I was recently asked how much should I save and how much is enough?
The simple anwer is, whatever you can afford – save and in my book that means invest. The exception is a pot of cash for unexpected eventualities and known commitments.
The whole idea of saving and investing is for money to grow in value at a greater rate than inflation, otherwise in real terms you are losing money. What you think of as your target growth rate and risk profile is a personal matter.
You must be realistic and be aware that the higher the possible returns, the more risk and volatility you will be requested to accept. Also, more risk does not automatically mean higher returns. What it means is more risk the higher range of returns, so you could lose or gain more but there are no guarantees. My role as your financial adviser is to guide, inform and advise you on this as it will have a serious effect on the potential outcome. So, planning, reviews and planning agian is paramount.
So where to start?
OK, this may well be different depending your stage of life.
Pre-retirement is all about accumulating wealth for self (you and possibly spouse) and family. You need to accumulate for when one day you stop working, so in most cases this is Pension Planning, ISAs, EISs, VCTs, Collectives amd possibly Investment Bonds; and of course the clearing all debts. This is so, when children go to University, need a deposit for their first flat, get married, first car, start a buiness or whatever else then, as with all us parents, we help. And one day, when it’s time to retire, we have sufficient wealth to support and fund the rest of our lives to the standard we had planned.
There are two key important factors, firstly you only get what you put in; and secondly, you need to make sure whoever looks after your investments help them to grow. We are talking effective wealth management. If you only hear from people annually or worse, never then it is fair to say they aren’t managing but they maybe being paid for the “service” they are not providing.
Post-retirement is all about wealth preservation with the target of sustaineable and growing income over time but most importantly protecting the underlying value of the investments.
The key factor being, you need to make sure whoever looks after your investments takes a suitable approach/strategy to help sustain and hopefully grow the investments. You will recognise this comment from above – we are talking effective wealth management. If you only hear from people annually or worse, never then it is fair to say they aren’t managing but they maybe being paid for the “service” they are not providing.
Here are some simple concepts :-
If you invest £500 per month and just make 5% per annum, compounded annually :-
- 20 years – you would have invested £120,000 and be valued at £203,728.89
- 25 years – you would have invested £150,000 and be valued at £294,060.44
- 30 years – you would have invested £180,000 and be valued at £409,348.92
If you invest £3,000 per month and just make 6% per annum, compounded annually :-
- 10 years – you would have invested £360,000 and be valued at £489,792.87
- 20 years – you would have invested £720,000 and be valued at £1,366,937.30
- 30 years – you would have invested £1,080,000 and be valued at £2,937,769.39
If you invest £100,000 and just make 5% per annum, compounded annually :-
- 5 years – valued at £127,628.20
- 10 years – valued at £162,889.50
- 20 years – valued at £265,329.80
If you invest £500,000 and just make 6% per annum, compounded annually :-
- 3 years – valued at £595,508.00
- 5 years – valued at £669,112.80
- 10 years – valued at £895,423.80
All you need now is your investment adviser to make in excess of 5% or 6%, to make these figures come true. Also, if we look at the last decade, the figures could be far superior to these.
Should you have any questions or want my help, my email address is :- welshmoneywiz@virginmedia.com
welshmoneywiz 
Leave a Reply