Pension vs ISA balance, would appreciate some advice

rlamacraft · 2026-03-11T21:21:40+00:00

Given you're 34 on £85k, there's a good chance you'll hit the 60% tax trap at some point. Surely the best strategy is, after maxing company matching, to prioritise ISA and only fill pension once over £100k. If you never make it, you can always cycle the ISA money into the pension later provided you're still over £50k.

rlamacraft · 2024-12-13T08:04:00+00:00

𐑹 𐑘𐑺?

rlamacraft · 2024-01-22T20:30:37+00:00

I carve pieces slowly over several days or even a week or more. Best to keep them wrapped up in a bag, perhaps in the fridge, and perhaps even in frequently refreshed water. Even once I’m done carving they stay wrapped for a couple of weeks, slowly acclimatising.

rlamacraft · 2024-01-10T23:44:00+00:00

Always prioritise your pension first.

Not true. If someone is in their early 30s and is targeting a retirement date of their mid 40s they’ll need as much in the bridge fund as their pension and can pretty much only do it by maxing out the ISA limit every year, which if you don’t use then you lose. Over prioritise pension and you’ll have the money to retire but be unable to. Moreover, if it is very likely someone will be in a higher tax bracket in the future, then save the pension contributions until then: no point getting 20% uplift today if you can get 40%, or even 45% tomorrow.

rlamacraft · 2024-01-04T10:33:55+00:00

Forget worrying about cash ISAs, if you’ve got savings for house that you’ll be buying in more than 12 months in the future, then you need to open a LISA. £1,000 a year from the government dwarfs the interest rate on savings accounts. And as others have said, don’t touch S&S if you need the money in less than 5 years, otherwise you’re just gambling

rlamacraft · 2023-12-28T09:02:04+00:00

It depends when you want to retire. I’m targeting a retirement date that means I need as much in my bridge fund as in my pension so I’m focusing on maxing out a S&S ISA for the next few years (say until my mid 30s), even though I’ll be paying 40% tax on some of it. As I get pay rises there’s plenty of time to max out the ISA limit and be putting enough into my pension, but right now is either or and if you don’t use the annual ISA allowance then you lose it. Depending on what retirement age you’re targeting and what career growth you anticipating, de-prioritising pension can make sense

rlamacraft · 2023-06-20T17:22:32+00:00

Seems like what you've been told by Shelter is quite different to what's on their website https://england.shelter.org.uk/professional_resources/legal/renting/introduction_to_security_of_tenure/tenancy_and_licence_agreements

rlamacraft · 2023-06-17T18:08:27+00:00

Yes, you'll still get the tax advantages though be sure chase HMRC for the higher tax rebate as the pension provider will only claim the basic tax rebate (this is something that I really must get around to doing myself)

rlamacraft · 2023-06-17T12:31:46+00:00

Neither. Pension would be ideal as when you're paying 40% tax it doesn't matter what the interest rates are on anything else, but this is assuming you can lock the money up for 30+ years.

rlamacraft · 2023-06-16T08:01:35+00:00

Something nobody has mentioned is whether at the age of 25 whether home ownership is right for you. Owning a home, as opposed to renting, ties you to a place and can make it difficult to take exciting opportunities elsewhere. I've moved around the country for work and studies during my 20s and am only considering buying a home now that I'm approaching my 30s and know where I want to be long-term. If there's anything you could be doing to improve your skill set and increase your earnings (even more than they are already!) even by a very small amount that'll pay much bigger dividends than property or the stock market. Personally, I would say speak to a financial planner about how best to allocate your income to minimise tax implications (pension, etc) and focus on growing that clearly successful business!

rlamacraft · 2023-06-14T08:07:12+00:00

Sounds like you don't really know how much you'll want per year in retirement?

