Alternative suggestions to VLS SIPP

kerrjp

Hi Everyone,

I am getting our financial house in order you can see by my other recent thread, however I have a pension specific question, I have just started a transfer of my current pension from Aviva to Vanguard, my new Vanguard SIPP will be invested in the VLS80 fund, I pay into my pension from my Ltd Company I have now realised that my pension pot currently only 16k is drastically behind so intend to get to work on this right away, however my Wife works with me for my Ltd company and she as of yet has no private pension.

 I recently realised that this is a bad move as although we view the pension in my name as "our" pension we will be taxed on it when we come to draw on it with only a single persons allowance so it would make a lot more sense to open my wife a private pension and pay into this in the same manner from the Ltd company essentially splitting the retirement savings between ourselves. 

I was going to open her a Vanguard Sipp for simplicity however I realised that we then have my private pension and my S&S ISA all with vanguard invested in the same Fund.  My wife has a S&S ISA with nutmeg although I am aware that the fees are quite high and that their pension requires a minimum initial pay in.  So my question is can anyone suggest a SIPP along a similar line to Vanguard with something like the life strategy funds that might be an alternate option and possibly somewhere better to transfer her S&S ISA to ? 

thickasabrick

Nothing wrong with you both using Vanguard as the platform for holding your investments.
It's one of the cheapest platforms to hold your SIPP in.
If you plug your figures into Snowman's platform charges spreadsheet (one of the regular posters on this forum).
SIPP value £16000, number of funds 1, number of purchases per annum 12 = £24 total platform charges per annum.
Nothing wrong in both investing in the same fund either if it meets your risk profile and requirements.
The Vanguard LifeStrategy 80% Equity Fund consists of 15 underlying funds.
Out the three largest holdings, the top one (19.3 %)  has over 595 stocks listed, the second one (19.1%)  has 2,043 stocks listed, the third (19%) has 3,554 stocks listed. That is quite diverse.

Fund	%
Vanguard FTSE U.K. All Share Index Unit Trust GBP Acc	19.3
Vanguard FTSE Developed World ex-U.K. Equity Index Fund GBP Acc	19.1
Vanguard U.S. Equity Index Fund GBP Acc	19

Whilst there are other trackers with similar characteristics available from different providers it sometimes makes sense to keep things simple. Sometimes it even reduces your costs.
There are some risks having both your investments on the same platform but as long as they are authorised by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) these are probably outweighed by the admin convenience. Especially since contributions are coming from the same company. 
Monevator article "Compare the UK’s cheapest online brokers"

kerrjp

Hi thickasabrick, 
Thanks for the info, I will for simplicity sake open her the same SIPP that I hold.  Do you believe the Vanguard S&S ISA would also be abetter move for her over Nutmeg as I have only just realised that their fees are quite high and although so far the performance has been good I would suspect that VANGUARD VLS80 would do just as well but will also take advantage of their low fee and even their capped fee structure as things grow? 

thickasabrick

kerrjp said:

Hi thickasabrick, 
Thanks for the info, I will for simplicity sake open her the same SIPP that I hold.  Do you believe the Vanguard S&S ISA would also be abetter move for her over Nutmeg as I have only just realised that their fees are quite high and although so far the performance has been good I would suspect that VANGUARD VLS80 would do just as well but will also take advantage of their low fee and even their capped fee structure as things grow? 

Always run your own figures through the calculator and then decide if the platform offers the features you want at the price you're willing to pay.
Not familiar with the costs for nutmeg, although I suppose if you enter the value of the ISA into their fees page you'll be able to compare it more accurately. 
Vanguard is however mentioned in the article below as offering one of the cheapest percentage fee stocks and shares ISA.
Monevator covered this recently in this article - "Cheapest stocks and shares ISA hack"

Albermarle

You could look at a HSBC ISA , where you can buy the HSBC global strategy funds ( competitor to VLS ) 
You can also buy these HSBC funds on other platforms .

Thrugelmir

Did you consider the Vanguard Target Retirement Funds?