Receiving an inheritance or lump sum

Receiving an inheritance can mean receiving a life-changing sum of money. Deciding what to do with it can therefore feel like a huge responsibility, often at an emotionally difficult time.

You should never feel rushed into making any decision after receiving an inheritance. But when you are ready to explore your options, it’s very important to take professional advice.

You’ll likely have questions about what your options are, whether you should spend or invest and what you should be spending on, or investing in.

Our conversation with you will start with some different questions. What would you like your future to look like? Does this money change your position or alter the assumptions on which you’ve based previous decisions about your future? Are dreams you hold, which were previously unreachable, now within reach?

Answering those questions may take a bit of time and thought but they are worth the conversation.

How we help

Lifestyle financial planning

We first start with the big questions – What does receiving a inheritance mean for you and your family? Does it allow you to bring forward your plans? Tweak your plans? Or is it a full rewrite? Maybe you didn’t have a plan in the first place. Maybe plans you once thought were unreachable, are now possible.

Whichever it is, lifestyle financial planning takes as its starting point, what you want your life to look and feel like. Answering that question can take a bit of thought. Once you have identified what you want from your future, our Chartered Financial Planner will help you build a step-by-step plan to reach those goals. Financial planning will bring you clarity, answers to your questions and a roadmap to the future you want for yourself and your loved ones.

Lifetime Cashflow Planning

You’re bound to have questions about what your options are. Maybe you're not sure whether to spend or invest the money? Do you pay off your mortgage or get a bigger one? This could be the first time you have a lump sum to invest, or perhaps it feels different to investing money you’ve earned.

You don't want to make a mistake and regret your decision in years to come. We can run a variety of lifetime cashflows to show you the long term implications of the decisions that you make today. In doing so, we will be able to show you what’s possible, and what’s not.

Retirement planning

Thanks to changes in average life expectancy, pensions legislation and the way society now views retirement, there are more options than ever when it comes to retiring. Do you want to stop work altogether as soon as possible? Or is stopping work your worst nightmare? Do you want to phase into retirement gradually over several years? How do you dream of spending the years ahead? And crucially, do you finances support your ambitions. We’ll help answer your questions and get you on track to the retirement you want.

Gifting

Seeing younger generations benefit from an inheritance, whether it’s through financial assistance to get on the housing ladder, or help with private education or university fees, can be a wonderful, life-affirming experience. For this reason, many people choose to gift during their lifetime rather than waiting to transfer wealth in a will. There are also tax benefits to gifting which mean it's an option that works for the whole family. We’ll guide you through the possibilities and help you understand whether it’s the right path for you and those who could potentially benefit from your gifts.

Please note, the Financial Conduct Authority does not regulate estate planning.
A pension is a long-term investment not normally accessible until 55 (57 from April 2028). Your capital is at risk. The value of your investment (and any income from them) can go down as well as up which would have an impact on the level of pension benefits available.