Vanguard Life Strategy

JohnRo

There's nothing foolish about VLS60

redpete

These decisions do depend on things like your attitude to risk, how long you can keep the investment and whether you might need to access the funds at short notice.

Assuming relatively small risk and medium timescale then with that sort of amount to invest I wouldn't worry about going beyond the VLS fund. Maybe put 10% into one or two other more risky managed funds just to see what might happen (e.g. one of Woodford's funds - but depends on whether you are happy to increase your exposure to shares, to UK shares, ...).

As for timing, Grexit might happen, if it does some markets might drop, or they might drop and recover fairly quickly, or they might not drop much at all and continue rising steadily, or it might not happen, or interest rates might increase and bond markets react worse than they have so far, but when and how much, or steady increases might continue for a year or more. Personally I wouldn't drip feed a lump sum but get it the market straight away, by all means drip feed surplus funds from income each month from now on.

(But there are far more experienced and knowledgeable investors than me who contribute here so see what others advise.)

dunstonh

I recently transferred to AXA only te realise I cannot buy VLS

But you do have access to the L&G multi-index funds which are comparable (and currently out performing VLS - probably on the bonds side given L&G have more flexibility than VLS but also property).

Mynxmox

[QUOTE=dunstonh;68629663...._given_L&G_have_more_flexibility_than_VLS_but_also_property).[/QUOTE]

Thanks for pointing this out donstoh, I have been looking at incuding property in my portfolio.

As to the other part of my question; if i transfer from SVS and AJBell, should I sell and transfer the cash or is it better to transfer the funds?

Thanks

masonic

Mynxmox wrote: »

As to the other part of my question; if i transfer from SVS and AJBell, should I sell and transfer the cash or is it better to transfer the funds?

What's better depends on what is important to you. If you transfer the holdings as stock then you will incur (higher) transfer fees, but will not be out of the market during the transfer. If you sell up and transfer the cash it will be cheaper, but you may miss out on gains in your investments while you are out of the market. Cash transfers are usually quicker than stock transfers, so there are a few factors to weigh up when deciding.

mapk

redpete wrote: »

These decisions do depend on things like your attitude to risk, how long you can keep the investment and whether you might need to access the funds at short notice.

Assuming relatively small risk and medium timescale then with that sort of amount to invest I wouldn't worry about going beyond the VLS fund. Maybe put 10% into one or two other more risky managed funds just to see what might happen (e.g. one of Woodford's funds - but depends on whether you are happy to increase your exposure to shares, to UK shares, ...).

As for timing, Grexit might happen, if it does some markets might drop, or they might drop and recover fairly quickly, or they might not drop much at all and continue rising steadily, or it might not happen, or interest rates might increase and bond markets react worse than they have so far, but when and how much, or steady increases might continue for a year or more. Personally I wouldn't drip feed a lump sum but get it the market straight away, by all means drip feed surplus funds from income each month from now on.

(But there are far more experienced and knowledgeable investors than me who contribute here so see what others advise.)

Thanks Pete, I'm looking at a mid to longer term time frame and am not completely risk averse - so, considering when and where to include commodities, small-cap and property. Dunston (thanks!) has previously suggested looking at the L&G MI5 fund which includes property, and I was thinking of a shift from VLS60 to there, or perhaps investing in both simultaneously..

I'm a little cautious with commodities, fearing that I might get my fingers burnt at this stage - maybe when I've learnt a bit more.

My initial investment (a mere two months ago but, as a newbie I can't help but watch!) consisted of £3000 to VLS60 (-4.15%) and £2000 to Woodford's new Patient Capital (+13.77%). Meaningless, I know, in the grand scheme.

I figure diversifying beyond a multi-asset tracker only makes sense when I have between 20K and 30K in VLS or something similar.. or perhaps a proportion (%?) in Woodford's CF Equity Income Fund, or would that be exposing myself unduly to UK fluctuations? So many questions!

Anyway, cheers for the feedback from all here - I'm having a great time, just wished I'd started sooner!

bowlhead99

mapk wrote: »

Thanks Pete, I'm looking at a mid to longer term time frame and am not completely risk averse - so, considering when and where to include commodities, small-cap and property.

