Vanguard Life Strategy

savingsaving2015

Hello.

I am thinking of starting an S/S ISA with one of the Vanguard Life Strategy funds, 20, 40, 60, 100. I am not too sure what the difference is between Acc & Inc is though?

Being a first timer at this, i was hoping to hear real life views on the different Vanguard Life Strategy funds, how they are working out for you and the best provider in terms of fees are?

I am thinking about £100-£150 per month for 15-20 years and my risk level is medium/med.high.

Once this is sorted, any advise/tips as to any other funds to add to the Vanguard?

Thank you

Archi_Bald

ACC means your dividends get added to the fund value without you having to do anything.

INC means dividends will be paid into your account and you decide whether to invest and/or withdraw the money.

Do a search for Vanguard on the forum, there have been many discussions on the Lifestrategy funds.

Radiantsoul

Income pays you a dividend every so often, accumulator reinvests what would be a dividend.
If oyu are investing for 15-20 years then an accumulator saves having to do something reinvest.

savingsaving2015

Thank you for the reply.

Ok, so if i go with the INC route i can simply withdraw the cash to me, or re-invest in the scheme I am in?

I have spent a lot of time looking on the forum but not really found any experience after the person has took the plunge with the Vanguard or what investment company they used in regards to start up and ongoing fees?


My shortlist is:


HL
Iweb
charles-Stanley
Fidelity
Cavendish Online


Thank you.

Archi_Bald

As I said, there has been a great deal of discussion, e.g: https://www.google.com/search?as_q=lifestrategy&as_epq=vanguard&as_oq=&as_eq=&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&lr=&cr=&as_qdr=all&as_sitesearch=forums.moneysavingexpert.com&as_occt=any&safe=images&tbs=&as_filetype=&as_rights=&gws_rd=ssl

As to platform: this is also discussed on the forum. And/or you can use http://www.comparefundplatforms.com/ to model what's best for you.

Generally speaking, a platform charging a %age seems best for most newbie investors, whilst a fixed fee provider is better for most investors who have bigger investments. But it also depends on your trading frequency and number of funds etc.

DominicH

15-20 years is a long time, so even if one of those platforms is cheaper right now, it may not be in future, and the cost of transferring to another platform could nullify any advantage you got from going with the cheaper platform.
iWeb used to be cheap, but has now introduced a steep £200 entry fee, which seems to be saying "no new business, please." If so, you have to wonder if other fee increases are in the pipeline. Maybe Halifax, which owns iWeb, wants to wind it down and push people towards its own-branded platform. Who knows?

Basically, it's very hard to say which is the best long-term choice of platform. I tend to favour platforms that charge low or no exit fees, because if they move the goalposts on you then at least they should give you some notice and you can do something about it.

JohnnyJet

Before I invested I looked at several investment companies but opted for HL, they definitely aren't the cheapest but I chose them because of their user friendly site and easy to understand guides.

I have invested in the VLS 60 fund and over the roughly 2 year period that I've been in this fund my holding is up over 20%. I drip feed my money in so my increase will be less than others.

Recently my new investments have been in the VLS 80 fund and a strategic bond fund because I wanted more manager input regarding the type of bond I invest in. My holding in this VLS is up over 9% in approximately 9 months.

My ongoing fees are a 0.45% platform charge and a 0.27% (from memory) charge for the fund. Cavendish will charge a 0.25% platform charge but I have heard their site is not as user friendly. I will probably move there when my charges are more significant.

dunstonh

Or go with the L&G multi-index funds off platform which may result in a cheaper outcome.

bluebell321

What do you mean by off platform please?

bowlhead99

Off platform means you can go direct to the manager (l&g) to buy the fund rather than pay a platform / fund supermarket to let you access their platform if you are only going to hold one or two funds with one manager anyway. HL's platform costs 0.45% a year; Charles Stanley is 0.25%. If you went direct to L&G you could buy without even needing a platform. With Vanguard you could go to them direct as well, but you need £100k minimum to be a direct customer...

So Dunstonh's suggestion was to cut out the middleman but you can only do that if you use a slightly different product.

Note he is talking about the "multi-index" funds which are similar in concept to Vanguard Lifestrategy, as one fund that invests in other index funds. Rather than individually buying all the individual underlying holdings, (FTSE UK index, U.S. index, Europe index, Japan index, EM index, corporate bonds index, government bonds index, property index etc etc etc)


If you are dead set on the Lifestrategy here's a 1300 post thread.
https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4392271

Some of the responses are more useful than others

C_Mababejive

Not an expert but just checking,, direct with L&G for example here the UK100 tracker has an AMC of 0.82%

http://i.legalandgeneral.com/consumer/investments/products-and-funds/index-tracker/investments-productsandfunds-indextracker-fund-uk100.jsp

But via HL

I think the platform fee is 0.45% pa and then the fund charge is 0.06% though it isnt exactly the same fund and i cant load up the docs to find the fund ID number as it isnt loading the docs properly at the moment..

EDIT the ISIN on the first link to L&G is GB00B0CNH726

But this doesnt seem to be available via HL ??

OOPS Edit again

yes it is
http://www.hl.co.uk/funds/fund-discounts,-prices--and--factsheets/search-results/l/legal-and-general-uk-100-index-class-r-accumulation-inclusive/key-features

with a fee of 0.37%

Im having broadband probs at the mo...