MIL options for retirement

Justwe03

I agree with you all personally. However, I am very wary of coming on too strong and making her feel financially illiterate. She has never missed a bill payment in her life. Her credit file is very 'green'

Her eldest son is broke and sending his wife and child back to the UK to live so she can access schools etc... The Daughter, Well I am not entirely sure what is happening there.

BF and I (when we move in together) will manage absolutely fine. He has a few thousand of debt but we are working through it, snowballing etc... He is just starting his own company and things have really turned around for him

I managed to get her to open up a little more yesterday, and she keeps absolutely meticulous records so that was brilliant. She gets her State Pension which is topped up by £20 a week in pension credit and from Feb when she turned 65 she is also starting to receive £2.67 a week in savings credit.

Her debt, is in fact a loan for double glazing, another loan (to pay back a credit card?!) and a 0% credit card.

Windows are due to finish January 2016, £87 (ish)
Loan due to finish March 2016, £97 (ish)
Credit Card, £40pm she pays on a £1500 debt. 0% for 18months (i'm going to look into this in a month or two I think)

I had a look through her bills yesterday and managed to half her sky, bb and phoneline. She has Sky Protect which I am wondering if she really does need?

Looking into gas and elec switching for her also.

She's had a valuation of the property done already but said yesterday for the price it was valued at £157,950 she doesn't know if she wants to leave it...

But she does also want to look at some retirement properties so we will keep having a mooch. If she decides to stay, the property will be suitable for her, the only thing I can ever see needing changing is the bath needing to be level accessed.

I gave her some cash (as a gift) and she's been out to the local community centre and done some activities in the last few days and met a lady that she used to work with years ago, so is feeling very bright :T

Thank you all for your help and advice, it is very much appreciated and made me realise I wasn't entirely mad as most think the same as me!

I am staying over at her house one night next week so we can take her to the free financial advice morning at Age UK and out for lunch.

agarnett

Justwe03 wrote: »

... She's had a valuation of the property done already but said yesterday for the price it was valued at £157,950 she doesn't know if she wants to leave it...

Equity Release plans got quite a bad name once upon a time, but I am not sure whether generally the current offerings of "lifetime mortgages" are thought of as a deal worth considering / value for money ? Inputting age 65 and value £157,950 into Aviva's calculator comes up with an interesting dollop of cash which might make the dear lady brighten up still further ?

Not sure how such schemes might affect entitlement to pension credits though ...

margaretclare

So she's not really in debt and not financially-illiterate at all! Good for her! Having a loan for double glazing, assuming she's able to pay it off, doesn't really count as 'debt'. It is of course debt if you're a purist, but most of us will have had similar and happy with it.

atush

Improvements for the home that will increase saleability and reduce bills like DG are fine.

So she is finding thigns tight even though she gets PC already. A slight concern? But you have lowered her bills so that is something.

How long has she had sky? I dont use sky protect- when my sky box fails it is always some years old so they give you a new free one anyway other wise I would leave so I always get one? This is more cost effective for them than losing a customer.

margaretclare

We don't use Sky - we find there's more than enough to view using Freeview.

Justwe03

I did ask her about cancelling Sky but she wants to keep it as she likes her crime shows and I'm not about to argue with her I have spoken to he about cancelling sky protect it's £8.75 a month!! (robbing so and so's) Last time I had a problem with my box it cost me £30 for an engineer and they gave me a new box straight away.

It looks like next year (2016) will be massively different to the last few years once those big loans are paid off. She has about £515pm income and spends £224 of it repaying loans. Understandable why she is struggling before even looking at her bills

atush

Cancel sky protect and look at her package and see if she can get a cheaper one that includes the shows she watches.

I have a house with 4 men in it that uses sky for sport, I like sky 1 and sky atlantic to watch shows from home.