Complimentary fund for Lifestrategy 80

Corbula

Hello, I've been saving into a Vanguard Lifestrategy 80 Acc for around 18 months now through Charles Stanley Direct. Starting with a lump sum of £12000 and then £50 a month from around 6 months ago. I'm doing this for later life, not necessarily retirement but potentially if I need some of it earlier I can. The idea though is later in life (I'm just about to turn 29).

Along side this I have my pension, which as from April I'm contributing 5% and my employer is contributing 3%.

I am saving up for a house and have the HTB and things but realistically £600 a year wouldn't make much difference to that. I'm thinking of doing another £50 a month into another fund. I think this would be a good contribution for retirement when you put it all together, what do you think? It's about 12% of my salary, just under £25000.

What funds would you recommend to compliment Lifestrategy 80? I see some people say property funds, but I was thinking future technologies as a potential option. Funds that benefit from things like 5g, AI, robotics. Seems like it could be a good idea.

What would you recommend?

Alistair31

In your circumstances I’d just stick with VLS80.
If it ain’t broke...

eskbanker

There aren't any complimentary funds, they all charge

If you're looking for something to complement a multi-asset product that's already inherently heavily diversified then it doesn't really have sector gaps to fill as such - you can of course select something specialist that takes your fancy but you'd essentially be upweighting an allocation purely on the basis of your own conviction/analysis rather than plugging a hole as it were....

You're hopefully doing this within a S&S ISA already, but worth considering a Lifetime ISA for money you'd be happy to commit until you're 60 (in return for the 25% bonus).

AnotherJoe

In that case would suggest you look at whats variously called renewable or alternative energy



These are two I've just bought into recently there are quite a few others

iShares II plc S&P Global Clean Energy
The Renewables Infrastructure Group Limited


If you wanted technology then Scottish Mortgage Trust (which offhand doesn't sound very high tech) is a decent performer

ColdIron

I would look for something it doesn't already have rather than overweighting on stuff it does have, perhaps smaller companies. Or just stick with VLS80. Be aware that if you add equities it will reduce your 20% bond allocation and raise its risk profile. In your shoes I would prioritise my house savings

Corbula

eskbanker wrote: »

There aren't any complimentary funds, they all charge

If you're looking for something to complement a multi-asset product that's already inherently heavily diversified then it doesn't really have sector gaps to fill as such - you can of course select something specialist that takes your fancy but you'd essentially be upweighting an allocation purely on the basis of your own conviction/analysis rather than plugging a hole as it were....

You're hopefully doing this within a S&S ISA already, but worth considering a Lifetime ISA for money you'd be happy to commit until you're 60 (in return for the 25% bonus).

good catch! Yes I'm doing it in a S&s ISA already and will continue to do so. I might look into the Lifetime one but I can't until I'm sorted with my HTB ISA for a house. Even then I don't know if i could transfer all of it or not.
So you're saying just do more into the lifestrategy one.

AnotherJoe wrote: »

In that case would suggest you look at whats variously called renewable or alternative energy



These are two I've just bought into recently there are quite a few others

iShares II plc S&P Global Clean Energy
The Renewables Infrastructure Group Limited


If you wanted technology then Scottish Mortgage Trust (which offhand doesn't sound very high tech) is a decent performer

OK thanks for the suggestion, I will look into these.

ColdIron wrote: »

I would look for something it doesn't already have rather than overweighting on stuff it does have, perhaps smaller companies. Or just stick with VLS80. Be aware that if you add equities it will reduce your 20% bond allocation and raise its risk profile. In your shoes I would prioritise my house savings

Yea smaller companies are another option. It seems though that are lot of funds follow very similar ups and downs as Lifestrategy does. I know Lifestrategy is very UK based, so was thinking of things that it doesn't have or things that might do well in the future or are at least consistent growth.

The joys of trying to buy on you're own the huge amounts I will need, £600 over 12 months won't dent it. So thought I might as well get other things sorted at the same time.

eskbanker

Corbula wrote: »

Yes I'm doing it in a S&s ISA already and will continue to do so. I might look into the Lifetime one but I can't until I'm sorted with my HTB ISA for a house.

LISA is independent of both S&S and HTB ISAs, i.e. you can pay into all three concurrently if you wish - you can't get the government bonus from both a LISA and a HTB for use towards a first-time property purchase, but can use the HTB for the house while simultaneously funding a LISA for long-term use.

Corbula wrote: »

Even then I don't know if i could transfer all of it or not.

No, you can only put £4K per year into a LISA but the fact that this is promptly boosted by 25% makes it something of a no-brainer for money that can effectively be locked away until 60.

Corbula wrote: »

So you're saying just do more into the lifestrategy one.

Not really, I was saying that it's perfectly legitimate to diversify into specialist areas if they float your boat, but was essentially just making the largely semantic point that this isn't necessarily complementing VLS as such, it's just modifying your allocations unless you're going into territory that VLS doesn't cover at all, i.e. VLS will already include shares of some of the larger companies developing future tech.

Corbula

I will keep looking to see what I can find before I just do more into Lifestrategy 80. What about this one though, its not exactly completely different to VLS but it's done very well although it has a high charge at 0.731%. It's grown well but it doesn't have quite the same dips and VLS has had over the last couple of years.
Lindsell Train Global Equity B GBP

kcrane

These four ETFs fit your criteria:

RBTX - Robotics
DGIT - Digitalisation
ISPY - Cyber Security
LOCK - DIgital Security

fred246

VLS80 US 34% UK 24%
FTSE GLOBAL ALL CAP US 50% UK 5%
If you think VLS80 is too UK heavy you could add a global fund

george4064

To be honest, anything that Vanguard LS doesn’t hold will complement your portfolio.

Have a look at the fact sheet to see where it’s invested and choose another fund/investment trust that holds assets your Vanguard doesn’t.

To give a few examples could be small cap, property, infrastructure, private equity etc....