The Road to Financial Security

cookie9

Sorry to hear you have had a few upsets Pushkin. At least I hope the film at the cinema was good. Re Dh you are not responsible for his actions you can advise an suggest but he is an adult. My Dh is similar and doesn't even have a pension. The likelihood is we will live off my pension and the state pension, if it still exists by then! At least you have given yourself some financial security by trying to reduce the mortgage.

Luckyinlife

With the plaster work if it is still patchy come monday it means it wont be dry in time for the carpet i would try to get the carpet fitted bit later on in the week if you could ? I had to leave some of mine as it was patchy but
If you get a white matt emulsion and water it down 10-20% it will breath better and the plaster will soak it up great
Youll find it is very thick for the first coat so watering it down will help it spread a lot easier as well

i myself dont have a pension as of yet well i do but its very very small and hardly worth talking about. i do have plans to sort this out but not an till im 30 really which currently is 2 years away.

Im sure you guys can sort it out and get thro it :]

amycool

We found that our newly plastered walls took a lot more painting than expected! Don't rush it before it's ready though or it will just flake off. Hmmm...I wonder if you could get some of the sticky plastic for painting. We were keeping our carpet and he put that down. The only possible problem areas are right at the very edge where it can seep if you're a messy painter. It's not likely though. The cold damp weather can't be helping matters!

Sorry to hear your discovery about your OH's pension. It must be frustrating when you put so much into your future and then have to bail your OH out. Luckily I met my OH when we were teenagers so I've always made sure he made the right financial decisions! Still, looking on the bright side, there are loads of people with no private pension at all when they retire. You both have a pension and you're not days from retirement so you're not in a terrible situation, just a slightly less good one than you thought. It'll all be fine in the end.

Pushkin

Hi Cookie, Lucky in Life & Amy Cool

Thanks for decorating tips - DH has declared it ok to do first coat albeit with leaving 2 very small ceiling corners alone as they hadn't quite dried. Undercoat is a special paint for plaster work. I think (fingers crossed) we should be ok - problem with delaying carpet fitting is it wouldn't just be for a day but probably for at least a week - these guys are so busy.

Anyway he has just finished so lets hope I'm not back tomorrow for a rant as it's all flaked off overnight :eek:

He spoke to my dad about the pension - I stayed out of the way as I am a bit too emotional!

We need to strike the balance between injecting enough cash for his pension and not making ourselves too short now. It should be ok but I'll have to get my head round saving less or overpaying the mortgage a little less.

DH is closer to 50 than 40 & I know there are other people maybe with his attitude. However given his age and the point we (well I thought it was both of us - obviously not!) have both reached regarding financial management over the last couple of years I am just stunned and to be honest feel very let down. I am 4 yrs younger than him, earn less money and yet my pension is worth 3 times as much!

Deep breath - promise I will stop going on about this now - in a way he is correct we can't rework the past, what is done is done. We just need to do the best we can now that we have the full picture.

Haven't been nearly as productive regarding housework as I should have been so I need to wake up with my domestic head on tomorrow and attack the chores like a ninja!

Luckyinlife

Hehe great work on the painting im going to be at it most of the afternoon tomorrow my self hopeing to get bedrooms and office sorted :]

The pension thing is a hard one to comment on because i myself am very laid back about mine and its even worse for me because im self employed so need to do SIPP each year
I think for me its best to save up for the year and put a % of what i saved into a SIPP each year Please tell me off hehe
i haven't done the above yet as iv been saving for this house for years now

Pushkin

Luckyinlife wrote: »

The pension thing is a hard one to comment on because i myself am very laid back about mine and its even worse for me because im self employed so need to do SIPP each year
I think for me its best to save up for the year and put a % of what i saved into a SIPP each year Please tell me off hehe
i haven't done the above yet as iv been saving for this house for years now

Well I think you are young - under 30? I think pensions are something you think about more as you get older - only natural I guess. I never thought about mine at that age, although I am lucky in that I've worked for the same company since I was 27 (I'm now 44) and my father was very vocal I started a pension when I joined them. Result is I did so and as it was done up front like that I've never felt a reduction in income -what you never had you don't miss.

I would never ever suppose to judge anyone or even really give the financial direction (none of this comes naturally to me) however someone once said this to me, it's stuck and I think its pretty accurate.

A good pension is not about how much you put in each month its about how long you pay in each month - the longer the better.

I think that means if you pay £1000 a year for 30 years you will likely be better of than if you pay £3000 for 10 years because the money is being invested as you go along and therefore gaining in value.

That said its all about where you are in life and I don't think a pension should be prioritised over emergency savings, paying off debts, getting a house etc.

Study walls seem to be holding - fingers crossed, we've just put a portable heater in there to try and dry it all.

Luckyinlife

Ya im 27 currently 28 this year now
I know what you mean i would like to get to pension saving myself asap but i have said to myself im going to try to get mortgage free before i can do that with any conviction

For me personally i would rather spend 10 years paying of the house then saving for retirement after that in my case hopefully 20-25 years of saving after the mortgage is payed off towards retirement.

As you say its all about where you are in life currently

them heaters do a great job i live close to the beach so just open a window when its windy and it blows well haha

How is it looking you happy with it now :]

katiegizmo

Hi Pushkin

I've never been in that kind of situation but I get that you must be feeling really let down and annoyed!
I don't know if we are doing the right thing but we have decided to focus more on paying down our mortgage than pensions - we do have a couple of little pots and make a monthly payment basically just to get the employer contribution from my OHs work. I don't think they will be worth much by the time we retire and being really gloomy, retirement is getting further andfurther away. We're mid thirties.
I just figure the mortgage is a bigger chain on us than the benefit if a larger pension. At this point anyway. We are not yet in our forever home so I might change my thinking when (if!!!!) we get there.

I guess I am trying to say that it's not the be all and end all, pensions, and you are in a much better position than most by just thinking about it now and taking action. :T

Chin up hun, money schmoney is what I always say when it gets me down and have a little time to think about something not financial!! xx

edinburgher

I suppose I can see it from your DH's point of view (i.e. the damage has already been done), but what a horrible blow for you to have to figure out.

You mentioned the effect of investing a little over a long time vs. a lot over a short time a few posts ago. It's called pound cost averaging and helps to smooth out the peaks and troughs of investing.

Unfortunately because DH is that little bit older, you won't be able to benefit from this as much and you will be paying into a pension at what is an expensive time for equities (stocks and shares). That said, tax relief on pension contributions will help to pick up some of the load and you will just have to grin and bear the rest.

Having a paid off home is an important goal, but pension provision may trump this for you and DH. Paying money into his pension instead of OPing and taking some of his pension as a lump sum to pay off a residual mortgage might make more sense for you? Something to consider, hope you get things sorted.

Pushkin

OOh am completely thrown by the new format of this site so not sure where or in what format this is going to appear! Thank you all for the comments, just me letting off steam. DH spent an hour or so with my dad Sunday and has promised to find out what the max % of pension contribution his company will match and set that up for next pay day. I'll rework the figures once that is done and we will assess as we go along. Don't want to do anything in haste.