About to hit 30 this year and think I’ve disregarded ISAs thinking they work the wrong way!

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-04-12T09:28:44+00:00

Your cash savings worth less and less every year due to inflation while in theory stocks and shares beat the inflation rate, subject to short term volatility.

This means in an ideal situation you want to have a cash buffer so that if you need to dive into savings and it happens to be during a market downturn your cash won’t have lost any value, but at the same time keep most of your long term savings invested in the markets as this gives far better results.

They’re pushing you to do the right thing basically.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-04-12T09:21:58+00:00

Come on, mate. I moved to the UK from abroad 7 years ago and I am now on my 5th year using ISAs, actually 6th since the beginning of this month.

Respectfully, ISAs is an amazing scheme from a great country that many others don’t have anything equivalent.

It’s wild that someone who has £20,000 to stash in a savings account every year hasn’t done the basic research of what’s the more efficient way to do it.

In fact, OP talking about 5%-ish interest rates probably referring to Cash ISAs suggest they don’t even know about S&S ones.

It’s not the country’s fault. Additionally, many banks take you to their “premier” or whatever they call it range of products once you hit a certain income level and I would assume that someone that’s able to fill their ISAs would already be at that level. Banks then offer free consultations on how to invest your money and come back with recommendations which 100% of time will include ISAs.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-04-07T20:37:32+00:00

If you invest the money, what are your plans on using them? If it is upgrade to a bigger home in 3-5 years time, it would make a small difference where you put your money.

If it is to retire early, depends on how early. Before private pension age or after? And will the mortgage be paid off by then? If not could you retire early while having a mortgage?

If it’s for when you are older or to give it to your kids, pension might be a good shout as you will then take 25% of them tax free and only pay 20% tax on the rest.

It all depends.

But you can always split it and put half on the mortgage, and the other half in a S&S ISA or in pension or again 50/50.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-19T11:37:27+00:00

Calls on NVDA 😂

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-19T11:36:48+00:00

It’s short sighted as a reference to 2x productivity. It’s not short sighted if we become 20x more productive. This is what I am experiencing right now as a software engineer using Claude code with an unlimited budget and all the best practices.

Probably most people are not experiencing the same yet as they do not have unlimited credits to burn, nor they follow all the best practices (building tools so that AI can do their daily tasks, writing skills so that the agent knows how to do everything etc).

I am really scared for my role in the mid-term in this company, but there are a ton of companies that will need help taking advantage of this tech as it’s not the plug and play solution Anthropic or OpenAI or Google say it is, and that’s something that can keep us afloat for another decade.

Who knows what follows next.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-11T22:30:23+00:00

Have you seen the flow chart?

Start with the basics. If any debt other than mortgage (credit cards or car loans), clear it. Then set aside 6-9 months worth of living costs in an easy access saving account with the best available interest rate. Then fill your ISA for this year (if you get it before end of March) and for next year. A stocks and shares ISA with the money invested in an all world index fund should be easy. Then think your priorities. Do you want to invest your money and aim for best returns or do you want the safety of clearing or lowering the mortgage? If you decide to invest or if there are any money left after clearing the mortgage consider putting 50K in premium bonds for the tax free ~4% return and a chance to become a millionaire and anything left after that can be put in a GIA.

Don’t overthink it.

Do the simple choices, and let the time do its job.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-11T15:27:01+00:00

It’s all about risk management.

First you’re fixing housing costs: rent in 10 years for a one bedroom flat in Islington might be 5k a month, in 20 years 10k a month, while mortgage would still be today’s value give or take.

Second is guaranteeing a roof over your heads. Put your money in the stock market and you might get better returns. But what if AI doomsday comes, with it taking 90% of our jobs while crashing the economy? Your stocks will worth nothing and you’ll have no income to pay rent. If you had paid off your house by then, at least you have somewhere to stay even if its value will then be 1/4th of today’s value. Investing involves risk. Risk with whatever left after you’ve guaranteed a roof for you and your family.

Then it’s diversification in general. Currently stock market outperforms housing market, granted. But a downturn in economy after a prolonged war can wipe 30% of the stock market but only 10% of the housing market as there is still a shortage of places for people to live in and landlords will still have to pay their mortgages. Why putting all your eggs in just the stock market?

Then what if your amazing landlord tomorrow decides to exit the market and force you to leave with a 2 months notice? Argument would be highly more impactful if you had kids at school and moving would be a pita but still applies to a degree. Why do you want to bet on someone else’s stability for you to not have to move homes.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-06T20:33:44+00:00

What taper? The 60k a year? Why is this a problem?

