Statement of intent

setmefree2

StuartGMC wrote: »

Actually, both NRD are 65 and usual hits on pensions when retiring early, but I think we'll soon face a stage where they say, retire when you're dead, there's no money for pensioners anymore!:rotfl:

I want to retire at 60.:p I just can't find anywhere safe to put my pension:o. The scheme I'm in doesn't have a fund for Latin America - just emerging markets in Asia & Russia :rolleyes:.

gallygirl

setmefree2 wrote: »

I want to retire at 60.:p I just can't find anywhere safe to put my pension:o. The scheme I'm in doesn't have a fund for Latin America - just emerging markets in Asia & Russia :rolleyes:.

I'll look after it hon, send it this way .

My pension is with FP & we can choose funds - seems like a big choice till you actually start looking at them as most of them I've discounted - don't want tracker funds etc. If you don't self select they do it for you, picking the appropriate risk for your age - fortunately they don't tell you how much you would have made in that way rather than how much you've [STRIKE]lost[/STRIKE] made by being proactive .

Will be reviewing it end of June but supsect v tiddly compared to you lot.

kassytbag

:beer: Hi stuartgmc - just to let you know i have been using the spreadsheet you sent me and am finding it incredible at sorting my finances out - i am hopeless with spreadsheets but i have really gotten into the swing of it - still trying to understand savings bit - but hey ho!!! the rest of it is brilliant - thanks so much for letting me use it it really is changing the way im dealing with my debt because i feel i now have all the figures at my fingertips
thanks again:T

StuartGMC

setmefree2 wrote: »

I want to retire at 60.:p I just can't find anywhere safe to put my pension:o. The scheme I'm in doesn't have a fund for Latin America - just emerging markets in Asia & Russia :rolleyes:.

SMF, my pension is still a final salary scheme (just hope it continues to be the "best" option in future years) and I contribute 10% with company adding 25%
(I do know I'm one of the lucky ones, but, it does also influence decisions on changing jobs etc).

Our investments in Latin America and Russia are purely via ISAs from online fund supermarket. Of course these are both high risk funds and you could lose a lot hence I still have a portion in UK funds (Investec UK Smaller Companies). I think I would have a different balance if it were my pension rather than (hopefully) increasing savings.

I'm not sure the idea of somewhere safe to put your pension links quite so well with the risk profile on these funds. Of course, a fund spread over global markets rather than regional may have a better chance of balancing risk and growth?

StuartGMC

kassytbag wrote: »

:beer: Hi stuartgmc - just to let you know i have been using the spreadsheet you sent me and am finding it incredible at sorting my finances out - i am hopeless with spreadsheets but i have really gotten into the swing of it - still trying to understand savings bit - but hey ho!!! the rest of it is brilliant - thanks so much for letting me use it it really is changing the way im dealing with my debt because i feel i now have all the figures at my fingertips
thanks again:T

Kassytbag; pleased to be able to help - gives a good "happiness" quotient ; pity we can't bank those too! :j

The savings tabulations relate to assessment of regular monthly savings with planned growth in contributions (eg year 2 is year1+10%) which can change over time reflecting the usual fact that your salary tends to level out when approaching retirement age (one thing that is a concern with final salary scheme) and you have less disposable income to save. The other columns then relate to the approximation of the annual compound interest earned at a range of rates. You can just delete the sheets as they don't feed back to the actual calculations of your financial position.

Cheers

StuartGMC

A brief update; noting how well many of you do in reduced monthly costs, I've been looking at ours to some degree. Having increased the monthly ISA contribution some 12% I was now pondering what we could do about increasing the overpayment to 56% or even 71% of the monthly payment...

These do produce some very nice improvements in the date we'll clear the mortgage and that would also free up redundancy cover and the life cover insurance on the mortgage per month too. Now I know some will question the redundancy cover, and I may drop it once the economy has sorted itself out late in 2009 and mortgage is lower, but having been through company closure in the last recession I am well aware you can't rely on your company paying anything if they do go bust... kiss goodbye to several months worth of salary you might think is coming your way :mad:

However increasing the overpayments will impact on the rebuilding of our ready access funds :rolleyes:

So, as an interim, I think we'll get some hard data on our routine monthly household spend (food etc) so it is more accurate than the estimate I use presently, plus we may see areas for saving. Petrol costs are always entered in my spreadsheet and it is presently calculating average spend from early-Feb, but I need to move now to April onwards to be sure it matches the accelerating rate of change at the pump. In theory, if OH can capture real data for spend in butcher, supermarket etc I could do a similar real sheet in the spreadsheet so it is a summation rather than just an estimate.

In the meantime, perhaps the simplest move is to continue at 40% overpayment and then additionally pay in the same amount as the interest charged each month :rolleyes:

I guess I should consider myself lucky to have such choices available :rotfl:

setmefree2

For what it's worth, IMHO, you should keep hold of redundancy insurance, for peace of mind if nothng else.:cool: Good Luck with analysing the food shopping.:D

kassytbag

i echo smf2 - peace of mind is worth a lot - good luck with the food shopping - i try so hard but am sick of the kids saying - theres nothing to eat in this house - it can be soul destroying

Courgette

kassytbag wrote: »

i echo smf2 - peace of mind is worth a lot - good luck with the food shopping - i try so hard but am sick of the kids saying - theres nothing to eat in this house - it can be soul destroying

I understand that completely. My son is exactly the same. Last night when we went shopping I gave him a calculator (he's 10) and got him to add up how much we were spending as we went along. This kept him occupied, kept me focussed and I hope began to teach him just how expensive all the little snack things that they like so much actually are. Will have to wait and see whether that is actually the case though :rolleyes:

C

StuartGMC

Had a chat with other half about our spending; we both agree that care is already taken on purchases (i.e. we are not throwing out food) and try to get the balance right on "quality" and price. We also agree that we are not going to live off the ultra-cheap supermarket lines, but rather look to optimise spend (must pop over to the Grocery Challenge area)

However, we will spend the next few months gathering data on spend (and savings made) and my spreadsheet will therefore need another sheet with each expenditure noted (as I already do with my petrol), highlights on cost savings (so we can see these accrue over time) plus breakout across items like:
@ food
@ cleaning and similar products
@ non-alcoholic drinks
@alcoholic drinks...

The latter is a worry; once Airmiles split from NatWest I looked at the points accrued and thought "still can't use them easily" so we bought 72 bottles of wine with free delivery in September. Only problem is last few remain now, so we'll need to actual pay for more!

Also of concern, 95% of the alcohol is for me (love real ale!) and I can already see where pressure will apply for savings....
(ponders "fixing" spreadsheet.... to overcome this "problem")