Scottish Life Endowment

Pobby

Anyone else had a letter from the above regarding the this fantastic(not) investment?Amazing how badly they have done.If I had paid in the same amount of premium into a savings account I would be ahead.

dunstonh

Scottish Life is a provider and endowment is a tax wrapper. Scottish Life do have some very good endowments using their unit linked range.

Yours in the Scot Life with profits fund which is a poor quality fund. Have you investigated to see if you have acces to their unit linked range?

If I had paid in the same amount of premium into a savings account I would be ahead.

If you take into the account of life cover, many endowments, even those that are no longer offering good potential have actually exceeded savings rates. The problem is usually that it hasnt been by enough and some of them had target growth rates which were just too high. Often, its not the return but the target growth rate that is at fault.

JoeK_3

As previously indicated, if this is a with profits policy, you may need to make changes

Is it a with profits endowment?

You should investigate if a switching facility exists, to invest into another fund.

If not you may want to look at the alternatives;

1) Sell or surrender the policy
2) Pay the value off your existing mortgage.
3) Overpay your mortgage by the endowment premium

Before you do this, you should consider whether you need the life insurance and if your health is good.

Check on the cost of replacing the life insurance and any overpayment penalties on your existing mortgage.

JoeK

Pobby

I don`t need the endowment to pay off the mortgage.SL say that I cannot transfer into another fund.

Pobby

Just heard back from APP who are not interested in handling my endowment so they must think it is rubbish.So not quite sure what to do.Once again it is not required to pay off my mortgage.

First thoughts are to cash it in and and look for a low/medium risk investment and continue to pay the premium(plus more) to add to the savings.

EdInvestor

Pobby wrote: »

First thoughts are to cash it in and and look for a low/medium risk investment and continue to pay the premium(plus more) to add to the savings.

Yep.Sounds good.

Have you opened a maxi ISA this year?

This discount broker will rebate charges and has a quality fund choice.

https://www.h-l.co.uk

JoeK_3

EdInvestor wrote: »

Yep.Sounds good.

Have you opened a maxi ISA this year?

This discount broker will rebate charges and has a quality fund choice.

www.h-l.co.uk

Before making recommendations to go into a stocks and shares ISA, it would be advisable to assess the OP's risk profile.

By it's a good job that you're not a qualified adviser or they would have your guts for garters and string you out.

JoeK

EdInvestor

Pobby wrote: »

First thoughts are to cash it in and and look for a low/medium risk investment

OP states his risk profile is low/medium.As any advisor ought to be aware, the maxi ISA wrapper is used not only for shares, but also for low-medium risk corporate bond, gilt and property funds.

In any case, a low-medium risk profile does not exclude share-based investments, such as endowments. :rolleyes:

JoeK_3

EdInvestor wrote: »

OP states his risk profile is low/medium.As any advisor ought to be aware, the maxi ISA wrapper is used not only for shares, but also for low-medium risk corporate bond, gilt and property funds.

In any case, a low-medium risk profile does not exclude share-based investments, such as endowments. :rolleyes:

Assessing the risk profile of a client is not just about stating that they are low/medium risk, it's taking careful thought to both the short term and long term risks involved in holding investments.

As advisers, we are all aware that corporate bonds lose capital value in an increasing interest economy and the effects of moving into this type of investment at the moment is an immediate erosion of the capital invested.

Further than this anyone encouraged to go to an execution only website that doesn't know what they are doing is asking for trouble.

Beware OP of what you would be taking on by this recommendation!

JoeK

Pobby

I am taking great care and doing research into the matter.I also have a further,even more,significant amount of money to invest.

EdInvestor

The best thing any investor can do is inform himself as much as possible in advance about investment issues .This applies whether he uses an advisor or not. Read threads and ask questions here, look at other websites.Take your time and don't be intimidated.

The more you know the more likely you are to be able to monitor any advisors for "commission bias" and general incompetence - of which, sad to say, there is a lot - as is obvious from the very large number of misselling cases involving products too numerous to list.