Finance Review

If you are at all concerned about your private individual wealth management then you should set aside some time to do your own earnings protection plan and review your investments and financial situation.

It has been an incredibly difficult year as far as finances are concerned. Governments worldwide are struggling to ease the financial position in previously untested ways. While the credit crunch has raised some specific issues, taking a general overview of your financial planning could highlight some important questions.

Investments

If you have deposit investments, are they properly protected? The Financial Services Compensation Scheme now protects up to £50,000 of an investment in a specific bank (see opposite). Do you have more than that at risk in an institution? Should you spread these investments?

What about the stockmarket? It has been extremely volatile year. How have your equity-based investments been doing? It may be time to look at these to see if your portfolio is balanced properly.

For example, are you overweight in any particular sector where there could be some excessive downside risk?

Mortgages

If you have a mortgage you may well be coming to the end of a fixed interest rate period, possibly leading to increased mortgage repayments. With the mortgage market in a state of uncertainty following the recent interest rate cuts, it is important to take professional advice. Experienced mortgage advisers often know where the best deals are to be had and could save you considerable amounts of money. Your home may be repossessed if you do not keep up repayments on your mortgage.

Protection

The financial situation over the last few months has adversely affected the wealth of many families and you may wish to look at the different ways of protecting your family for the future. Do you have enough life cover to protect your spouse/partner as well as your children or grandchildren? Again, professional advice is important to ensure that such life cover is set up in the correct way.

Last 5 posts by Mikel Klein

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