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Philip A J Smith is a Mortgage & Protection Adviser and founder of HELP Advisory — Home Equity & Legacy Planning Advisory. With four decades of experience advising clients on property finance, protection, and later life lending, his work centres on a question most families avoid until it is too late: what happens to what you have built, and who is prepared to carry it forward? He is the developer of the Legacy Clarity Tool — a guided digital environment that helps individuals and families think through later life, property, and legacy with clarity and without pressure. Philip collaborates with the Generational Planning Group on topics affecting self-directed investors navigating the transition from accumulation to preservation.
Self-directed investors spend years refining how they build portfolios. Far fewer consider who takes control of those portfolios if they cannot. Most self-directed investors also find it very hard to let go, leaving it too late to decumulate and protect their legacies in later life. This often leaves executors dealing with complex estates and significant IHT liabilities.
As private investing has become more accessible over the past two decades, a growing number of individuals have taken responsibility for managing their own portfolios. Many have done so successfully, developing deep familiarity with markets, strategies, and risk.
Many successful private investors eventually reach a point where they trust their own judgement more than anyone else’s. Years of reading, experience, and careful decision-making lead to portfolios that reflect their own thinking rather than someone else’s advice.
To the investor who constructed the portfolio, the logic behind these decisions is usually clear. To everyone else, it may be far less obvious.
Spouses, partners, or family members often know that investments exist, but not necessarily how they are structured, why they were chosen, or what the long-term intention behind them might be. They are even less clear on how this wealth can be transferred to the next generation in a tax-efficient manner. In practice, self- investors themselves are often uncertain about the rules and taxation surrounding wealth transfer.
To the investor who constructed the portfolio, the logic behind these decisions is usually clear. To everyone else, it may be far less obvious.
Spouses, partners, or family members often know that investments exist, but not necessarily how they are structured, why they were chosen, or what the long-term intention behind them might be. They are even less clear on how this wealth can be transferred to the next generation in a tax-efficient manner. In practice, self- investors themselves are often uncertain about the rules and taxation surrounding wealth transfer.
Self-directed investors often put off decisions about generational planning, recognising that it involves a degree of letting go — and there always seems to be time to address it tomorrow. But circumstances and legislation can change quickly.
Illness, incapacity, or simply the gradual effects of ageing can interrupt the ability to manage investments directly. At that point, the question becomes less about investment performance and more about wealth preservation and tax mitigation.
The control problem
Many investors assume that if something were to happen to them, the transition would be straightforward. In practice, it rarely is.
Without clear legal authority, even a spouse may not be able to manage investment accounts. Financial institutions cannot simply take instructions from family members unless the correct structures are already in place. The absence of those structures can significantly reduce the ability to carry out IHT-efficient tax planning at the very moment it matters most.
Structures that investors often overlook
For many experienced investors, the natural focus remains on markets, valuation, and portfolio growth. Issues such as documentation, long-term governance, and wealth preservation planning can feel secondary. They are often postponed because they do not seem urgent.
Yet these structures are precisely what determine whether a carefully built portfolio continues to serve its purpose when the original decision-maker is no longer involved.
Practical considerations may include questions such as:
- Who has the legal authority to act if the investor cannot?
- Should asset preservation structures, such as straightforward trusts, be considered?
- Do family members understand the broad strategy behind the portfolio?
- Are there clear instructions about how assets should be managed or distributed?
None of these questions relate to investment selection. They relate to stewardship and asset preservation.
Accumulation versus Preservation
Building wealth and preserving wealth are often treated as separate conversations. The first tends to focus on markets and opportunities. The second focuses on structure, responsibility, and legal tax planning.
Both require careful thinking, but they are not the same discipline. Successful investors are usually well versed in the accumulation phase — comfortable with risk, volatility, and long-term decision-making. Preservation introduces a different set of considerations and requires a deep understanding of legislation. At that stage, it is important to seek advice from someone who is qualified to provide it and who is prepared to be accountable for that advice.
The correct legal and HMRC-compliant structures will ensure that wealth can be protected, organised, and eventually passed on in a way that reflects the investor’s intentions.
Sadly, for many people, that shift in perspective happens later than it should.
These topics will be a major focus at this year’s London Investor Show, where the Generational Planning Group will be hosting informational sessions for self-directed investors. You can meet the author, Philip A J Smith, at the Wealth Clinic.
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