Recent Articles

Deemed disposal

For years, if you saved money in an investment fund, your money accumulated under what is called a “gross roll up” structure. That is, the value of your fund grew without having to pay tax. The tax due on … Read More

Investment property or pension?

There was an interesting article in The Irish Times last week and the age old debate of buying an investment property or investing in a pension . With the Irish obsession with property now back in full swing (after … Read More

Financial Planning is not a budgeting service, it’s much more important than that

A common error that people make is to mistake financial planning with budgeting. While it is very important to have control of your finances, budgeting is only one building block in the financial planning process.

What is budgeting?

Budgeting is … Read More

You can’t afford it

As part of the financial planning process, I find out what you would love to achieve in life. That may involve lots of different things; paying for your kids university fees, changing job, travel, moving house. Usually, to achieve … Read More

Help to Buy Scheme

I mentioned the Help to Buy Scheme in a previous blog about Budget 2017. In light of the recent announcement by the Central Bank that they are relaxing the loan to value requirement for first time buyers to 90%, … Read More

Don’t put all your eggs in one basket

In 2011, I met a new client who works for a bank. He had been working for this bank for decades and had accumulated a lot of shares in them over the years. During the credit crunch recession, he saw … Read More