Sarah Davidson
Published December 2, 2025 8:00am
Updated December 2, 2025 8:25am
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Andrew’s savings weren’t in the most profitable place until his late sixties (Picture: Metro)
Andrew Greenaway likes to tinker but it wasn’t until he hit 68 that he put that skill to the test with his life savings.
‘I’d always been a bit nervous about managing my pension myself,” says the 70-year old retiree.
‘It was all in passive funds and looked after by my independent financial adviser. Then after Liz Truss and Kwasi Kwarteng’s mini-Budget in 2022 I realised I had to get to grips with it myself.’
Like so many with their savings invested into default funds, Andrew’s money was gradually being moved from equity funds to bonds as he got older. Known as decumulation, this strategy has long been considered a safe bet.
Andrew only started questioning where is savings were a few years ago (Picture: Getty Images)
The theory is that as you progress through retirement, it’s sensible to have more of your money in less volatile bonds.
But as Andrew found to his cost, received wisdom isn’t always the best advice.
‘I lost so much money because of Truss and that debacle,’ says the Belfast-based father of two. ‘Even so, I know plenty of other people who were even harder hit. I remember people saying – where has all my pension gone?!’
After speaking to his IFA, he chose to open a self-invested personal pension with Bestinvest.
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Previous Page Next Page‘There is so much information available that it was a bit overwhelming, but gradually some the fear started to fall away as I learned more about where my pension was actually invested.’
Andrew began to read up on the funds he had money in.
‘I was shocked to see that more than 70% of my pension was in US companies and most of that was in the big tech firms like Meta and Apple,’ he says.
‘I immediately started to sell that down so that I wasn’t so exposed to one sector in one country.’
It is important to understand where your savings are being invested (Picture: Getty Images)
The next question was what to put his savings in instead.
‘Before I retired I worked in high security public sector environments and I was keen to invest in more defence companies. That was actually a lot harder than I thought it would be because so many funds have environmental, social and governance restrictions.’
After some considerable research, Andrew found a couple of funds that tracked a group of companies exposed to the defence sector.
‘I started to build up my holdings in those and now have around 25% of my pension in defence.’
Andrew also focused on diversifying his geographical exposure, reducing his US holdings down to 23% of his portfolio and putting the rest into funds invested in Asia, Japan, India, Europe and the UK.
‘I also started looking at the size of companies I was invested in,’ he says. ‘I didn’t want to have too much in large caps so now I make sure that there’s a mix of smaller companies with the potential to grow and more medium sized businesses too.’
When Andrew first opened his Sipp, his pension was worth £185,000.
‘In just over two years I’ve grown that to £245,000. There have been some big dips in that time but mostly the value has held up. When Donald Trump was announcing all his tariffs that was pretty scary but I managed to hold my nerve.’
Andrew says it was important to ‘hold his nerve’ amid Trump’s tariff announcements (Credits: Getty Images)
What advice would he give to anyone else with a pension they don’t fully understand?
‘I’ve learned a lot over the past few years but there are some things I wish I’d known sooner,’ Andrew says.
‘I didn’t go to see PensionWise until I was 62 but I was eligible for that free help from the government from the age of 55. That would have been a big help.’
Andrew also suggests having a look at all your pensions and consider amalgamating them into one Sipp.
‘If it’s all in one pot it’s a lot easier to handle – I had five different pensions before I moved everything to Bestinvest. There was no way I could fully understand where I was doubled up on funds and sectors.’
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He also recommends getting a financial adviser to help you navigate to begin with.
Seeking a financial advisor, no matter your age, can be helpful (Picture: Getty Images)
‘And don’t do the traditional 60% in bonds and 40% in equities – you have to break away from that mantra.’
Finally, Andrew says: ‘It can seem frightening but there are safety nets when you invest yourself. So long as you’re careful to have a mix of funds, even if one goes wrong you’ll have the others.
‘There is nothing to be afraid of – the only regret I have about going it alone is that I didn’t do it sooner.’
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