Life can be expensive.
While savings pots and pension contributions are important when planning for different life stages, exploring the option of investing can be an effective way to help you achieve your financial goals.
Our aim when it comes to investments, is to help make it easy to understand the process. And remember, you don’t need large amounts of cash to get going, making it much more accessible than you might think...
In this article, we explore more about investments - what it means, why it might be a good option for you and the types of investments available...
What does investing mean?
Investing – especially for the first time – can seem daunting and confusing. With interest rates on savings accounts being lower than the inflation rate, building up a diverse investment portfolio could offer much healthier returns and enable you to achieve your financial goals.
When you invest, your money is used to buy different types of assets. These assets are packaged together into funds and portfolios offered to investors by investment managers.
It’s important to remember that investments are not risk-free and you could get back less money than you originally invested.
You should always feel happy with your investment choices in relation to what your current circumstances are and how you see things in the future.
Why invest?
You may invest for a number of reasons:
- Saving for a specific purpose, i.e. retirement, your child’s university fees etc
- Building a pot of money for personal use at a later date - special occasions and holidays, for example
- To help offset the impact of inflation and the cost of living crisis, ensuring that you maintain a good standard of living
Before you invest
Investing is for people with long-term financial goals in mind. This could range from hoping to grow their savings for a house deposit right through to investing with the aim of a more comfortable retirement.
Before you invest, we recommend that you address three key areas:
- You have settled any debt
- You have enough emergency funds (we cannot emphasis this enough!)
- You have adequate protection to cover common risks such as being off work due to sickness or an accident
Types of investment
There are many different ways to invest your money depending on how comfortable you are with risk. Other types of investments include:
- Shares in companies (also known as equities)
- Property
- Bondsand
- Cash
Returns from shares, property and bonds can be from changes to their capital value as well as from the income they produce. Returns from cash are from the interest income only.
Cash should always form part of your savings but long term is guaranteed to reduce purchasing power due to inflation.
We can explain these in more detail and help you choose the right mix of investments tailored to meet your financial circumstances and long-term objectives.
We believe the safest way to invest for the long term is with a well- diversified managed portfolio. This is where working with an experience financial adviser is really beneficial.
What should I invest in?
You may be thinking about choosing your own individual investments to make up your portfolio. However, while there’s lots of investment advice in the market, it tends to be very general in nature.
Your financial adviser will help you understand what investing is, whether it’s appropriate for you, the potential benefits and the risks involved. Most importantly, your adviser will consider how investing fits with your financial plans, your needs and your aspirations for the future.
Accessing my money
If you’ve always saved your money in a bank account, it’s only natural to feel apprehensive about being able to access the money in your investments should you need it.
It’s important to be clear about your requirements from the outset in terms of being able to withdraw your money at any time if your circumstances dictate. There are some types of investment available where your money is tied up for a fixed period of time, it’s important that you feel comfortable with your investment choice.
Investments, such as shares in particular companies, can be volatile over shorter timeframes and checking the status of your investment on a daily basis can be counterproductive.
Finally, before you invest your money, it’s wise to check the fees that are applicable. There may be annual management fees, set-up fees or withdrawal charges included.
We’re here to help
Our role as your Financial Adviser is to understand what you want to achieve, to recommend a suitable portfolio to get you there, and to be by your side through every step of the journey. For more information on investing please call Willow Tree Financial Services on 01323 436680 or email Rachael@willowtree-fs.co.uk.
Investment: at a glance:
The Bank of England base rate has increased in each of the last 13 reviews from its historic low of 0.1% back in November 20211.
The FTSE 100 Index’s yield for 2022 was 3.65%2, which is slightly higher than the historical average yield.
Investing is recommended as a long-term commitment, typically 5-10 years or longer.
1 https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/the-interest-rate-bank-rate
2 http://siblisresearch.com/data/ftse-all-total-return-dividend
3 https://www.gov.uk/government/statistics/annual-savings-statistics-2022/commentary-for-annual-savings-statistics-june-2022
4 https://www.ons.gov.uk/economy/inflationandpriceindices