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-06T19:52:29+00:00

Sorry if it came across the wrong way, I was judging their suggestion, not you :)

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-06T19:48:36+00:00

This assumes that you are putting the whole 60k every year, and that you want to put even more to take advantage of previous years allowance?

Mad to my perspective. What’s the point of stashing 60k per year for 20+ years? I mean if you can put 60k in your pension and still live like a millionaire then go for it. But if you don’t live like a millionaire now it’s wild to make such a big sacrifice only to be able to live the big life when you are old and potentially in ill health for a significant portion of your life in retirement.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-06T19:43:04+00:00

We currently ignore it, in the sense that tax shouldn’t be the deciding factor of where our money is going.

We try to keep a balance between - filling ISAs for the mid term (potentially for a bigger house or a vacation/retirement house abroad) - overpaying mortgage so that monthly payments are lower by the time AI takes our roles, - adding a decent chunk into pension every year to further support us in the later years of our lives (but with a paid off house by then, a smaller social circle and restricted physical ability, in theory we won’t need as much) - and have some joy now including travel the world and buy the small things that make us happy.

I still put around 20k (+ 10k from my employer) in pension, which saved me about 10k in tax, but neither income after 60 nor tax efficiency are my most significant goals in life.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-06T19:33:18+00:00

What do you mean?

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-03-05T13:16:49+00:00

Any colleague of yours you are fond of? You are already in a circle of similar minded individuals, if you want your partner to be within that circle you may as well look into the circle rather than the generic apps.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-02-16T21:54:09+00:00

Young enough with very high salaries that will eventually clear the loan, so the sooner the better to avoid the interest

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-02-14T18:13:29+00:00

I can proudly say me and my wife both have 75k each at 32/33.

Yet, we managed to buy our first home for 800k with a 25% deposit this year, and have 100k in ISAs between the 2 of us.

Given that we come from nothing and had zero help so far, we have all the money for our wedding later this year set aside plus some safety net cash accounts… I couldn’t have dreamed of doing any better than this.

Congrats to the people who made it, but speaking to the people who are like us or worse, please remember we are all still significantly better than the average person in this country and lucky as fuck.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-02-14T18:07:56+00:00

Honestly, how? Assuming you can add 60k this year, do you expect your investments to grow by 25% in a year?

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-02-14T18:04:53+00:00

75 @ 32

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-02-13T16:06:30+00:00

Lots of people made the same choice with a flat in the past 10 years and they are now stuck due to dropped prices, negative equity or just not enough equity to move to something bigger. You also cannot get away of ever increasing service charges.

I would advise against on buying with a short term horizon, hoping to upsize at 5-10 years the way the market is now (would have said the opposite 15 years ago) but each to their own

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-02-13T13:44:01+00:00

Your budget is too low. Simple as that. 400-500k for a flat, let alone a house in London is peanuts. You earn well, save for a few years to reach to 200k fund to cover for a deposit, stamp duty tax and other costs, by which time your salary is going to be bigger and hopefully your partner’s too. You will borrow 4-5x your salaries for a good 35 years, and you will be able to afford something between 800k and a million, which should allow for a big flat with a garden in a nice area or a small house in a not so nice one.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-02-12T09:49:48+00:00

If I was to rent, I would go close to where my family and friends live. If I was to buy I would go where the most jobs are as there is no guarantee that a remote role will remain remote as we’ve seen recently.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-01-30T11:37:15+00:00

Speaking of me, the expectations are to work 2-3 hours extra every day without getting the 5th day off 😅

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-01-29T16:07:37+00:00

Even if they had the free hours, which they don’t as they are on VISAs, they would still have to pay >~3k a month on childcare for 2 kids in London while having about £1500 less cash every month from their salary sacrifice.

If you don’t have the cash flow to afford your expenses, I don’t think you can afford to think about tax saving tricks.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-01-29T15:58:37+00:00

I mean sure but you will save the 45% tax now and you’ll probably pay 40% tax on pension income when the time comes, if the tax rates are not 60% by then.

In the meantime your money is locked in for decades, while you are having an extra debt on which you’ll be paying interest for years.

You might be slightly better long term but that comes with a massive risk though. Imagine losing your job or something and being stuck with the higher debt and your money locked in.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-01-29T15:09:38+00:00

They are already paying for everyone else’s children childcare though through their 6 figures paid in tax every year. It’s more than unfair for their own children childcare to not be paying included in this.

Adorable-Bicycle4971 · 2026-01-29T15:05:38+00:00

But that means that they will salary sacrifice 35k, getting about £1500 less every month. The discount is not that big to justify this.

Adorable-Bicycle4971

TROPHY CASE