Advice On Investing a Small Windfall

Flobberchops

Considering we're talking a timeframe of just a few months, your best bet may be to simply use interest-paying current accounts spread across at least two providers (as 80k is over the FSCS limit), or if you're amenable to a little risk see if you can scoop up some P2P loans that are close to maturity.

njmase

teddysmum wrote: »

If you work in such a high level financial situation, surely you have better contacts to advise you than a group of anonymous people on a free for all website ?

I'm of the mind that free, impartial advice with nothing to gain may be a bit more honest than paying a Financial Advisor...or especially asking a bank for advice.

I'm not very experienced at dealing with Finance and any help is much appreaciated...even if that help does end up pointing me in the direction of a Financial Advisor.

atush

njmase wrote: »

Hehe...I guess I am being a little loose tongued with the title. In my company quite a few people made a lot more on their stock sale.

@DigForVictory: Agreed. Should I be keeping the money in a bank I would definitely spread my assets to be within the insurance limit. I remember too well the Northern Rock fiasco.


I should clarify on the "if my relationship doesn't work I want to come back" statement: I have a space at my parents house I can indefinitely stay. The only reason I haven't bought my own place in the UK is because I travel to Europe so much and it wouldn't make sense....along with not needing to pay my parents any rent....I didn't think it was worth buying a new place for myself.
If things were to go wrong in my relationship I guess I would just continue to stay at my parents full time and start the process of moving in to the place I own....vs selling (if feasible) and buy my own new place. I don't think I would be too bothered waiting a year for this process

@atush: I put in 6% of my wages into my pension, which my employer currently matches. I'm also putting £500 per month into a separate savings account (non-ISA) for emergencies etc.

I guess even with the fees of renting out a house...even if I "lose" money on the rent...let's say I rent out for £800 per month and cost to me is:

£600 mortgage plus £240 tax bill=£840 + £60 fees = £900 per month

I'm still looking at this with the view that I'm paying £100 per month "mortgage" effectively to then have a house paid off in 15 years.....barring the house market completely crashing...but then with no pressing incentive to sell, I'm sure I can wait for the right time with the way the property market peaks and troughs?

I would up your pension a few %, esp as you can afford it. You can also afford to bung some rent your parents way- to at least pay the cost of having you there. They could use it to pay for luxuries for themselves. Maybe they'd like a jaunt to europe too?

Alpaca

If you're interested in BTL, it might be worth looking at Property Partner where you can buy and sell shares in BTL properties. It's effectively a "stock exchange" for BTL properties. Benefits over doing it the "traditional" way are:
1) You can diversify by spreading your investment across multiple properties of different types in different areas.
2) No hassles with arranging and managing mortgage, agents, tenants, maintenance and so on - it's all done for you behind the scenes.
3) Selling your shares on the platform is going to be a whole lot easier (and cheaper) than selling a whole property.
4) To the tax points that have been mentioned above, your rental income at Property Partner is classed as a dividend so it's tax-free up to £5k if you don't have other dividend income. Rental income from a traditional BTL property would be taxed at your marginal income tax rate.

I've been quite impressed with them since singing up earlier this year.

Besides that, it would be worth looking at p2p as well. There are some good platforms paying high rates on loans secured against assets (usually property). Some of these are also highly liquid so it's easy to sell out of loans early if you need the money back at any point. Again, this would be in stark contrast to owning a BTL property where it could take months and months to get tenants out and sell the place.

With the above options, if you need somewhere for yourself you could get your money out and buy something that meets your needs. Meanwhile it's pegged to property prices (Property Partner) and/or earning decent rates.

bigfreddiel

droopsnoot wrote: »

Except that if you're renting the house out to someone, you probably wouldn't just be able to pitch up on the doorstep, turf them out and have somewhere to live yourself. Not saying it's a good, bad or indifferent idea, just that it's not somewhere you can turn up at short notice to move in, if it's rented.

And when you do get in you will probably be into a huge renovation and clean up period, just hope they don't set up a Ganga factory!

Good luck fj

steampowered

It sounds to me like you'd be better off simply investing in a share tracker fund (such as a FTSE 100 tracker).

BTL doesn't sound sensible to someone in your situation. You would be putting all of your money into one asset; you would be highly leveraged (since you'd need a chunky mortgage); it doesn't sound like you are financially equipped to deal with rent void period; and it doesn't sound like you'd be able to deal with problems with the tenants as you are often travelling.

Eco_Miser

steampowered wrote: »

It sounds to me like you'd be better off simply investing in a share tracker fund (such as a FTSE 100 tracker).

Yes to an index tracker fund, or preferably a multi-asset fund, but not the FTSE 100 - that's both volatile and unbalanced.

planteria

njmase wrote: »

I'm of the mind that free, impartial advice with nothing to gain may be a bit more honest than paying a Financial Advisor...or especially asking a bank for advice.
I'm not very experienced at dealing with Finance and any help is much appreaciated...even if that help does end up pointing me in the direction of a Financial Advisor.

good response. that is what the forum is for. to bounce ideas around. if someone comes up with something that helps you, great.