How We’re Planning To Invest In Our Future And Pension

If you had asked me a few years ago how we were planning to invest in our future and pension I wouldn’t have had a clue. While I like being prepared and planned it didn’t really extend much further than a year down the line.

Research from the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association showed that 18m (56%) of people saving into a pension was not confident that they were saving enough to let them live the lifestyle they wanted in retirement. And I’m sure a lot of us can relate, especially Millennials and Gen Z. The costs of living in the new are so expensive most of us can’t afford to look into the future.

It suddenly dawned on me the other month that if I started making plans to invest in our future and pension now it would cost less than if I panicked in 10 or 20 years’ time. I’m no financial advisor so I can’t comment on the best ways to save or invest but here’s what we’re doing.

Plans to invest in our future and pension with my workplace pensions

I’ve had pretty crappy workplace pensions ever since they first started. I think I now have 4 in total from various jobs. Two of them are pennies that I put in the absolute minimum. My last one with ASOS was a bit better as I upped the contributions. And my current one has been set up with an increased contribution from day 1. For those of us who are employed a workplace pension is an easy way to start. Most employers will match contributions up to a certain percentage.

I can’t remember what percentage it began on but I’ve increased mine to about 8%. But within the next year, I’d like to up it to 10% once we’re settled in the house and with our finances.  For me to invest in our future and pension I knew I had to up the original contribution as this wouldn’t help us save much. I have a meeting with my current mortgage company in a few months to discuss merging all of my smaller older pensions into my current one. I’m hoping this will make things easier to manage and stop me from losing track.

Stocks and shares ISA

Luke, on the other hand, doesn’t have an employer pension as he’s self-employed. So I started looking into other options for us to invest in our future and pension. My workplace pension alone won’t be enough to support us both. I’ve been thinking a lot about investments lately and as we want to do some long-term stocks and shares seemed like a good idea. Bear in mind I’m no financial advisor. But from what I’ve read it said you can afford to take a bigger gamble if you’re investing longer-term. This means your investment has time to go up and down. Whereas if it’s shorter-term you may not be best to take as much of a gamble.

While I was on Quidco I stumbled across Scottish Friendly who offered stocks and shares ISA which sounded intriguing. If you left your money in for 10 years or more you were guaranteed at least the amount you’d put in back out. This seemed like a bit of a no brainer for me. And meant I could go for a medium risk stock and shares ISA without too much worry.

I started this up last month for a modest amount each month, but it’s always something I can increase a little over time.

Invest in our future and pension with a LISA

The final thing which is on the cards to help us invest in our future and pension is a LISA. This is the one on the list I’ve not set up so I still have some research to do. But the basic of it is a Lifetime ISA (LISA) that allows you to save up to £4,000 a year towards either your first home or retirement. And you get a 25% cash bonus each year on top. So if you save the max you’ll make £1,o00 a year.  This is a long haul savings option as you can only access it when you’re 60. So in another 29/30 years for us.

The amount will be tax-free. And we won’t need to take it all out at once if we don’t want to. So we can withdraw a bit every year or so to cover something we may need/ want to pay for. Again once we’re settled into our house I want to look into the best place to get a LISA. It seems like a great option with Luke being self-employed.

This is how we’re planning to invest in our future and pension. What about you?

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