Retirement Planning

Women’s Pensions Falling Short of Male Counterparts

By The Bower Team / In Retirement Planning

A recent Prudential survey says that women retiring this year will be living on an average pension of £234 a week, which falls two-thirds short of that of their male counterparts.

This figure has dropped by 11% on that produced by the same survey last year, whilst the figure for men has only dropped by 3%. Read more

Your Pension: How will you fund it?

By The Bower Team / In Retirement Planning

Huge numbers of people approaching retirement age — millions in fact – are heading for a worrying mix of hefty mortgages with no savings.

A report by Aviva found that 25% of ‘pre-retirees’ – those aged between 55 and 64 – have a mortgage and in 20% of those cases it exceeds £75,000. The report, which came from a study of over 1200 people, stated that 40% of pre-retirees have average savings of only £8,600, excluding pensions, and that this sum could easily be swallowed up should a household emergency occur.Read more

One in Five Set to Retire in 2010 with NO Pension Fund

By The Bower Team / In Retirement Planning

Recent research by Prudential has uncovered that 18% of people set to retire in 2010 will do so without any personal pension.

This year’s retirees could be in for a shock however, as many of those surveyed were unaware of the value of the basic state pension. 31% either did not know what they would get, or overestimated the amount by around £25 per week.Read more

State Pension Rise Doesn’t Include SERPS

By The Bower Team / In Retirement Planning

Perhaps one of the very few almost positive things to come out of the Pre-Budget Report was the April 2010 state pension rise which sees an increase of 2.5% in the rate from £95.25 to £97.65 for a single pensioner and from £152.30 to £156.16 for couples.Read more