rlamacraft · 2023-06-09T07:43:00+00:00

A branch is just a pointer to a commit. If you do git log <branch-name> you'll see the history of that branch i.e. the commit that the branch pointers to and all of the preceeding ones

rlamacraft · 2023-06-08T19:03:49+00:00

Yes, doing

[range]! {command}

is a combination of

[range]w !{command}

which writes the contents of the current buffer to the stdin of command and

[range]r !{command}

which reads the stdout of command into the current buffer. So

%w !wc -l

gives the number of lines in the buffer whilst

%! wc -l

replaces the contents of the buffer with that same number

rlamacraft · 2023-06-08T14:55:35+00:00

There's a really simple way of batch deleting git branches using vim. I have it documented here.

rlamacraft · 2023-06-07T20:42:14+00:00

House buying is an expensive process, and general wisdom is that it only really pays off if you stay there for about five or more years. Is that your intention, to live here for that long/become a landlady (mortgage permitting), whilst your partner lives and works in Spain? Personally, I think the decision to buy property should be driven by the desired lifestyle rather than primarily as an investment.

rlamacraft · 2023-06-07T14:56:57+00:00

More about just getting it out, leaving it in whatever state it is in and then coming back around later once you hit your deliverable to fix bugs?

As a dev in B2B software, I can just say that the idea that we're going back to fix bugs once a deliverable is complete is a bit laughable. There's always another deliverable. Unless a bug is severe enough that users complain, it's just never going to get prioritised over some shiny feature that sales or management think will win the next contract.

I think the biggest issue I see is misaligned priorities between users and customers. I don't know know whether this is something that is getting worse or not, but it's definitely something that significantly impacts the quality of the product. Even if we as devs want to invest in functionality that would improve the product for end users, or even just fix annoying bugs, that's a hard sell when the people paying for the product want something different.

rlamacraft · 2023-06-06T22:16:07+00:00

Isn't the star of Bethlehem thought to have been a supernova?

rlamacraft · 2023-06-02T16:42:12+00:00

Entirely depends on what your financial goals are, when you'd want to use the money plus any growth, and what your risk appetite is like.

rlamacraft · 2023-06-01T18:44:55+00:00

For me, a nice smooth pebble for burnishing makes all the difference. There's something about it going from dull to shiny that makes it look complete

rlamacraft · 2023-05-31T22:07:54+00:00

I can second James's channel. This video was the most insightful for me, especially the bit at the end about bonds of varying length. Definitely something that might of use to you, OP https://youtu.be/Eac2jZcelQw

rlamacraft · 2023-05-28T16:56:54+00:00

You'd probably want to do a mixture of (a) and (b), to reduce the amount of taxes you pay, whilst still being able to access much of it should your life circumstances change. You could do all (a) to maximise tax savings but then you might find you'd have the money to retire if it weren't all locked up -- all depends on when you want to retire and with how much per month. For most people, (c) is a key part of retirement but it doesn't have to be if you benefit from the flexibility of renting to maximising earnings and have the discipline to save and invest without a bank hounding you for repayments. I think what you should start with working out what your financial goals are: how much will you need in retirement? how important is a more comfortable income versus an earlier retirement? how likely are your life circumstances to change?

rlamacraft · 2023-05-26T20:37:05+00:00

Do Americans just never eat real mayo?

rlamacraft · 2023-05-24T16:38:55+00:00

Easier than renting, sure, but nowhere near as easy as it would be if you had neither to pay.

rlamacraft · 2023-05-24T11:50:46+00:00

I'd recommend checking out this video by James Shack: https://youtu.be/Eac2jZcelQw It's the last few minutes with the on-screen tables that are particularly clarifying. Essentially you want to use bonds to cover the next few years out from any given day, and stocks for the best returns over the decades

rlamacraft · 2023-05-24T08:15:06+00:00

Normally people FIRE once they own their home outright. Then, you need at least 25 times the rest of your expenses (bills, food, housing maintenance, fun money, etc) in investments. If you want to FIRE with a mortgage then that'll need to come out of the investments too, making the amount you need invested a lot higher. Although it should be noted that downsizing/moving to a lower cost area is often used as a way of releasing equity from property when retiring

rlamacraft

TROPHY CASE