₦airaland Forum

Lexusgs430:
For us IPTV lovers, got a very good IPTV deal....... Still testing it.......

Under $30 per year + firestick not even required......

All channels open eyes like okpomiliki.........

Fear catch me sef

DeeOneBangin:
Everybody make una help me thank our Ancient of days oooo. Full package bouquet

Thanks boss.

When you on your TV now, you go think say you still dey 9ja .............

erico2k2:
Great. Naturally do you know how to drive?

What advice do you have for me. I learnt how to drive in Nigeria before I came over. I'm not an expert. The only time I was behind the wheel was with an instructor .

r4blessing:
Yes I chose the London offer but only because I wanted to do my post grad studies as well.

I still prefer the island, it’s less stressful and your take home is higher due to the lesser tax charge

Thanks. Guernsey's lower tax , smaller population and warmer weather is very attractive.

nellaluv:
What advice do you have for me. I learnt how to drive in Nigeria before I came over. I'm not an expert. The only time I was behind the wheel was with an instructor .

Purge everything you know about driving a vehicle and driving habits.........

Your horn is not a musical instrument .............

I cannot download the amex app from playstore because the location on my phone is Nigeria. How can I change the location please? I have tried to no avail.

Viruses:
I cannot download the amex app from playstore because the location on my phone is Nigeria. How can I change the location please? I have tried to no avail.

Reset your device or get apk file .........

Lexusgs430:
Reset your device or get apk file .........

I bought the phone new here, I don't know how it managed to pick Nigeria

Viruses:
I bought the phone new here, I don't know how it managed to pick Nigeria

When you signed into your Google account, it retained your location.......

Are you now denying Nigeria........ Even before the coc.k crows........

CheesyTee:
My people, please help chook mouth for this matter.

The current place we live in is not suitable for kids. Although the landlord came to fix some of the things we complained about, he only comes when it's almost time for the next rent.

Why not move out you may ask. Especially when we didn't sign a long contract. It's really tough getting a house to rent on the island as most house owners either do short-let (Airbnb mostly) or put the property up for sale.

We have been applying for houses advertised online and have no luck securing one.

We recently found out the reason through this potential landlord the reference provided by the previous house agent. The agency said we left the property dirty and they had to professionally clean it. Even though we cleaned the property ourselves and sent images as proof but they still charged us £200 for cleaning and repainting.

I am so down and don't know what to do cos this place is quite expensive and not suitable at all.

Update!

The new landlord is ready to rent to us after calling the agency to clarify. The landlord said that's a petty thing the agency did. The complaint was we didn't clean the skirting area of the house well and also the washing machine tray.

She mentioned she asked if the charge they took off our deposit covered the cost of cleaning and they said yes.

She said it won't affect her renting to us and it's normal to experience such.

DeeOneBangin:
Everybody make una help me thank our Ancient of days oooo. Full package bouquet

Thanks boss.

I'm coming to your DM. I want to watch dstv too. Big brother naija is starting soon

Viruses:
I bought the phone new here, I don't know how it managed to pick Nigeria

Go to play store setting > change country and add a uk debit card

Lexusgs430:
Purge everything you know about driving a vehicle and driving habits.........

Your horn is not a musical instrument .............

Yes boss

Ticha:
Pension and wealth planning for the future - very long read.

To access full pensions, we have to pay 35 years of national insurance to access the full state pension in the UK and in New Zealand, a naturalised Kiwi aka us has to pay at least 10 years of income tax. It means we can't access the full state pension in both countries.
In both places, I doubt if we could live on the pension anyway even if we qualified for it. The full UK pension is about £7k a year so £14k for both of us. Yes, you could potentially access other benefits, but it means from age 65 for women and 67 for men, you’ll be living on approx. £1k a month unless you have savings to draw on. If you have savings of more than £16k, you also can’t access any state benefits either. So we have been planning for retirement.

We have a Global Vanguard All Shares account (the name has changed over the years) - managed by Henderson Securities. We've had it jointly for more than 12 years (husbot for much longer) and have dipped into it sometimes (mainly to pay for IVF). We haven't touched it for years now and the funds have grown exponentially. If we continue paying into it consistently, we should have about £600k worth of shares (yay compound interest) by the time I'm 55 and husbot is 52. To give an idea, we've always paid a minimum of £150 each monthly into it since 2010. Henderson does the investing and taxes on our behalf. We haven't bothered to check what they invest it in, but we picked an aggressive growth fund for a long time and that really paid off (hence using the profits for IVF). Now it's in a mid-range growth fund and will remain there. We have upped our monthly minimum payments to £250 each a month now because we can afford to do so. The SOA comes every March, but we don’t check it or even look at it beyond seeing how much is there when the SOA comes.

In New Zealand - we pay into the government Kiwisaver scheme (pension scheme). I contribute 3% of my earnings and husbot contributes 5% of his earnings, the government contributes $521 every year. We can withdraw our Kiwisaver once we've been out of NZ for 12 months (6 years of payments), so we plan to withdraw it and dump it into Henderson when we leave.
Onto tangible assets – We have property in both countries. I sold my house in 9ja once I realised it was an albatross and put all the funds into a UK purchase. Our UK family home although rented out is on a full repayment mortgage. Thanks to the current property boom (which can also go bust!) we have some substantial equity in it. We also have other BTLs on interest only mortgages. We can always sell one to clear off the mortgage on the family home if needed.

