I met my clients Mr & Mrs X to arrange their investments shortly following their early retirement. They particularly wanted to keep some capital back to cover the shortfall in income they would suffer before their state pensions kicked in, but also wanted to protect some capital in case stock markets fell.

They were also concerned about Inheritance Tax and the potential impact that Long Term Care could have on the value of their estate and what they could leave to their two children. We arranged suitable investments for the clients to protect capital, utilize ISA allowances and change existing investments to match their attitude to risk. We also amended their wills and included trusts to protect assets after death.

Sadly Mrs X passed away very suddenly and the planning came into effect a lot sooner than we all would have liked, but because of the planning put in place we have secured assets in trust which are protected against both Inheritance Tax and the Local Authority should Mr X require Long Term Care in the future.

Whilst we cannot control what life has in store for us we can plan for all eventualities, even those ones we don’t want.

A client was looking at their defined benefit pension scheme, as they did not know whether to take the scheme or as they didn’t not rely on this income in retirement, whether to look at inheritance tax planning and passing the pension through to his children.

We obtained a transfer value from the scheme. This was before Brexit.  After Brexit gilts rates dropped so we requested a further transfer value to find it was 25% more than the original value 4 months before.  This along with the clients circumstances led us to advise the client to transfer out of the scheme, with a much fairer value.

I had dealt with one of my clients for a long time, when she asked me to start looking after her parents. Unfortunately, her father was very ill and passed away soon after her mother inherited his pension. This happened around 6 months before pensions freedom. By delaying any benefits from the pension plan for 6 months, her mother now has income free of tax from the pension, otherwise this would have been taxed. Her mother is now ill and needs care and this money can fund all her care costs that she needs.

A client wished to purchase a commercial property before it went to auction, we raised sufficient funds from his buy to let portfolio to make this happen, in time. This property we then refinanced to provide capital for a development loan which we assisted on for him to buy land and develop 2 properties. It really helps when you can look at both commercial and residential lending together to find the best outcome.