If you had £100 P/W to "Invest", what would you do with it?

kinger101

Robinhoody said:

£100 week I’d try to buy a couple of ounces of silver bullion every week if I could find someone who was willing to sell

test it as soon as you get it with a magnetic slide to make sure it’s pure silver

I don't know which bit of advice is worst;
(a) investing in a single volatile asset
(b) doing due diligence after the asset is purchased
(c) believing one can use a magnet to confirm something is pure silver.

jimpwarsop

kinger101 said:

jimpwarsop said:

You're 42, you have lost all your excess weight and cleared all your debt. Well done you.

OP has had a history of debt problems, and has done an amazing job of turning things around.  They've come on here asking about advice re. savings.  Not what to spend it on. Time does have a habit of flying by, so it's nice to reach your sixties knowing you can be in a position to comfortably retire.  

Thats your opinion.   I was offering mine.

Eco_Miser

£100 a week spare money, after making provision for all expected spending, like holidays, insurances, replacing appliances & vehicles etc. is good. Don't be put off by the talk of hundreds of thousands or millions of pounds. Some people on here are very well paid, others are effectively on less than minimum wage.

Maximising pensions (what do you mean by that, getting all you can from your employer, or getting all you can from HMRC?) is a good idea, but you won't be able to touch the money until you're 57 (except in very particular circumstances), so having a pot of money, outside your emergency fund, to cover changing circumstances could be a good idea.

Currently Premium Bonds are a good place to hold money without any danger of actual loss (though inflation will reduce its spending power). Your return for a large holding over several years is likely to average 0.8%, but could be a low as zero (unlikely) or as high as several million (massively unlikely, but not impossible).

Otherwise you could invest within a Stocks & Shares (S&S) ISA (up to £20k per year at present) for returns exempt from UK income tax and capital gains tax. Vanguard, HSBC, Blackrock, and others offer widely diversified collective investments at various risk ratings, which can all be invested through various ISA managers/platform at a variety of charges.  See Monevator archives for much detail on investments, including best place to keep them, pension/ISA split, difference between major multi-asset funds (as mentioned above), and much more.

Also keep some cash in easy access accounts, quite possibly multiple current accounts plus Regular Savers (see long running thread here).

steampowered

Albermarle said:

Agree with the first two but would think an extra £50pw in the pension would be better than a S&S ISA.

I agree that the pension is likely to be a better choice from a pure financial perspective due to the tax relief.

The reason why I suggested a S&S ISA is that it gives a bit more flexibility because it can be accessed before retirement - for example if Op finds that she needs to access that money in say 15 years time but before retirement due to a long term drop in her income or wanting to move house.

Does depend on the Op's age though and it is a personal decision - ISAs and pensions are both great choices - and a mix is possible.

kinger101

steampowered said:

Albermarle said:

Agree with the first two but would think an extra £50pw in the pension would be better than a S&S ISA.

Does depend on the Op's age though and it is a personal decision - ISAs and pensions are both great choices - and a mix is possible.

Worth adding that there's also the possibility to move what's saved into an ISA now into a pension at a later date.  Though tax benefit of doing so is always subject to change.

juicyjackieb

Thank you all!! This has been so helpful! 

Increasing my pension is going to be my first move, I logged onto my pension account for the first time (it’s only 3 years old, I started late) and it projects 29k in my pot which seems very low? I need to boost that for sure!

After that I’m still not sure. The possibility of access worries me if I had a major emergency how accessible are all the options, plus, how safe. 

Please keep your thoughts rolling, loving researching these!

MovingForwards

Congratulations on clearing the debt, it's a great feeling.

Split up the money as see it as short-term needs, long-term needs and retirement needs:
- short term is cash needed in an emergency
- long term is cash for repairs / maintenance / replacement car etc
- retirement is cash into your pension.

There are a few of us around who don't have big incomes and make the most of what we have.

I'm building up different pots for an emergency (loss of job), home repairs / upgrades / my car plus overpaying my mortgage. I also save into a SIPP. 

Do you have any short-term, over the next year or two, aims? Any long-term plans?

RobM99

How about putting the money into an easy-access savings account while you make your decisions?

Albermarle

I logged onto my pension account for the first time (it’s only 3 years old, I started late) and it projects 29k in my pot which seems very low? 

These projections tend to be very pessimistic and of course the pension does not know that you will be increasing your contributions.

Alexland

Albermarle said:

These projections tend to be very pessimistic and of course the pension does not know that you will be increasing your contributions.

I find pension projections are more optimistic about future returns than me!

Anyway £29k won't buy much pension maybe £1k pa depending on the age of retirement.