Financial Advisors

Malthusian

sparky0138 wrote: »

Ah. It's within the first 12 months. So would you recommend waiting until after the first review?

Most advisers don't apply any exit fees at all (only upfront and ongoing). The significance of the 12 month period is that if your mother is paying fees by instalments, that's the maximum period over which they can be paid (without the adviser being deemed to be offering credit). If she's not paying fees by instalments that doesn't apply.

I was also wondering if this is a good time to be moving funds with Brexit just around the corner. I know the impact it will have is unknown but would people advise against it right now and wait to see what happens short-term?

Delaying action until the newspapers aren't blithering about largely irrelevant obscure local news stories is a good way to lose money. That day will never come.

I keep seeing people recommending Vanguard LifeStrategy all over the place. It looks "simple" on the website and the past performances look great but I guess it's not as easy as just transferring all the money into one fund (depending on risk level of course) and letting it do the work otherwise everyone would be doing it. What I'm saying is, this still needs hours of research, right? It's not a simple way of avoiding paying for a FA?

Ideally you would spend a few hours reading up on the basics of investment and diversification before sticking your money in VLS. But if you don't bother you won't lose money by sticking your money in VLS anyway, unless you panic and sell at a loss. That is why people tend to recommend it.

There are other one-stop-shop solutions available, some arguably superior, but everyone recommends VLS because everyone recommends VLS. DIY investors recommend VLS so DIY investors buy VLS and then they recommend VLS because that's what they've got and know about.

sparky0138

I just wanted to say a huge thank you for all this advise. I need to sit down now and digest it all before discussing it with my mum.

Malthusian wrote: »

Most advisers don't apply any exit fees at all (only upfront and ongoing). The significance of the 12 month period is that if your mother is paying fees by instalments, that's the maximum period over which they can be paid (without the adviser being deemed to be offering credit). If she's not paying fees by instalments that doesn't apply.

I can't find any mention of exit fees but her statement says the Adviser Servicing Fee is 1% per year paid in monthly instalments so would she have any further charges, do you think?

OMW take a product charge monthly as well (0.4% for the first £25,000 and 0.2% for the rest). If she transfers through OMW and stays with them, she'll be paying more than VG's 0.15%. I've just read the terms of a VG account. Can someone please confirm I've read it correctly in that she would need to transfer to a VG fund via OMW and then she'd be able to go through VG and open a general account so that she can then transfer it to that. So she would then be finished with OMW completely.

Sorry for all the questions, I'm just trying to get my head around it.

Audaxer

sparky0138 wrote: »

OMW take a product charge monthly as well (0.4% for the first £25,000 and 0.2% for the rest). If she transfers through OMW and stays with them, she'll be paying more than VG's 0.15%. I've just read the terms of a VG account. Can someone please confirm I've read it correctly in that she would need to transfer to a VG fund via OMW and then she'd be able to go through VG and open a general account so that she can then transfer it to that. So she would then be finished with OMW completely.

Sorry for all the questions, I'm just trying to get my head around it.

I don't think the actual Vanguard platform offers SIPPs yet, but you/she can transfer to a SIPP with one of the other main investment platforms, e.g. Hargreaves Lansdown, AJ Bell, Halifax Share Dealing etc, and within the SIPP on any of these platforms you/she can still invest in a Vanguard LifeStrategy fund if she wishes to do.

It would be best to compare the charging structures for SIPPs on all the main platforms, and select the most cost-effective one for a £60k SIPP investment. As well as the platform charge there is a 0.22% annual charge for Vanguard LifeStrategy funds, which automatically is deducted from the fund balance. Overall the charges would be much cheaper than her current pension.