Long term savings advice

[rhinochopig]

We've just acquired a lawn-chimp, so I would like to set up an account to cover university fees when he hits 18 (or a new car if he doesn't want to do the uni thing).

There is a lot of conflicting advice around at the moment, so I was hoping that someone on PH might have found the most effective way of doing this?

Any tips gratefully received.

Thanks

[Brown and Boris]

rhinochopig said:

We've just acquired a lawn-chimp, so I would like to set up an account to cover university fees when he hits 18 (or a new car if he doesn't want to do the uni thing).

There is a lot of conflicting advice around at the moment, so I was hoping that someone on PH might have found the most effective way of doing this?

Any tips gratefully received.

Thanks

I starting putting just £20 a month in a savings account when my son was 8. 10 years later (about 8 years ago) it was worth about £3K which he wasted chasing some girl around the world (is that wasted?).

If I was doing it again I would go with equities over the long term: simple FTSE tracking with low fees. There was a post the other day that the research suggests that long term, even more expensive managed funds do no better than those which track the FTSE closely.

I am sure there are specialist products that make the most of the tax position if the saving is 15 years plus and destined for school/uni fees.

[rhinochopig]

Brown and Boris said:

rhinochopig said:

We've just acquired a lawn-chimp, so I would like to set up an account to cover university fees when he hits 18 (or a new car if he doesn't want to do the uni thing).

There is a lot of conflicting advice around at the moment, so I was hoping that someone on PH might have found the most effective way of doing this?

Any tips gratefully received.

Thanks

I starting putting just £20 a month in a savings account when my son was 8. 10 years later (about 8 years ago) it was worth about £3K which he wasted chasing some girl around the world (is that wasted?).

If I was doing it again I would go with equities over the long term: simple FTSE tracking with low fees. There was a post the other day that the research suggests that long term, even more expensive managed funds do no better than those which track the FTSE closely.

I am sure there are specialist products that make the most of the tax position if the saving is 15 years plus and destined for school/uni fees.

Depends - did he get the girl?

Cheers B&B!

[Brown and Boris]

rhinochopig said:

Brown and Boris said:

rhinochopig said:

We've just acquired a lawn-chimp, so I would like to set up an account to cover university fees when he hits 18 (or a new car if he doesn't want to do the uni thing).

There is a lot of conflicting advice around at the moment, so I was hoping that someone on PH might have found the most effective way of doing this?

Any tips gratefully received.

Thanks

I starting putting just £20 a month in a savings account when my son was 8. 10 years later (about 8 years ago) it was worth about £3K which he wasted chasing some girl around the world (is that wasted?).

If I was doing it again I would go with equities over the long term: simple FTSE tracking with low fees. There was a post the other day that the research suggests that long term, even more expensive managed funds do no better than those which track the FTSE closely.

I am sure there are specialist products that make the most of the tax position if the saving is 15 years plus and destined for school/uni fees.

Depends - did he get the girl?

Cheers B&B!

No, just a summer fling thing. First year at uni went to Canada for Christmas with her, summer loving and a new girl for the new academic year who he followed around Europe, then a Japanese American girl he was all for leaving the country for.

[minerva]

Good lad. Sounds like he had a great time. Three of them and it only cost a grand apiece! Bargin!

[ukshooter]

[/quote]

I starting putting just £20 a month in a savings account when my son was 8. 10 years later (about 8 years ago) it was worth about £3K which he wasted chasing some girl around the world (is that wasted?).

If I was doing it again I would go with equities over the long term: simple FTSE tracking with low fees. There was a post the other day that the research suggests that long term, even more expensive managed funds do no better than those which track the FTSE closely.

I am sure there are specialist products that make the most of the tax position if the saving is 15 years plus and destined for school/uni fees.
[/quote]

What research? The 10 year performance of the FTSE100 to end of April 2009 is -10.7%. I am looking at unit trust returns of 109.8% and 66.6% from managers of our UK funds over the same 10 year period to end of April 2009 (source: Lipper Hindsight). Yes there are plenty of managers that underperform and that is why you need to look not at the fund management companies but the individual managers when it comes to making investment decisions.

The old chesnut of expensive managers doing no better really doesn't hold water when actually looked into. We are considered expensive but in relation to value for money we come out quite well because of the over-performance. Maybe that's why we keep winning awards for wealth management (even during the bad times!)