What's your pension plan in these uncertain times ?

[Catweazle]

There's an interesting article in Moneyweek about UK property.

 

http://www.moneyweek.com/investments/property/uk/property-market-libdems-pensions-for-houses-60700

 

Here's a part of it:

 

The truth about UK property

 

 

What’s at the heart of this nonsense?

The BBC complains that “the size of deposits has risen in recent years, as banks have become less willing to issue mortgages.” It’s as though the banks – the rotten brutes - are deliberately spoiling everyone’s chances of getting on the great British property ladder.

Yet five years ago, almost to the day, people were queuing up outside Northern Rock, concerned they might never see their savings again. Northern Rock was also the champion of the 125% home loan. Those two facts are not unrelated.

The financial crisis was caused largely by banks in various parts of the world being too lax with lending standards. They have now reined things in for several reasons.

Firstly, regulators are telling them to. Secondly, they still have lots of bad loans and potential bad loans on their balance sheets, so the last thing they want is even more. And thirdly, they recognise that right now, British property is a risky, poor-value investment. So they want the potential homeowner to take on a big chunk of that risk – in the form of a healthy deposit - before they’ll get involved.

Normally this would have already resulted in a correction. And in many areas it has. The main reason that prices remain so expensive in some areas, and haven’t fallen further in others, is that the Bank of England is doing all it can to prop the housing market up. It knows the banks would be insolvent if it crashed.

So now we’re left in the ridiculous situation where the government would rather find some convoluted way to get the older generation to pay for the younger to ‘get on the ladder’, than allow a healthy correction to bring prices back to reasonable levels.

It’s a ponzi scheme on a national scale. Granny takes her pension and uses it to pay her grandkid’s deposit. After all, she’s already ‘made’ money on her house. But what happens when we all run out of liquid assets, and each of us is sitting in an expensive house with no disposable income in our pockets?

This pathetic obsession with property has to end. Until it does, Britain will continue to lag behind in the recovery stakes. Loopy schemes like this are often the sorts of things you see at the top of the market. Let’s hope this is the last we hear of it.

[la bala]

die early, job sorted.

[lumpy]

Gonna hit the tanning salon and then change my name to Adul Ramjad guaranteed way to get a free house and an income

Edited September 25, 2012 by lumpy

[storme37]

die early, job sorted.

http://www.dignitas.ch/index.php?lang=en may cost you your pension

[onefulham]

Marry a woman 14 years younger than yourself, that's what I have done, keeping her working should see me OK for quite a while after I give up 😊

[Spoonbed]

If the turkeys ever get round to voting for christmas( seeing as a lot of MP's have a property portfolio), I think , and hope, that there may be an increase in BTL's tax liabilities.

 

My own personal feeling is that BTL'S are borderline immoral. It is pricing out a huge proportion of first time buyers, and will help fuel the fire of the youngs sense of injustice.

 

 

[Cosd]

If the turkeys ever get round to voting for christmas( seeing as a lot of MP's have a property portfolio), I think , and hope, that there may be an increase in BTL's tax liabilities.

 

My own personal feeling is that BTL'S are borderline immoral. It is pricing out a huge proportion of first time buyers, and will help fuel the fire of the youngs sense of injustice.

 

Immoral!

People don't only rent because they can't afford to buy, the long term commitment of home ownership and short term requirement is a major part on renting.

At the moment I'm a landlord in a couple of years when my girls go to university I'm going to be looking to rent for them!

 

There are enough taxes taken on earnings already don't you think?

 

Cos

Edited September 25, 2012 by Cosd

[daz2202]

I did wonder if a pension was the be all and end all of things ....... I guess they are great if you don't become ill

 

my dear old mum worked all her life as a nurse, reaching the same rank as matron, she saved hard and bought a 2nd house to get a little extra income, sadly she now has Alzhimers and the care home takes all her pension and the rent she now gets from both houses...

 

her twin sister who is also with mum with the same condition get her care free..she signed over everything to her kids over 7 years ago .......... I guess the bigger your pension, the less they can take from the house

 

stay healthy folk

 

Jasper

 

Same boat as you, Your story is almost identical to mine.

 

So my answer to all is 'Live for today, and worry about tommorow, tommorow'

 

 

daz

[Catweazle]

It's difficult to know where to put your savings at the moment, interest rates are low and I reckon desperate governments will try to get as much off people as possible in the next ten years. The Bank of England will try hard to preserve house prices, but it's a bubble that has to burst one day and when it does the UK banks could be insolvent.

