Holiday Property Bond

jaybeetoo

fred246 wrote: »

The Holiday Property Bond website quite clearly says that it is an investment.

From the FT:


Holiday Property Bond (HPB), which was established in 1983, operates as an asset-backed life assurance bond regulated by the Financial Services Authority. Every £1 invested in a bond earns one point, and points can buy holidays throughout Europe.

..... while a bond may be considered as a long-term capital asset, it should not be treated as a conventional investment. “It is a lifestyle investment,” says James Boyce, managing director of HPB Management. “People mustn’t invest in the bond as an investment in the literal sense. It is not a property- based investment.”

Seronera

Fred 246 at it again making up some kind of conspiracy theory involving me 'promoting' the Bond to protect my Bond. Lets just be clear I have NEVER made a recommendation for anybody to put their money in the HPB. I've always tried to give honest information unlike Fred who just scaremongers, and I always suggest people read the small print and ask lots of questions, and from what I can see Bondholders on here are pretty unique in that they give honest answers that reflect their GENUINE experiences of HPB, be they good or bad, not the wild imaginings of others.

Fred is good at making stuff up because bond membership is remarkably stable so why would I need to promote it, and whilst he is accusing me of promoting it does he also say I have complained about it a number of times ! Faulty logic Fred.....

Anyway I've had two nice HPB holidays in December in the Lake District and Dorset, not forgetting glorious Devon last June and Fred is welcome to keep muttering away. Meanwhile the HPB is now 35 years old and a newly restored listed building property just beyond Dumfries will be coming on stream in 2019 so I might go and do a spot of sea trout fishing up there as I reach my retirement year.

Whatever you do, enjoy your holidays.....even you Fred !

fred246

Seronera wrote: »

Even with my increasingly worthless HPB I will be able to screw a few holidays out of it yet.......i hope.....maybe:mad:

Seronera

Seronera wrote: »

peoples saving are potentially at risk and its in everybodies interests that the current situation has a resolution that all parties can get behind, so that bondholders confidence can be restored, and they can continue to enjoy their HPB holidays...and no I don't work for them in any capacity whatsoever.

Seronera

Seronera wrote: »

There have been two or three 'realignments' of charging along the way ostensibly to stabilise the outgoings with the income. i.e. the charges have risen by some margin with the introduction of first a user charge and now an admin charge, and still there is no guarantee the books balance. The so called 'Gold Fund' is pretty well compromised due to high charges and poor investment performance. It does mean my bond value has eroded considerably from what I put in, so capital erosion is a real problem.
The financial arrangements at HPB are probably no more than what you or I would do were we in charge, but yes, they are opaque and I am less than happy with the long term implications. Where an organisation keeps coming back asking for more money off existing Bond members, then my antennae twitch and my hackles rise. Either the financial model does not work or somebody is taking too much out of the fund in charges.

I say this with great sadness as there is so much about HPB that is absolutely bloody brilliant. I knew about the high charges from day one so have no complaint on that score. I had not anticipated that they were not enough, and even after increases are still not enough judging from the letter I received from them this year making me an offer I felt I had to refuse. You can only milk a cow so many times.

Seronera

Some quotes from a Tim from Yorkshire on tripadvisor who has invested in 1987 and is almost certainly seronera:

Either way it’s a mess and as a bondholder from the very early days I feel mightily let down, but not as surprised as some, as I always felt the charges would kill the fatted calf one day.

I am not a fan of the charging structure and as such I have never 'referred a friend' and will not do so.

my honest opinion is that too many people are dipping their fingers into the pie and that makes the bondholders vulnerable, and threatens the viability of the fund in the long term

We just don't want to see this situation repeated five years down the line with Diamond Bond holders receiving a similar 'invitation' to prop up a charging structure we all know has some fatal flaws.

I just knew that a charging structure like that was unsustainable for the fund. You are right, it is too dependent on new premium income to be sustainable.

Gold/Silver bondholders felt that the £100 annual fee was a charge too far, over and above initial charges, annual management charges and user charges.

I joined in 1987 and I think we deserve to be better treated by HPB to be perfectly honest. It’s only a matter of time before this gets out into the wider financial press and causes damage to their reputation.

Also, do we bondholders need to be contacting each other by better means than TripAdvisor. I suspect we do. Any ideas?

I think there is still some goodwill towards the HPB, not least as it’s in all our interests to see it prosper.

It’s only a matter of time before this gets out into the wider financial press and causes damage to their reputation.

You are obsessed with protecting the reputation of the HPB. You have invested and have worked out that the only way to maintain your investment is to get more people investing. Any criticism is immediately ridiculed by you.

Seronera

So I had disagreements with HPB in 2012. Well here we all are in 2019 still having lovely holidays with HPB .....and thats the worst Fred can come up with ? Oh dear, how sad, never mind.

As it happens the HPB management listened and came up with a compromise solution to the problem we experienced. Of the group affected most are happy with what they came up with. The vast majority of HPB bondholders were not affected either way. And on we go into my 32nd year (I think !) of HPB membership. :beer: