Had a pension for 4 years. Can I take the money out?

antonyg18

Hi there.
I started a pension when I was 19. I'm paying £80 a month in and the government puts £20 in.

I'm wanting to buy a house so will I be able to take the money out that I've put in?

I'm thinking of stopping paying it until I get back on my feet after I've bought a house. I'm sure the financial adviser said they will be no penalties after 2 years of paying in. I've been paying it in for 4 or 5 years now.

Could anyone shed any light on this?
I'm going to give them a call on Monday. And I'm going to have alook at the paper work tomorrow

Thank you!

ViolaLass

It's a pension, not a savings account.

[Deleted User]

No, you cannot withdraw your money from a pension before retirement age unless there are exceptional circumstances, for example you have a terminal illness and even then it's not straight forward. The chances of you being able to get your money out are nil and if a financial advisor told you anything different they're... wrong. The only thing I can think of is that maybe they told you that you could cancel your pension before 2 years is up and get your contributions back? As far as I know that's the only thing that relates to 2 years (although the exact length of time depends on the pension you have, but 2 years is a common figure).

Does your employer contribute to the pension? Stopping contributing to your pension now would be a mistake, pensions benefit vastly from contributions when you're young -- although ideally you should be contributing more than just £100 per month.

antonyg18

No only I pay in as I'm self employed.

The 2 years after I was referring to was that if I take a break from paying in after 2 years I would not get any penitys for that.

atush

Well, there is your answer. You can't have the money till 55 or older.

Why you thought we the taxpayers should subsidize your house purchase remains unexplained ;-)

As a side note, stopping contributions is a tricky thing to do. You'll always find excuses not to restart your pension, and then you will retire poor. So find a way to save w/o that, or make a promise to restart within 6 months of buying house.