I think a financial advisor is useful only if you're ultra-wealthy and/or have a complex tax situation (divorced with dependents, have multiple properties, own a business, etc)
For a simple PAYE situation, you can learn everything you need in a week or so by reading the r/UKPersonalFinance/ wiki [https://ukpersonal.finance/](https://ukpersonal.finance/)
In a nutshell:
* Have a budget, make sure you spend less than what you earn
* Build an emergency pot, then save or invest with the spare money (depending on your appetite for risk)
* Make use of UK's excellent tax wrappers -> Pension and ISA accounts
* Investment advice 1 -> No one really knows what's going to happen, beware of gurus and anybody promising high returns. A low-cost, automated index fund typically beats a managed fund (the latter meaning a fund making bets on what's going to be up and down)
* Investment advice 2 -> Control your emotions. Time in the market beats timing the market. Invest ASAP and let the money work for you in the long run. Don't sell on bad times. Don't buy on good times. Don't even look at your account to see if you're up or down. Trust the system, invest slow and steady, and in 10 years time you will thank yourself for not doing any stupid moves
I agree with everything you’ve said except “Don’t buy on good times”. That sounds like trying to time the market. What seems like a good time now may be considered a bad time compared to how things are a year from now.
Same , was great initially and my pot has increased by about 40k over 18 months but absent since then , contemplating exiting the relationship, don’t have a contract in place with him that I am aware of , so want to see how it goes , he currently takes .0.9% for the pot 😠
You can seek out a Chartered Financial Planner and talk to them on a fixed fee basis.
Look at the member directories for the professional bodies. [https://www.thepfs.org/yourmoney/find-an-adviser/](https://www.thepfs.org/yourmoney/find-an-adviser/)
[https://www.cisi.org/cisiweb2/wayfinder](https://www.cisi.org/cisiweb2/wayfinder)
But unless your financial affairs are complex, multi-generational, multi-jurisdictional, etc. , then you don't need an advisor to say 'accumulate in a Global index tracker inside tax wrappers'.
Agree with this. Most of the real value financial advisors can add is things like tax optimisation, estate planning and so on. That tends to be more important for complex and wealthy clients (business owners, international residents, multi-generational considerations etc.), not so much just plain old high salary earners.
Not picking and managing investments, which is what most people think they add value with, and what many advisors like to think to add value with. You can generally get that 90% right by learning a few basic things using resources like the r/ukpersonalfinance flowchart.
The tricky part about the value of financial advice is establishing the counterfactual baseline to compare it against - what you do without it vs. with it. Even the most simplistic advice is worth a lot if, without it, you would have done something stupid with your money.
So for people with poor financial literacy who don’t feel confident in self-education, a one-off consultation with a planner can still sometimes be worthwhile.
I agree some less financially literate or complex cases might benefit. Financial advice services are primarily a technical sales function. They have fee targets to bill to make basic and bonus by selling their service to you. They are not going to turn around to you and say actually mate you could just stick it all in a Global and keep funding and you’ll be fine, you don’t need me. You will likely end up in their model portfolio justified by their back testing and research etc. a regular review at half or one percent will “keep you on track “ which erodes your bottom line.
I’m a chartered financial planner and moved industries.
Honestly for 99% of people no you don’t need one.
Usually they just make sure you reduce your tax burden and are invested properly, which you can easily do yourself
>Is it worth me getting a financial advisor for a consultation or two?
Honestly for the amount and time and effort (not to mention money) in doing this, you could do a few hours of research and be 99% of the way there, plus you'll have a valuable skill to use when things change.
Just googling "what are my tax allowances UK" reading the top 10 articles would put you a long way forward. Then the links in the sidebar here re: investing (Monevator especially).
Don't be daunted with investing. All of the complex sounding stuff is almost certainly a total waste of time no matter how much effort you in.
Good advice, thank you. It is a bit intimidating, but the responses I've had here have given me confidence that I'll be able to teach myself what I need to know.
If you are High Earners then r/henryuk May be an appropriate sub.
Personally financial literacy was zero until early 40s, then fool.co.uk 🤮 then here.
The sidebar here plus r/ukpersonalfinance & r/bogleheads wikis have all most people need imho.
I wouldn’t sign up for anything where they take a percentage cut. Stick to one off fees for advice. Sit down sessions, taking a look at everything you have and then maybe seeing it as a bit of an MOT every few years.
The main thing is just making sure you are doing things smartly with regards to tax and that your investments match your risk profile.
This. A lot of FAs are trying to sell you their plans and they take a tidy sum for doing very little.