The move to New Zealand has been the best thing for us financially. I have no employer loyalty. No one goes into education to make money as the pay is poor compared to the level of work and qualifications involved. I often jump ship every 2 years because that's the only way I can increase my wages. Wages in education are much higher in NZ than in the UK which is weird (5m v 67m) but good for me!
Anyhow, when we moved to NZ, we took opportunity of the higher wages and saved and saved and saved but buying a house seemed out of our reach. Then we met another couple who seemed to have the same values as us (family, financial, moral you name it). We pooled our resources and we bought a house in our name (we bought first because we had higher incomes and better credit). With property values going crazy, we within 6 months refinanced that property and gifted the cash to this family (basically paid them back their initial contribution and extra) so they bought one too in their name. They then refinanced and gifted us the cash and we bought another in our names.
Because we want to exponentially grow the money, we are demolishing the first house to build 5 new ones and then leverage that to give them enough to buy a 2nd property for themselves. They can choose to develop or hold or sell but we will have both walked away with 2 initial properties each.

It does mean we're financially tight until we finish the build March/ April 2023 (build starts in Oct 2022) but it's for our future financial security so we're totally happy to have a few tight years. It also means I can't help my extended family as much as I used to and boy! am I hearing about it! I've thoroughly enjoyed the consent and planning process for the development. We now have land use consent ad have just applied for building consent. It has been stressful and a huge expenditure but also a big learning curve. I almost decided to retrain as surveyor last year when we got the engineering bill ��. When the houses are completed, it'll be leased to Housing New Zealand on a 5 year repairing lease. The income from the 5 after tax is about the same as my before tax income (imagine fa) so we know we can comfortably live on that should shit hit the fan workwise.

Our current NZ home was bought with retirement in mind. We went for the biggest house on a large land. We also deliberately bought in a medium density zone. Basically, we can build up to 6 four bedroom houses on the land if we demolish the existing house. If we decide not to retire in New Zealand, then that is what we would do in about 7 years’ time. If we choose to retire in NZ (I seriously doubt it) then we'll sell the UK family home and pay off the mortgage on the NZ one. It has bedrooms and a full bathroom downstairs and is disabled friendly – no stairs to access the whole of the ground floor. I have no intention of going into a nursing or care home.

Shareswise - we've now opened targeted growth fund accounts for the children with Lansdown Hargreaves. We pay £100 a month into each child's account. They will get full access at 18. Hopefully, they can use that to pay uni fees, supplement apprenticeship wages, down payment on a house or even go traveling before uni/ work starts.

We have also created a family trust. I look at the truly wealthy and what they have for going for them is generational wealth and good financial planning. In my family, I'm the first to be in a position to actually start building generational wealth. The trust will hopefully go on forever as it's for the direct progeny of my husbot and his siblings (both his siblings have no children and want none) and me and my siblings so it means my nephews and nieces will get payments annually out of it once they hit 21 but their parents can’t access any of the funds. We've currently set it so it can only be dissolved by a court and no beneficiaries can sell assets out of it including us once the asset has been placed in it.

2 reasons we have done this – divorce/ separation for us or our children. Even though we all hope to remain married till death, the truth is that divorce and remarriage happens. The trust is set up to protect the financial interests of all beneficiaries. If either of us divorces, we will continue to be paid out of it. Should any of us re-marry, the spouse will not be able to access any funds from the trust. Same with the children. Stats also show that first generation immigrants usually create the biggest wealth and subsequent generations waste the accumulated wealth. It is very likely that our children will not have the kind of drive we have because they have been born into or have lived in plenty enough to be happy with state handouts in the future. Therefore, they might actually see us as a burden as we grow older and infirm.

So hopefully at retirement, the trust can top up our pension but also ensure we remain at home till end of life and not be a burden on the children.

This is not financial advice. Just sharing what we have done.

Bookmarked

wonlasewonimi:
You dey look for trouble



and you too

Stop encouraging him lol

That didn’t take long

dettolgel:
Abeg I get question here ooh.


Please those of you with experience on matters like your wisdom will be of great help.

Speaking from personal experience.

1. Yes.
2. Home office doesn’t care.
3. School doesn’t have to know

Thanks.

Tried this a few hours back but it didn't work.

I tried Monzo and Revolut but the cards were declined.

Might try the Paypoint or traditional bank option.

omopapa:
Go Post office with your debit card, they will take the cash from you and deposit directly into your acct. Check revolut’s maximum daily deposit

people dey vex ooooh

rayralph:
Dm lexusgs430.

You can DIY.

You don’t need a middleman to set it up.

It’s fast and easy. Easy peasy.

Alright. I'll do that thanks

Please does exemption from council tax or discounted council tax enjoyed by those not eligible have implications? because it seems the councils don't know unless they are informed. My understanding of council tax is that it is based on 2 adults living in a property meaning if one of them is not a disregarded person e.g a full time student, they are supposed to pay an element of council tax maybe discounted.

Hello Elders,
Please I am in need of pounds, got some naira

Hello everybody
I just arrived in the uk 2 days ago
Can someone please suggest a bank I can set up online
Monzo won’t give me one
And netwest is asking for proof of living

I only have my student id
And my brp card.