Advice re ISA fund investments

marrioa

I have been investing £200/month for the past 2 years in 4 different Funds. At present one fund is in the black but 3 are in the red. I've only "lost" £180 so far, but am concerned this will get worse. Two of the funds are now on H&L wealth 150. Two are balanced/managed, one growth, and one special. I am 48 years old and working but hope to be able to "retire" by 55 and do p/t work.
Would it be more prudent to cut my losses and move the money to a savings/bond/certificate?
It's not a great deal of money in the investment world but I'm a bit worried about the future.

Aegis

What are the funds, out of interest?

Just remember that the funds are likely to be a lot cheaper now than they were 6 months ago, so your money is buying more units now. When the prices recover (which they should do if you have picked decent funds) you'll have turned a nice profit. Selling now could be a big mistake if the prices continue to recover as well as they have done over the last week or so.

Of course, there's no guarantee that the investments will recover, but the chances are quite high that they'll be worth a lot more at some point between now and the next 7 or 8 years as long as they're not ultra-specialised into a sector that goes utterly bust between now and then!

dunstonh

I have been investing £200/month for the past 2 years in 4 different Funds. At present one fund is in the black but 3 are in the red. I've only "lost" £180 so far, but am concerned this will get worse. Two of the funds are now on H&L wealth 150. Two are balanced/managed, one growth, and one special. I am 48 years old and working but hope to be able to "retire" by 55 and do p/t work.

You have only lost £180 after just two years of contributions. That is nothing. Perhaps you are investing above your risk profile?

With regular contributions you really have to be looking at 10-15 years to see the real benefit as it takes so long to build up a worthwhile sum. The decline in the markets over the last 4 months has been a great thing for you. You are now buying units cheaper. In the long run you stand to gain more on those than the ones you bought this time last year.

Graeme7777

Hi,

I agree with Dunstonh who says that you may be "investing above your risk profile". General opinion is that it's important that you match the riskiness of your investments with how much risk you're willing to take. No point in investing in very risky assets if losing a small portion gives you palpitations!

You're likely only to get the full benefit of investing in funds if you're prepared to commit for the longer-term. Following such a programme will allow you to reap the potentially huge benefits of compounding and can transform what may be relatively small monthly amounts into a very juicy sum later.

Key, of course, to such success is choosing good funds but there is plenty of free data on the web to help with this.

I'm not a professional advisor but I hope my post is of some help.

Good Luck!

marrioa

Thankyou for your replies, I find it comforting that there are good people out there. Personal thanks to dunstonh, whose experience and past support I still remember.

It doesn't feel like I'm investing too far out of my comfor zone, but I guess I sometimes need reassurance that I'm not completely hapless.