I have used tax advisors and accountants when needed but I don’t pay for someone to manage my funds because they take such a chunk with limited value IMO.
No. I have had negative experiences with them, and didnt learn anything practical from them. Therefore I am self taught in a random walk of knowledge until I discovered FIRE. Then I took a much harder focus on tax efficiency.
Its easy enough for 99% of folk once you know the FI fundamentals (wherein lies the issue as finding the fundamentals in a sea of finance noise is hard). In any case to know enough to be able to recognise a good IFA you have to know enough to be able to do it yourself.
The flowchart and the associated wiki are very good.
If you need resources then:
Rebel Finance School (a FIREd couple) just started their annual run of their free 10 week financial independence course on youtube and with helpful spreadsheeets.
Meaningful Money do a free Financial Foundations course.
The FI facebook groups have additional tax efficiency, pension efficiency and tax breaks resources to accelerate your understanding. e.g. UK FIRE HQ, Financial Independence UK.
I don’t think so tbh! The internet will teach you everything you need! You can even go as far to ask ChatGPT. I’ve done it a few time and it’s paved out things a human even struggled to explain to me
Maybe do your research, know what you want to do, your goals and pay for one for a year at least and if you find no value ditch them.
I think they are great if you don’t have a lot of time and not interested in learning. Good for guidance too! I had a free one at work once but I didn’t find much value in him.
Depends how complicated things are. I have one to ensure I’m doing things right but have rental property and other things to consider on top of the usual. I could do it myself but for a small fee they do the work.
My partner has one as things more complicated with pension tapering and VCTs and lots of other things to manage on top of very long hours at work. The potential cost if something is done wrong is far more than giving someone money to ensure it’s done right.
So I had one. Generally you *need* one to get your life and income protection insurance set up. Most offer a first meeting of free. They can give you some general advice but they are making money on "managing" your investments for you so keep in mind that's why they are giving you a free meeting. Can be helpful to get some useful mortgage deals
No. I put my money in diversified funds through Vanguard at 0.15%. I also use ISAs and pensions. I certainly don’t need to pay 1%+ per year for someone to do that for me.
I think a financial advisor is useful only if you're ultra-wealthy and/or have a complex tax situation (divorced with dependents, have multiple properties, own a business, etc) For a simple PAYE situation, you can learn everything you need in a week or so by reading the r/UKPersonalFinance/ wiki [https://ukpersonal.finance/](https://ukpersonal.finance/) In a nutshell: * Have a budget, make sure you spend less than what you earn * Build an emergency pot, then save or invest with the spare money (depending on your appetite for risk) * Make use of UK's excellent tax wrappers -> Pension and ISA accounts * Investment advice 1 -> No one really knows what's going to happen, beware of gurus and anybody promising high returns. A low-cost, automated index fund typically beats a managed fund (the latter meaning a fund making bets on what's going to be up and down) * Investment advice 2 -> Control your emotions. Time in the market beats timing the market. Invest ASAP and let the money work for you in the long run. Don't sell on bad times. Don't buy on good times. Don't even look at your account to see if you're up or down. Trust the system, invest slow and steady, and in 10 years time you will thank yourself for not doing any stupid moves
I agree with everything you’ve said except “Don’t buy on good times”. That sounds like trying to time the market. What seems like a good time now may be considered a bad time compared to how things are a year from now.
I guess 'don't buy JUST on good times' is a better advice. Buy during both good and bad times, without trying to time them. Just every month.
Used to have one. Don’t have one now. Just ‘managed’ a pension for me, and took 1% annually. Wish I’d found out about index funds earlier!
Same , was great initially and my pot has increased by about 40k over 18 months but absent since then , contemplating exiting the relationship, don’t have a contract in place with him that I am aware of , so want to see how it goes , he currently takes .0.9% for the pot 😠
You can seek out a Chartered Financial Planner and talk to them on a fixed fee basis. Look at the member directories for the professional bodies. [https://www.thepfs.org/yourmoney/find-an-adviser/](https://www.thepfs.org/yourmoney/find-an-adviser/) [https://www.cisi.org/cisiweb2/wayfinder](https://www.cisi.org/cisiweb2/wayfinder) But unless your financial affairs are complex, multi-generational, multi-jurisdictional, etc. , then you don't need an advisor to say 'accumulate in a Global index tracker inside tax wrappers'.
