Any advice on selling an Endowment Policy would be appreciated.  Please PM.

Thank you
Sweep ;)

Hmmm best advice anyone can give is hang onto it just now as in today's endownment market it is the final bonus that is where the money comes from. If you sell before then you won't get anymore and probabaly a lot less than you have paid into it.

If you are determined to sell it ask a independant financial advisor for a recommendation .

Pam 

Don't that's my advice

Not worth the paper it's written on!  It has to go!

Sweep ;)

But you will always get less if you sell it than if you don't :)

Daisy

Can you keep an endowment running if you sell your property ?

Yes you can keep it running if you sell your house, it is not linked to the property.

I would definatly not recommend selling the policy, especially at the moment.  Have you considered making it paid up?  I.E you stop making further payments and it runs until maturity. 

Yes :) You don't need to have a house to take out an endowment policy. They were quite common forms of life insurance/savings many moons ago - but of course they aren't popular now since the stock market crashed and they no longer pay out the final value promised.

Daisy

Take professional advice from an independent financial advisor!
A lot depends on the length of time the policy has left to run and it's projected maturity value,including any final bonus pertaining to it reaching maturity.It may be possible to make it a 'paid up policy' and not actually have to make any further payments to it.Plus it is probably giving some life insurance as an added bonus in the meantime.
We have bought policies from family in the past,who  decided to give up on them and paid them the surrender value,then kept the policies to maturity.Not all have matured to great value,but we have never actually lost money on any of them!
Don't act hastily without proper advice.A lot of this advice is given freely but you need to check where in your area you are best to go for it.
We even paid off our endowment mortgage early over 2years ago now,but kept the policy going to maturity and still made a tidy profit.
The market is such that any policy taken out in the last few years before they became unavailable, are struggling,they are a long term investment as a rule.Same as shares and stockmarket investing.
I think at the end of the day a lot of people will go back to stuffing the mattress again for a 'rainy day'.
Hope you get sensible,sound advice and that you are able to make a decision based on it :)
Jacqueline.

<<Yes you can keep it running if you sell your house>>

Thanks Tim - glad to hear it :)

Most endowments are pretty cheap to pay monthly so i would have thought it was best to carry on
I will do then for the sake of £15 a month

Sorry, just a word of caution. Mum and dad took a endowment policy out about 24 years ago, which should have paid their house off, and given them alot left over. They were going to be about £5000 short of paying it off :( And that was, at the most, a £50k mortgage. and had to sirt it out so they will pay it off in a few years time. So if you have an endowment taken out a long time ago, please check to make sure that it will mature to what was originally said. I think there is actually a way of suing the company if you have proof they have said it will pay off your mortgage and it doesnt.
Sorry, I havnt put it very well, but it is a bottle of wine and a Bridgette Jones on video night!!!!!!!!

Sweep they are not worth anything now if you have taken then out in the last few years BUT ones that are 10 years plus do have accrued profits and even if it is not the best thing to have done with your money it would be worse to throw away what is there just now.

Pam

It depends how long there is left. The older ones are doing better. Ours has 5 years left to run, and although it isn't likely to reap the £17,000 profit we were advised, we aren't likely to lose out, and should be at least £5,000 up. Unbiased advisors have told us to stick with it.

This is an Endowment that was intended to cover the Mortgage, but we have had statements now for a few years to say that it is underperforming(by 20,000), so we are changing to a Repayment Mortgage, although by surrendering the Endowment we will get less than we already have paid into it, we also have peace of mind that when this new Mortgage is paid off that is it.

Just wondered if any of you had gone through this, also how long it took.

Thanx
Sweep :) 

Have you considered keeping the endowment running & changing part of your mortgage to repayment, but keeping part of it on endowment - that way you will have the best of both worlds! & even though the endowment will not reach the origional forecast, it should cover the small part you want it to.  :)

I would never take an endowment out for a mortgage, repayment mortgage everytime you know were you stand and you can see your mortgage going down :)

No I would never have done had I known the predicament we find ourselves in now - this was taken out in 1990.

Ah well we live and learn

Sweep x

Hi sweep
Im so sorry this has happened to you, so many people have the same problems with endowments,
Although my mother-in-law had an endowment to cover her funeral and that unexpectedly paid out more than expected when she died 2yrs ago bless her.

Heidi

I have the same problem Sweep. Took out an endowment mortgage in the late 80's when they were popular. Now find that it's not going to cover the mortgage on maturity (first they said 12k short then 17k) so have changed to repayment. Have kept the endowment payments going because it will still be worth having when it does come to fruition, and will be ours to do as we please with. We will have one hell of a holiday that year. Going to New Zealand and Tonga Islands :D

heidleberg ,

Those who had good financial advisors who gave them honest appraisals are fine and there are a lot of these around. They may not be getting back what the expected but enough to do the job.  I agree thousands and thousands have not been as lucky.

Sweep , 14 years is too long to cash it in now. Honestly.

Pay part of your mortgage repayment which will help reduce the outstanding amount. If you can afford to change it all to repayment they you will get something back from the endowment.

They are not a complete waste it is just sad that some of the investors were not truthful with people.

It is not that uncommon now for people to pay for example 50 % capital and interest and 50 interest only.

Pam