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House Price Crash Forum

1/3 have no Pension Savings


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HOLA441
Guest TheBlueCat
6 hours ago, doomed said:

Well just take it off the ones that have saved and redistribute it in the name of fairness.

That's the one - and it largely explains why so many people voted for Corbyn at the last election. 

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HOLA442

I have heard some stories recently re offers to exit private defined benefit schemes. Transfer values were insane multiples of the annual  pension! 40x Unfortunately also IFA sign off required but people could not get the sign offs. I know they had to shut down defined benefit transfers out of public sector schemes!

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HOLA443
3 minutes ago, Ash4781 said:

I have heard some stories recently re offers to exit private defined benefit schemes. Transfer values were insane multiples of the annual  pension! 40x Unfortunately also IFA sign off required but people could not get the sign offs. I know they had to shut down defined benefit transfers out of public sector schemes!

I worked for a bank from 2000 for 6 years earning £20k ish (age 23 to 29). I've just transferred out my final salary pension... £80k lump sum into my SIPP!

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HOLA444

I worked for a company for four years between 1974 and 1978 and paid 5% of my salary into the company's pension scheme, which was compulsory. The company has been taken over and merged many times since then and when I finally tracked it down and spoke to their FD, she was very sympathetic but couldn't help as they did not take over the pension scheme.

Not the end of the world, but it should have been worth a few grand some forty years later.

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HOLA445
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HOLA446
31 minutes ago, Bruce Banner said:

I worked for a company for four years between 1974 and 1978 and paid 5% of my salary into the company's pension scheme, which was compulsory. The company has been taken over and merged many times since then and when I finally tracked it down and spoke to their FD, she was very sympathetic but couldn't help as they did not take over the pension scheme.

Not the end of the world, but it should have been worth a few grand some forty years later.

https://www.gov.uk/government/news/new-pension-tracing-service-website-launched

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HOLA447
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HOLA448

My dad did the right thing - saved in savings accounts and saved for a pension.

And now £600 of it a month is going on home helps - if he had no savings he would be getting it all for free.  

Saving is seen as a bad thing these days - you should be spending and borrowing. So why would most people bother - spend it before the government takes it anyway! 

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HOLA449
1 hour ago, ThePiltdownMan said:

That's assuming the benefits system of a few decades ahead will resemble what we have now. I wouldn't bank on it. 

This is very true, my own calculations have always included a decade of Tory rule now, 2020s Labour and by the 2030s a Tory government with a mandate to strip the welfare state back to the bone. 

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HOLA4410
7 hours ago, frankief said:

In the end,a lot of people say to themselves 'I may as well spend my hard earned money now, at least I know where it is going and I will look to the state to support me in old age'.

Ha, that's pretty much the same as public sector employees who will get two state pensions, their employment pension "pots" and "savings" only exist as entries in a spread sheet.

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HOLA4411
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HOLA4412
1 hour ago, MARTINX9 said:

My dad did the right thing - saved in savings accounts and saved for a pension.

And now £600 of it a month is going on home helps - if he had no savings he would be getting it all for free.  

Saving is seen as a bad thing these days - you should be spending and borrowing. So why would most people bother - spend it before the government takes it anyway! 

And the feckless shall inherit The Earth :(.

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HOLA4413
7 hours ago, spyguy said:

Well...

Number of issues /points.

As you get older, you spend less.

Id not like stop work friday and retire monday.

Im hoping to have a staged retirement, having the last 20 years working say 20h/w and not 52w/y.

I kniw its hard for most people. Im planning on moving self employed.

Well I’d say yes in terms of retirement run up, but not in terms of your 20s to 40s and marriage, kids and mortgage etc.

My household is currently at peak spend - but that is what you get with a working wife, 2 kids under 7, private school fees and a nanny!

 

 

 

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HOLA4414
4 hours ago, Bruce Banner said:

I worked for a company for four years between 1974 and 1978 and paid 5% of my salary into the company's pension scheme, which was compulsory. The company has been taken over and merged many times since then and when I finally tracked it down and spoke to their FD, she was very sympathetic but couldn't help as they did not take over the pension scheme.

Not the end of the world, but it should have been worth a few grand some forty years later.

Well, I think you should be able to and entitled to find it! Was it DB or DC?

 

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HOLA4415
10 hours ago, stormymonday_2011 said:

I think one of the reasons most of the public sector has stayed away from DC schemes is that the state as an employer would actually have to pay real money into them now rather than simply shuffling the liability onto future generations of taxpayers. For example as far as I am aware  in the Civil Service only the employees actually pays any  real cash contributions and those are not in a fund but simply swallowed by the state into the general budget.

Since when did they care about this?

Given national debt keeps rising I'm guessing it was around about a quarter past never..

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HOLA4416
1 hour ago, Mikhail Liebenstein said:

Well, I think you should be able to and entitled to find it! Was it DB or DC?

