Investments for retirement

[AutumnalBliss]

As a SAHM what options are open to me for saving for my pension. I've been a SAHM for 14 years and am actively looking for work now. I lived overseas for 17 years and have just tackled my state pension and paid voluntary up to 23 years. I have 17 years until state pension age (I'm 50) and will make sure this is up to date working or not to get to a full state pension.

DH's pension is not great as he was overseas too and had to cash in his pension overseas for tax purposes. Luckily we now have no mortgage as we paid it off with the cash. He is paying £250 a month for a private pension for me.

We have some spare cash that I would like to invest for our retirement years but I am unsure what to do. It is about £150 a month for me. I think the £250 is the max I can put in a pension as a SAHM but I'm not sure. When/ if I get a job I can put in up to 40K a year in a private pension.

Aside from what I have done is there anywhere I can invest my £150 a month over the next 17 years to get some more pension pot?

Just to add that every year I use up my 20K cash ISA allowance.

The rules are that you can save 100% of your salary up to 40k, or £3600, whichever is the greater.

Your husband is saving £250, which (unless it’s an employer payment from his own business) is actually more than someone with out earnings is allowed.

When the money gets paid in it has tax added to it, this ‘grosses’ it up. £240 per month is the maximum.

You need to stop saving £20k in a cash ISA and use the allowance to buy a stocks and shares ISA. This will then function the same as retirement investments, but just under different rules.

Get a financial advisor and stop paying into the ISA which earns nothing I'm afraid.
You could however once retired, live off the ISA savings tax free for a few years until your investments kick in
Sounds as if you could be doing well!

Yes agree with everyone that says consider converting the cash ISA to sticks&shares. If you keep yourself a six month cash reserve you should think about investing as you save to earn better returns with the aim of growing your sum ahead of inflation. You can take out personal pensions and contribute to these, people have mentioned the contribution rules above. Nutmeg for example has a relatively low cost SIPP option which you can set up a monthly DD into.

with no income you can put up to £2880 into a pension (not the state one) each year and the government will turn it into £3600. Not a huge sum but a no-brainer so grab while you can as I very much doubt Corbyn will let this continue.

not sure if it can be backdated, especially if you have been abroad - you will need to find out.

cash ISAs (or indeed any savings account) pay about a quarter of real inflation but are better than nothing. I think you have time to ride out the stock market at your age but as always, spread things out.

check stock market ISA providers for their charges - the Hargreaves Lansdown bots will be along shortly but they can be very pricey.

not sure if it can be backdated, especially if you have been abroad - you will need to find out

It can’t I’m afraid

@julietcooper yeah whatever

Can I ask how you buy back the state pension years?