Half a million pounds to invest, need to live off the interest. What's best?

baby_boomer

ellat257 wrote: »

Get some advice from an IFA, or several.

No. An IFA who posts on this site has said you don't need to, given your stated time-scale and requirements.

Biggles

ellat257 wrote: »

Maybe an annuity or such would be better.

If, as seems likely (Harridan still hasn't clarified any of this), she's going to be buying another house in a year's time, an annuity is the last thing she needs.

Harridan

Thanks for all your replies, yes she is planning to buy another place, she wants to rent so that she can take her time to look around for places and not feel pressurised to take something not quite right. (She currently lives in our old family home which is much too big for her and costs a fortune in heating etc.)

I take all your points about inheritance tax, but I'm afraid my mother is one of those people who you cannot really discuss mortality with as she will probably take any mention of it as a signal that we are all sitting there waiting for her to die so that we can have her money. I know it's really stupid, but I suspect we will end up paying an enormous amount of tax to the exchequer when she dies, because she won't do anything sensible about it. Perhaps seeing a FA would be a good idea, just to flag up the idea of making some kind of plan to do something slightly better with all that money than giving it to the government.

baby_boomer

King_Weasel wrote: »

I would expect such a person to crystallise her present situation and her aims and to present the choices with their respective pros and cons accordingly.

Why would an adviser want to do that when there would be no commission available on what they should recommend? You would be wasting their time.

Searcher2

Harridan wrote: »

Thanks for all your replies, yes she is planning to buy another place, she wants to rent so that she can take her time to look around for places and not feel pressurised to take something not quite right. (She currently lives in our old family home which is much too big for her and costs a fortune in heating etc.)

I take all your points about inheritance tax, but I'm afraid my mother is one of those people who you cannot really discuss mortality with as she will probably take any mention of it as a signal that we are all sitting there waiting for her to die so that we can have her money. I know it's really stupid, but I suspect we will end up paying an enormous amount of tax to the exchequer when she dies, because she won't do anything sensible about it. Perhaps seeing a FA would be a good idea, just to flag up the idea of making some kind of plan to do something slightly better with all that money than giving it to the government.

If any of your mother's relatives die in the near future and someone has to do probate maybe get her to do it. I know she wouldn't but it could open her eyes... I am in the middle of doing probate for my mother's Aunt and I could cry with how much money is going to the government. She had made some inheritance tax relieving investments but not all of them were. The only plus sides are that I am learning more about IHT avoidance, being aware of headaches I could cause with diverse investments for people I leave behind (make sure you have all the details together) and saving the family up to £6000 in solicitors' fees for dealing with probate.

JoeK_3

What wrong with depositing the money at 6%, paying tax on the interest and netting down to £24,000 per annum, or have I missed something?

JoeK