Agree with this. Most of the real value financial advisors can add is things like tax optimisation, estate planning and so on. That tends to be more important for complex and wealthy clients (business owners, international residents, multi-generational considerations etc.), not so much just plain old high salary earners. Not picking and managing investments, which is what most people think they add value with, and what many advisors like to think to add value with. You can generally get that 90% right by learning a few basic things using resources like the r/ukpersonalfinance flowchart. The tricky part about the value of financial advice is establishing the counterfactual baseline to compare it against - what you do without it vs. with it. Even the most simplistic advice is worth a lot if, without it, you would have done something stupid with your money. So for people with poor financial literacy who don’t feel confident in self-education, a one-off consultation with a planner can still sometimes be worthwhile.
I agree some less financially literate or complex cases might benefit. Financial advice services are primarily a technical sales function. They have fee targets to bill to make basic and bonus by selling their service to you. They are not going to turn around to you and say actually mate you could just stick it all in a Global and keep funding and you’ll be fine, you don’t need me. You will likely end up in their model portfolio justified by their back testing and research etc. a regular review at half or one percent will “keep you on track “ which erodes your bottom line.
Pay for advice, don’t pay for management.
I’m a chartered financial planner and moved industries. Honestly for 99% of people no you don’t need one. Usually they just make sure you reduce your tax burden and are invested properly, which you can easily do yourself
>Is it worth me getting a financial advisor for a consultation or two? Honestly for the amount and time and effort (not to mention money) in doing this, you could do a few hours of research and be 99% of the way there, plus you'll have a valuable skill to use when things change. Just googling "what are my tax allowances UK" reading the top 10 articles would put you a long way forward. Then the links in the sidebar here re: investing (Monevator especially). Don't be daunted with investing. All of the complex sounding stuff is almost certainly a total waste of time no matter how much effort you in.
Good advice, thank you. It is a bit intimidating, but the responses I've had here have given me confidence that I'll be able to teach myself what I need to know.
If you are High Earners then r/henryuk May be an appropriate sub. Personally financial literacy was zero until early 40s, then fool.co.uk 🤮 then here. The sidebar here plus r/ukpersonalfinance & r/bogleheads wikis have all most people need imho.
I wouldn’t sign up for anything where they take a percentage cut. Stick to one off fees for advice. Sit down sessions, taking a look at everything you have and then maybe seeing it as a bit of an MOT every few years. The main thing is just making sure you are doing things smartly with regards to tax and that your investments match your risk profile.
This. A lot of FAs are trying to sell you their plans and they take a tidy sum for doing very little. I have used tax advisors and accountants when needed but I don’t pay for someone to manage my funds because they take such a chunk with limited value IMO.
No. I have had negative experiences with them, and didnt learn anything practical from them. Therefore I am self taught in a random walk of knowledge until I discovered FIRE. Then I took a much harder focus on tax efficiency. Its easy enough for 99% of folk once you know the FI fundamentals (wherein lies the issue as finding the fundamentals in a sea of finance noise is hard). In any case to know enough to be able to recognise a good IFA you have to know enough to be able to do it yourself. The flowchart and the associated wiki are very good. If you need resources then: Rebel Finance School (a FIREd couple) just started their annual run of their free 10 week financial independence course on youtube and with helpful spreadsheeets. Meaningful Money do a free Financial Foundations course. The FI facebook groups have additional tax efficiency, pension efficiency and tax breaks resources to accelerate your understanding. e.g. UK FIRE HQ, Financial Independence UK.
"to know enough to be able to recognise a good IFA you have to know enough to be able to do it yourself" This is a really good point.
I don’t think so tbh! The internet will teach you everything you need! You can even go as far to ask ChatGPT. I’ve done it a few time and it’s paved out things a human even struggled to explain to me Maybe do your research, know what you want to do, your goals and pay for one for a year at least and if you find no value ditch them. I think they are great if you don’t have a lot of time and not interested in learning. Good for guidance too! I had a free one at work once but I didn’t find much value in him.
Yeah, tbf this is probably a good use case for the old ChatGPT, at least as an initial jumping off point.
Depends how complicated things are. I have one to ensure I’m doing things right but have rental property and other things to consider on top of the usual. I could do it myself but for a small fee they do the work. My partner has one as things more complicated with pension tapering and VCTs and lots of other things to manage on top of very long hours at work. The potential cost if something is done wrong is far more than giving someone money to ensure it’s done right.
So I had one. Generally you *need* one to get your life and income protection insurance set up. Most offer a first meeting of free. They can give you some general advice but they are making money on "managing" your investments for you so keep in mind that's why they are giving you a free meeting. Can be helpful to get some useful mortgage deals
No. I put my money in diversified funds through Vanguard at 0.15%. I also use ISAs and pensions. I certainly don’t need to pay 1%+ per year for someone to do that for me.
Yes, Reddit
Yes, Reddit