SAHM and pension

[Marroon]

I’m probably being unreasonable to ask here to begin with but if you’re a SAHM how are you saving for a pension?
Anything that’s a better or worse option from your perspective?

Balancing payments into ISAs could be used to even out the difference.

I hope this comment was made by a misogynistic incel trying to be funny.

if not, and you’re a woman, then I feel sorry for you.

a sahp does work, childcare, they just don’t get paid for it. Their spouse relies on them doing this, so that they get paid. And the same way the child is both of theirs, so is the money.

if you are in a relationship where you are not valued and respected, change that.

What?!? The ops title said she was a sahm!! What else would she need to explain?

Also adjacent to your financial planning, it might be wise to think about planning for your DC should they not be able to be financially independent as an adult. There are financial advisors that specialise in this sort of advice, because of the knock on implications. But broadly speaking, because of compound interest, small contributions you make now into a child's SIPP or other investment wrapper would grow in a substantial pot over the decades.

SIPP is good idea for pension. Make sure you do your research about investing it. Rebel Finsnce School or Mesningful Money Pete mathews or similar.

I agree, and we have mechanisms for all children already. Luckily in the long run it’s the sort of condition DC can learn to manage themselves with time so should life a normal adult life with financial independence.
It’s just a huge barrier in the early years to things like childcare meaning maintaining typical working life isn’t possible right now.

I think check your NI contributions. You can pay for extra years to make sure you get a full state pension. Obviously you can add to this with other investments but that is a good baseline I would be looking to cover first.

You certainly can.
My old workplace pension was in a 'safe fund' not doing much; and the fees were over 1%.
I transferred this into a SIPP last year and pay a fee of around 0.03%, and it's grown around 40%.
Worth looking into.

If your child gets DLA at middle/higher care rate, you can claim Carer's Allowance. This pays Class 1 NI credits, which are slightly better than the Class 3 NI credits that are awarded with Child Benefit. Both credits count towards state pension, but Class 1 also counts towards JSA and ESA eligibility, but Class 3 don't; plus Class 1 will pay credits for caring for a disabled person of any age, whereas Child Benefit only pays credits for a child under 12.

I don’t see how that’s a downside? Most people don’t retire at 55 anyway

I'm not backtracking at all. My opinion on women who choose not to work with a view to relying on their spouse for an income remains the same. My opinion on families that require full time care of a child also remains the same. The two opinions are entirely different because the two scenarios are entirely different.

If you cannot cope with people offering you opinions when you have asked for opinions, Mumsnet is probably for you.

Being a SAHM by choice is wildly different to being a SAHM through necessity to look after a child who has additional care needs.

For a start make sure your state pension contributions are paid up. You used to be able to fill in gaps from years ago but I don't think you can go back so far now. DWP Future Pensions are very helpful and gave me good advice a few days ago (I was on carers allowance but that just ended two months after DH died, and they had been paying my NI contributions as part of that).

I am a woman who chose to bring up healthy, happy, intelligent, thriving children alongside having a successful career as most modern women do. Women literally fought for this right.

You accuse me of misogyny. The irony! Isn't it far more misogynistic for a man to 'rely' on a woman to look after his children? We moved on from that decades ago. Parents are parents. It does not matter whether they are male or female. No woman should ever be 'relied upon' to look after a man's children. You need to pull yourself into the 21st century.

Actually, women fought for the right to have choices. Your sneering judgement of other women’s choices is not feminism.

No not as far as my question which was not “what do you think of my lifestyle?” And instead was very specifically about finances.

Why on earth would I need to be able to “cope” with someone going out of their way to be a nasty?
The more you double down the worse you’re looking.

A personal pension is all you need, Aviva, Fidelity, Quilter, will do whole of market. Vanguard will do their own funds but are very cheap.

A woman once said to me at a coffee morning "oh so you're a kept woman!" when I told her I wasn't working. I can still remember how that felt. As it happens, I gave up a pretty decent job in the City because I adopted two children who turned out to have multiple additional needs and who couldn't manage childcare (or rather childcare couldn't manage them). If they were to have any chance of making it in life - just calming down their extreme anxiety and hyperactivity and addressing their attachment needs - they needed a stay at home parent. I earned less than my husband and I had the skills to do all the dla, ehc applications, the hospital and therapy visits etc. I resent the idea that any SAHMs are somehow lazy. I knew a lot of other SAHMs and many of them could have worked but prioritised different things.

OP, I claimed carer's allowance and dla for the children. Carer's allowance does contribute credits to your gov pension.

Not wanting to be controversial…..
but you could get a job and therefore have an occupational pension!

I started an ISA in my name when I was a sahm.

No, I’m certain you do want to be controversial.

Only saying what people will be thinking 🤔

This is exactly the sort of comment that people think applies to everyone. You try that with two adopted children who couldn't be left with anyone.

I think you’ve misunderstood feminism. It’s about choice, women getting a choice. Women can choose to be career focussed or they can choose to be sahm’s. Sneering at the one you haven’t chosen is misogyny.

It’s not what anyone with at least half a brain is thinking.