What’s best for your retirement, BTL or pension?

What’s best for your retirement, BTL or pension?

0:01 AM, 19th April 2024, About 8 months ago 19

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Hello, buy to let was seen as the ideal ‘pension’ investment for those who didn’t have the luxury of a gold-plated public sector or final salary pension. But with landlords now struggling to make a profit, and actually losing money on their BTL investments [despite record rents], many thousands have already exited the PRS, and many more are on the verge of doing so.

That was my plan to supplement my retirement, and while I’ve done OK over the past 25 years, I have more recently experienced a £20,000+ loss due a single feckless tenant, and a remaining BTL I cannot remortgage due to capital depreciation attributable to leasehold [I know, I shouldn’t have!], leaving me on a high variable which means I am currently subsidising my tenant.

We appear to have baked in a future Labour government, with an unassailable majority to do whatever it wants, and landlords have always been top of their list for Madame Guillotine ‘come the revolution’. So, where next for your pension investment?

This annual research has been published by Netwealth who, admittedly, have a vested interest. However, their reasoning is solid, especially for those not in the fortunate position of having achieved significant capital appreciation over the years, and those currently considering investing in the PRS for their pension. This Moneyweek article explains more.

Of course, there are alternative tax-efficient investment options e.g. ISAs, and if you still believe in the PRS as a long term investment but don’t want to invest direct in your own bricks and mortar, you could consider a REIT.

Now I’ve retired, the key for me is diversification, and I’m doing them all.

What do others think?

Thank you,

Lou


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geester24

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18:57 PM, 19th April 2024, About 8 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Ed Regent at 19/04/2024 - 17:59
Yes it is. Statistics damned lies and statistics. My graphs say different.
https://money.com/gold-vs-stocks-performance/

geester24

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18:58 PM, 19th April 2024, About 8 months ago

Michael Booth

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19:58 PM, 19th April 2024, About 8 months ago

If you can get ya pension money and invest in into buy to let all day ,a colleague of mine a relatively famous footballer in the 80s and 90s did exactly that he said it was the best thing he did but you need to pay cash no mortgages other wise you are open to the perils of interest.

Ed Regent

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20:27 PM, 19th April 2024, About 8 months ago

Reply to the comment left by geester24 at 19/04/2024 - 18:57
Article you link to say gold outperformed S&P this year to date anyway, and that is when it was at '5,215'. You may have seen that it's now at circa 4700. I know where I prefer to keep some savings.. sound money, trusted for thousands of years = Gold, gold mining shares, royalty cos. We can revisit in 12 months and see where we are.

Lisa008

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9:14 AM, 20th April 2024, About 8 months ago

I think the property market has changed a lot over the last 10 years... from the 2000s onwards it was sold (I think) like a retirement plan and an answer to passive income... but now, with all these punitive changes - it's not as 'profitable' as it used to be, and noone ever factors in the 'management' aspect of it. All of that is now more expensive... labour and materials for repairs, epcs, electric certificates, gas certificats etc., its a lot of admin.

The beauty of shares and a pension is that is it entirely hands-off... but with property people were remortgaging and benefting from taking that money out and doing stuff with it - thus leveraging the asset. I think it all depends on your situation but if I was in my 60s, I'd probably be looking at winding down a portfolio and only keeping the best ones... and then diversifying into other things... I think bitcoin will do well in the short term, investing in businesses - but I wouldn't have all my eggs in property.... landlordsexodus.com and sites like that are popping up everywhere because they know the writing is on the wall and people need to find alternatives to 'just property'... its not what it used to be... and the 'good old days' are not coming back... hedge your bets and rebalance your portfolios accordingly!!

GlanACC

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8:35 AM, 21st April 2024, About 8 months ago

I went into BTL for my pension (over 20 years ago), but my other small business is still going and I am living quite comfortably off that. So I neither need my BTL investments or my private pension pot. I would advise anyone in BTL to have a plan B in case things go wrong (as they have done twice now in the past 20 years)

Andrea

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9:26 AM, 22nd April 2024, About 8 months ago

Hi all what do you think about rent to another company to rent on serviced accommodations so it's hands off, I have 2 flats in one house and had a couple of nightmare tenants looking for best way forward as I'm nearing retirement but need the passive income also have another flat but they are long term so for now ok

NewYorkie

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11:19 AM, 22nd April 2024, About 8 months ago

Reply to the comment left by Andrea at 22/04/2024 - 09:26
I am retired, and after a very bad experience, no longer want any management involvement.

If you are proposing to let to a company, who will then let it to someone else. I wouldn't recommend it! Why not simply use an agent?

GlanACC

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15:18 PM, 22nd April 2024, About 8 months ago

Reply to the comment left by NewYorkie at 22/04/2024 - 11:19
Andrea, so then you will have 2 problems - dealing with the company and potentially dealing with the tenant when the company doesn't.

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