 

Even Gold is risky, there is talk that much of government reserves is actually fake tungsten filled bars, some were found in a US reserve bank last year and now they're turning up in smaller dealers. Apparently the US made a load of fakes to sell to USSR in the cold war and these have been slipping into government reserves worldwide.

 

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-09-23/gold-counterfeiting-goes-viral-10-tungsten-filled-gold-bars-are-discovered-manhattan

 

Chinese companies are openly advertising fake bullion for "novelty use" and even include instructions on how to cast gold around tungsten to make it undetectable by x-ray

 

http://tungsten-alloy.com/gold-plated-tungsten-alloy-bar.html

 

All very worrying.

[Laird Lugton]

 

 

Jasper

 

Same boat as you, Your story is almost identical to mine.

 

So my answer to all is 'Live for today, and worry about tommorow, tommorow'

 

 

daz

 

To a point I agree with you as their is no incentive for saving.

[Spoonbed]

 

 

Immoral!

People don't only rent because they can't afford to buy, the long term commitment of home ownership and short term requirement is a major part on renting.

At the moment I'm a landlord in a couple of years when my girls go to university I'm going to be looking to rent for them!

 

There are enough taxes taken on earnings already don't you think?

 

Cos

 

The thing is, in a few years when your girls leave uni' are they likely to be able to look to purchase the average FTB house?£50k deposit 4x salary?

 

That is what BTL, slack lending practices, Gordon Brown and Merv the Swerve King have led us to.

 

[pimpkiller]

theres government advertisements everywhere at the mo for pensions so id definitely run the other way. I wouldnt trust anyone with my money, if i had any.

[UKPoacher]

Fortunate enough to have retired from the police before they closed the doors. My pension isn't great, £12,000 p.a. after tax, but the lump sum and equity from the house is invested giving another £5,000 p.a and little wife has a private pension adding another £2,000 p.a. We sold up in the UK and moved to France where the cost of living is significantly cheaper. Rent is 500 Euros a month including logs for the fire, and we have no water rates. We live frugally, one car and no loans or credit cards. So far, we haven't had to dip into the invested cash and we had planned for up to £3,000 p.a. to be drawn out if necessary. We've got ten years before the State Pension is supposed to kick in. That will give us a good boost.

 

My wife did a financial assessment and is satisfied that we are doing OK. Any surplus gets invested in cash ISAs then into shares ISAs to maximise the tax free returns. If you buy shares in companies such as Sainsburys or Centrica you should get a steady rise in value and an annual dividend that is more than bank interest.

 

I wouldn't advise anyone relying on buy to let. I've seen too many horror stories where tenants have trashed houses, disappeared leaving unpaid rent and people without tenants for months due to the surplus of unrented properties on the market. I've got friends who have made a fortune renting properties, but eve they say the market isn't worth getting into these days.

[Chris Bb]

I wouldn't advise anyone relying on buy to let. I've seen too many horror stories where tenants have trashed houses, disappeared leaving unpaid rent and people without tenants for months due to the surplus of unrented properties on the market. I've got friends who have made a fortune renting properties, but eve they say the market isn't worth getting into these days.

 

Well, we got the scum out of our flat yesterday. A flat that's less than a year old. TRASHED. £800 deposit won't even pay for the redecoration, let alone the carpets, fridge/freezer (how do you ruin a fridge/freezer in only 4 months?), lino in bathrooms & kitchen (covered in hair dye), kithen fittings, plaster, etc., etc.. In a cupboard under the sink there was a bag of poatoes that had turned to liquid, truely these people were low life, radiators had biscuits and other items stuffed into them, words fail me. Even the curtain poles were damaged, it must have been children swinging on the curtains. Sellotape on the ceilings!?!?!?! Also we now have a pre-payment electric meter (we understand that they didn't pay their utility bills + they've done a runner) which will cost us to get replaced with a "proper" meter suitable for future tenants.

 

Hey, and guess what? Our landlord insurance doesn't cover any of this!

 

So, beware. We're going to give it another go but with another agent (mainly because we'd lose so much if we tried to sell) and will be attempting to sue the current agent for (finding the tenants from hell) any loss over and above the deposit. We've learned the hard way that this is a business, don't get emotionally involved & don't try to be Mr Nice Guy to tenants, they'll still **** on you from a height.

[Bluebarrels]

Thats right chris Bb some right scum about these people must live like pigs my mate let his house out down in Plymouth,he went back to check one weekend and they had flitted taking all internal fittings,bath ,sink,kitchen,toilets,carpets,internal doors the whole lot he got paid out on the insurance eventually,good luck with getting yours sorted BB

Edited September 28, 2012 by Bluebarrels