 

I've no idea, I was a child, a 23 year old sales manager who was going to live for ever and it annoyed me that I had to give up 5% of my salary for something so far in the future. It annoys me even more now.

I'm certainly entitled to it, I only wish I could find it. I took it a lot further that the pension tracing service but to no avail.

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HOLA4417
1 hour ago, Bruce Banner said:

I've no idea, I was a child, a 23 year old sales manager who was going to live for ever and it annoyed me that I had to give up 5% of my salary for something so far in the future. It annoys me even more now.

I'm certainly entitled to it, I only wish I could find it. I took it a lot further that the pension tracing service but to no avail.

That must be really annoying.  I’d have thought it would be worth something now, especially given interest rates/growth over the time periods.

Do you know the names of any old colleagues there, in case they know? 

Even if the scheme went bust, if it may have been previously transferred and might be covered by a protection scheme.

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HOLA4418
42 minutes ago, Mikhail Liebenstein said:

That must be really annoying.  I’d have thought it would be worth something now, especially given interest rates/growth over the time periods.

Do you know the names of any old colleagues there, in case they know? 

Even if the scheme went bust, if it may have been previously transferred and might be covered by a protection scheme.

I phoned my old boss, the ex sales director, ten years ago, when I retired and bought an annuity with my main pension pot. He was receiving a pension and he knew that the old technical manager was too but they were both in their seventies and had been drawing their pensions for years, recently paid, I think, by a company that took over the pensions for existing pensioners. It looks like I missed the boat by twenty odd years. I'm not going to phone him again as he must be in his late 80s now. 

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HOLA4419
10 hours ago, Bruce Banner said:

I've no idea, I was a child, a 23 year old sales manager who was going to live for ever and it annoyed me that I had to give up 5% of my salary for something so far in the future. It annoys me even more now.

I'm certainly entitled to it, I only wish I could find it. I took it a lot further that the pension tracing service but to no avail.

Pay a specialist to track it down. 

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HOLA4420
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HOLA4421
17 hours ago, anonlymouse said:

With a bit of diligence that's easily achievable. State pension is ~£6,500 per year, so that leaves ~£8,500 to find yourself.

Any reasonable (index equities and bonds) portfolio should allow you to draw down about 2-3% per year whilst preserving value against inflation. That means you need a pension pot of about £285,000.

Assuming the FTSE continues to grow at an average of 7% per year, someone on the median salary of £23600 has to invest £65 a month for 45 years to achieve a pension pot of £300k if they increase their contributions in line with inflation. That's 3% of their salary.

In fact, soon enough the government will make it mandatory for employees to pay in a  minimum of 5% of their salary into a pension, and for employers to match that up to 3%. Someone on the median salary will end up with a private pension pot of over £300k even if they never get a pay rise.

 

 

The FTSE does not reliably grow at 7% a year - it took 16 years to get back to its 1999 highs - a long time in any career.

Stockmarkets are pretty irrational and the thing that concerns me is not so much the entry cost (pound cost averaging means it's not an issue) but the exit price. I know you are meant to transition to fixed income in the decade approaching retirement, but that would not have helped you had you been 55 in 2007.

 Re-investing dividends you will get closer to it but we should also remember the eroding effects of inflation and management charges. 

Also, worth remembering that the FTSE 250 outperforms the 100.

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HOLA4422
8 minutes ago, Bruce Banner said:

Can you recommend one?

 

Afraid not, but there seem to be a number of companies that will help, presumably for a charge. 

There will be a paper trail showing what happened to your pension and someone will follow it if you pay. 

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HOLA4423
13 minutes ago, Ah-so said:

The FTSE does not reliably grow at 7% a year - it took 16 years to get back to its 1999 highs - a long time in any career.

Re-investing dividends you will get closer to it but we should also remember the eroding effects of inflation and management charges. 

Also, worth remembering that the FTSE 250 outperforms the 100.

Totally agree but over the length of a career - 45 years - you'll see a few boom and busts but ought to have average compound annual growth in that region. If you can put away as little as 1/20th of your salary to ensure a comfortable retirement then I don't think there spoke be excuses as to why that hasn't happened. 

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HOLA4424
26 minutes ago, anonlymouse said:

Totally agree but over the length of a career

You do realise that most people don't have a 'career' any more? They just have lots of different jobs, redundancies etc with most lucky to stay in any one place more than 2 years.

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HOLA4425
1 hour ago, anonlymouse said:

Totally agree but over the length of a career - 45 years - you'll see a few boom and busts but ought to have average compound annual growth in that region. If you can put away as little as 1/20th of your salary to ensure a comfortable retirement then I don't think there spoke be excuses as to why that hasn't happened. 

People are best able to realise the benefits of compound growth when they are young - under 30. But in reality they are usually broke at that age and may have other commitments. For most, the rapid pension build up happens in the years after 40 when earnings peak and other costs reduce. 

1/20 of your salary seems way too little if you want to build up say £400,000 minimum. 

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