Based on the figures you gave, you now have £2k plus 14% in one fund (2280) and £3k less 4% (2880) in another. The Woodford trust you bought has the goal of investing 75% of its assets in small developing companies. Not just 'small' as in 'below the £800m automatic entry position for the FTSE350' but really really small like sub-£50m companies which have never made profits and are a long way away from being listed. So, you have 75% of your £2280 (£1710) dedicated to extreme smallcap. That is 33% of your overall £5160 total.

So, I wouldn't be worried about considering when to add some small-cap. You have enough smallcap that you could quintuple your portfolio size before you start thinking of adding any more.

Property you could easily add a bit of now by changing your VLS60 for a L&G MI equivalent as you mention. The MI funds are a similar concept to the VLS ones although they are less rigid in their allocations of a definitive x% per sector. It will change over time based on the manager's market view. Nothing wrong in that if they are not charging a lot for the decisions. VLS change their allocations every so often anyway (eg UK vs ex-UK mix of equities changed a while back).

There is absolutely no point in investing in VLS and LGMI simultaneously and giving yourself two holdings to fret about which are both trying to cover the same objective via the same style. Pick one and do it.

I'm a little cautious with commodities, fearing that I might get my fingers burnt at this stage - maybe when I've learnt a bit more.

Commodities like gold, oil and orange juice futures are speculative rather than income-generating, but can be a good hedge to inflation. So can investing in a big pile of equities as you are currently doing. So the only reason to add them would be as a diversifier, something whose value moves in a different direction at different times to the rest of your assets. There is no need to start looking at a 'few percent in commodities' component for a £5k portfolio. Maybe a £50k or a £250k portfolio. Remember your global equities will include all the companies in the world who benefit from changes in commodities prices, although it also includes all the ones that suffer. Leave it for later.

I figure diversifying beyond a multi-asset tracker only makes sense when I have between 20K and 30K in VLS or something similar..

A decent multi asset fund (built on trackers or not) will easily be suitable until at least that level or beyond. It is not worth the hassle of holding and monitoring lots of individual positions and periodically rebalancing them, for any extra 'edge' or cost saving you think you might get, when a whole percent of £25k is only £250.

You might like to do it because you enjoy the fun of it or want the education. You could still enjoy the fun of it by letting a real fund manager look after your real assets in a multi asset fund and then you manage a virtual portfolio on paper to see how you would have done.

or perhaps a proportion (%?) in Woodford's CF Equity Income Fund, or would that be exposing myself unduly to UK fluctuations?

The VLS fund and the LG equivalent already have a bias towards UK equities. And you chose to only have a 60% allocation to equities in that core allocation. And then you immediately slapped the WPCT fund on the side, which is 100% allocated to UK and 100% allocated to equities. So, buying another fund which is 85% allocated to UK and 100% allocated to equities does not seem like it is helping to preserve your 'core' values, it is just pulling them further off track, unless you are only going to invest a really small percentage, in which case it is not going to make much of a positive or negative effect on your returns anyway.

If you think you are looking for a longer timeframe and having read and researched a lot more about investments your risk aversion is not what it was two months ago, and the 60% equity core ratio is too low, consider the 80% product (or LGMI6 instead of 5). There is no need to mess around with lots of different popular and trendy funds when you are only trying to grow your assets from the 5k to 50k level.

FWIW I don't think either of the Woodford products are bad products.

So many questions!

The questions about adding side funds and specifically the woodford income fund to an existing small holding of VLS has come up on this thread and its predecessors. So, read the thread and the board in general, and plenty of answers will be revealed. There is more than one answer to a question on how to construct a portfolio because there are infinite ways to grow £5k to £50k over a long enough timescale.

Anyway, cheers for the feedback from all here - I'm having a great time, just wished I'd started sooner!

Enjoy.

mapk

Thank you, Bowlhead, for such a full and comprehensible reply - you make the process seem much more straightforward. Have you thought of writing a book to see if you can bump Tim Hale from his No. 1 spot?

Carpi09

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/4392271

Read at your own leasure

TheTracker

Vanguard have scrapped their dilution levy.