quicker than 10 years too.....:undecided

COOLTRIKERCHICK

choille wrote: »

Well if I had loads of money I'd buy/build holidoid lets. Some here get £1,500 @ week high season & Christmas/New Year. The up to date ones that are smartly decorated & fitted out get 40+ week lets a year. You aint gonna get much better return on an investment than that really.

:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek: HOW MUCH!!!!

Think we should all club together and get equal part share in a holiday let up your way...

Its so true, IMHO I think there will be no state pension or state benefits in the future...Its slowly heading that way now.

We got no provisions for when we are older, with what has been happening with interest rates, and very low pension fund payouts etc, people are now looking at other options for their money..

In a very 'loose' way I have done this with the boys, instead of buying them playstation games etc, We have bought them guitars, amps etc, as I know in the future if they are strapped for cash, at least they can sell them, and get some sort of money back, where as playstation games etc they will be worth nothing..

I also think it is wise to get your house in order,,, like rhiwie has done, to invest in reducing your bills, outgoings.

Ideally I would love to be able to have a few cheaper end properties to rent out, so we would have a passive income when we are older, but dont know how I could afford that idea

right off to work

rhiwfield

Dave, sad to hear about Daisy

Pensions?

Like Dave I've got a gilt edged LA final salary scheme... for 3 years service!! :rotfl::rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

It is difficult to save for tomorrow in todays needy times, and demotivating when savings accounts pay sub inflation returns. We've just withdrawn our Premium Savings Bonds from NS&I and will use the proceeds to back our judgment on investing and dealing in antiques/collectables.

For those in the middle of builds getting them completed is the same as putting together a nest egg and a possible source of income (produce, stock rearing, FITS, RHI, holiday lets). But if you cant save at all then in later life work continues or you downsize and take some capital gain as State pension is, IMHO,likely to be insufficient on its own for a decent standard of living.

If people are disciplined enough to squirrel away part of their income, which will may mean sacrifices (no expensive hols, forego the latest smartphone upgrade ) then finding an inflation beating home for those savings is the next big headache :eek: