Change of pension advice needed

Kim1965

Albermarle said:

Kim1965 said:

Im a tradesman, the vast majority of my colleagues have no pension, they plan to graft until they drop/or rely on the state in retirement. 
 Its an excellent offer, no doubt gives life assurance and a pension to a spouse. Well wort the money. 

I thought many tradespeople invested a lot of time in making their own homes bigger/more modern/worth more, as a way of building up assets . Or even getting into BTL, by buying properties in a bit of state and getting them sorted through their own efforts and the help of 'mates rates' . The old 'property is my pension line' is  trotted out frequently on Homes under the Hammer for example. 
Maybe they are just a minority though?

You are quite right. Those (not many) who are switched on do up a couple of buy to lets, they understand property. There is a mistrust of pensions by trades, they think its all a con. Bizzare really. How they expect to do physical work up to 67 is beyond me. 
I think self employed in general tend to underfund/dont bother.
 The OP has shot himself in both feet unfortunatley.
 I am fortunate that i have some water authority db pension, have always paid into a pension and a family member who works in the pensions /investment industry and has been in my ear.. thankfully

Albermarle

This forum tends to be negative about BTL's but for a tradesman/builder it is not such a bad idea, if done intelligently and with a close eye on rent/costs/tax.
The alternative is to add value to your own property, and then move to a bigger one that needs a lot of work, and repeat a couple of times. Then as Malthusian suggested spend your retirement running a pub in Spain !

Although living with your family in a building site for 20 years, would not be great 

Nebulous2

Albermarle said:

This forum tends to be negative about BTL's but for a tradesman/builder it is not such a bad idea, if done intelligently and with a close eye on rent/costs/tax.
The alternative is to add value to your own property, and then move to a bigger one that needs a lot of work, and repeat a couple of times. Then as Malthusian suggested spend your retirement running a pub in Spain !

Although living with your family in a building site for 20 years, would not be great 

It can be done much more quickly than that. It helps if you don't have family though.

An acquaintance was fortunate in getting a plot on her father's land. Her partner was a tradesman and every month when they were paid they bought some more building supplies. They spent every weekend and all their holidays for two years building, with some help from other tradesman friends, then got married. It was a huge commitment for a young couple, but they started married life in their early 20s with a very decent detached 3-bed, well-insulated house fully paid. 

I used to think about them occasionally when paying my mortgage......