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What your retirement could look like: retirement living standards in the UK

Updated by The Accumulator on June 23, 2026

A sign that says “Old Age Ahead” as an analogy for thinking about future retirement living standards

Anyone planning for FIRE ¹ knows it’s hard to think about retirement living standards while you’re still having a blast in your 20s and 30s – or even when you’re neck-deep in your responsible 40s and 50s.

Like a precog from Minority Report, you can only glimpse fragments of your future.

Happily, intrepid retirees have sent us back reports from the frontier. And they’ve supplied just enough detail to fill in the ‘Here Be Dragons’ gaps in your FI map.

The resultant research – Retirement Living Standards in the UK: 2025 update – plots three tiers of retirement spending: from Minimal to Moderate to Comfortable.

This annually-updated paper also reveals what kind of retirement living standards such spending really gets you – from people who are already doing it.

Much ado about much more than nothing

Retirement research gives us a shortcut to answering that perennial awkward cocktail party question: How much do I need to retire?

Okay, maybe it’s only personal finance bloggers who get asked such questions at parties…

Anyway, instead of doing laborious calculations on a spreadsheet, you could just pick one of the consensus retirement income answers published by the Pensions and Lifetime Savings Association (PLSA). ²

We’ll get to those in a minute. But a bonus of this research is it also includes testimonies from retirees and near-retirees drawn from various socio-economic backgrounds and regions across the UK.

If our retirement future is an unknown country, then their words act like an audio tour guide. We learn something about what really matters – and as ever, the experience of others might help us find our own path.

Plus it’s interesting to read. There’s nowt so queer as folk!

Okay, let’s start with the hard data. We’ll then move on to the fluffy anecdotal evidence.

Retirement living standards 2025: income targets

Source: PLSA

This table is a bronze, silver, and gold rostrum of annual retirement incomes – as determined by sampling members of the UK public aged 55 or older.

There’s also more granular detail on what you get for your money at each level. We’ll get to that shortly but – spoiler alert – the Minimum lifestyle isn’t factoring in many trips to Florida.

What’s not clear from the table is the income numbers are after-tax.

This makes it an interesting contrast with the UK median household disposable income ³ of £36,700 as of the end of 2024, according to the most recent ONS data.

The poorest 20% of households are on £16,800 (including benefits) and the richest 20% have £71,100 to spend. Remember this is disposable income.

As for the median retired household income, that’s £29,728 – about 9% shy of the Moderate spending level for couples in the table.

Note that the PLSA expects the State Pension to do much of the heavy lifting in retirement. Especially at the Minimum standard.

This is why we think there’s no need to fear the State Pension being done away with. Scrapping it would be catastrophic for any government.

Solo sorrows

Another thing that leaps out from the table? Life is expensive for singletons.

The most effective cost-saving measure any retiree can make is to couple-up. No wonder there are so many senior Casanovas out there!

Be sweet to your significant other and keep them healthy. Give flowers, not chocolate.

What you get for your money

To understand the life of Riley promised by the numbers in the table, we need to dive deeper to see what our pounds are purchasing.

Here’s the singles version:

And for couples:

There is much social division written into these lines – especially in the contrast between the top and bottom. Please draw your own conclusions. I’d love to hear them in the comments.

While the table forces a statement of spending priorities, the reality is that many of us will drift back and forth across the tiers, depending on where we prefer to direct our financial firepower.

For example, The Accumulators are in the Minimum zone for clothing. But we’re in the Comfortable bucket for transport.

Retiree vox pops

What I most like about such research isn’t the numbers, however. It’s the voices.

The 2023 edition featured study participants discussing their lived experience for each major spending category. From this, a portrait emerges of retirement reality, painted in the primary colours of what money can buy.

The anonymous quotes below are excerpts from the study’s 2023 group sessions. (Sadly the 2025 report doesn’t feature these breakdowns, though they received a light update in 2024.)

Food spending

The snapshot above shows the foodie living standard each income band afforded in 2023.

The Comfortables are clearly loading their plates with much more spice of life than the Minimums. At least on the surface.

I say that because one of the things that the FIRE community has been great at is uncovering ways to enjoy life without throwing money at it.

For instance, you can take turns hosting dinners with your friends, which keeps you all socially engaged – and hopefully well-fed – without the overheads of eating out.

Still, rampant inflation in recent years hasn’t helped on this score, either. As one woman told the study:

I don’t think it’s just so much taking people out, but it is having people to the house to cook for them… which you are spending quite a lot of money to then invite people round to, you know, feed five or six people which I would probably do once a month.

In my 20s I spent like The Comfortables on eating out. That was just how I lived the life.

Now I’m under-spending The Minimums and I’m happy with that.

Housing spending

There’s been a sea change in how the study treats housing costs. Prior to 2025, it was assumed Minimums pay social housing rent while Moderates and Comfortables would have paid off their mortgages by retirement.

However, participants no longer believe it’s reasonable to assume that Brits can access social housing if they need it – especially in London. And costs escalate dramatically if you add in rent (figures from the 2025 report):

Earlier on, we saw a retired couple required about £24,100 to scrape a Minimum standard of living in London in 2025 (Green lozenge).

But the minimum cost soars over 81% (red lozenge) if retirees are fully exposed to the private rental market, according to this research.

Much of that hike can apparently be covered by housing benefit. However I’m none too sanguine about that. Wouldn’t it be better to build more social housing than line landlord’s pockets with taxpayers’ money?

2023’s study participants forecast trouble ahead for the researchers’ mortgage-free retirement assumptions, too:

I think that it is probably reasonable now that they would own it but in ten years’ time perhaps they would be more likely to rent?

Personally, I think we’ve fallen short as a country on home ownership. It’s hypocritical to hoover up housing stock and lock future generations out of the market by failing to build. We’re creating a generational divide that puts social cohesion at risk – even as younger generations are still meant to bankroll the NHS, long-term care, State Pensions, and fixing the climate crisis.

Also, the study appears to radically underestimate other housing cost. These are set at £1,300 per year for the Comfortables in 2025. That amount seemingly covers energy costs, maintenance and decoration, plus buildings and contents insurance.

There’s not a cat in hell’s chance you can keep a £1,300 lid on that lot.

I’d suggest the researchers need to redo their sums. Bear in mind the rule-of-thumb: 1% to 4% of your property’s value annually for upkeep and repairs.

Til divorce do us part

Finally on keeping a roof over your head, divorce looms large as a catastrophic roll of the dice in the game of housing snakes and ladders:

Lifestyles nowadays, people like myself got divorced a couple of times, I ended up on my own and … I live in rented. I have had houses and owned them in the past, but because of circumstances and stuff I don’t.

Divorce is often mentioned by readers in the Monevator comments as a third-party calamity. (Excuse me while I google ‘thoughtful gifts’.)

Speaking of unhappy endings I’d rather not think about…

Body disposal etiquette

Being at an age where they’ve seen plenty of family and friends pass away, the study’s focus-grouped retirees are very pragmatic:

You could die with a million pounds but have your family got access to that million pounds to bury you?

Probably not because it has got to go through probate and solicitors so they might not have the £3K, £4K, £5K to bury you next week or in a fortnight’s time.

Pre-paid cremation plans are included in the Moderate and Comfortable budgets. The interviewees confirmed they didn’t want their loved ones to foot the bill.

Mrs Accumulator is under instruction to pop me out with the bins. But she says she will put me in the freezer so she can still chat to me.

We’re gonna need a bigger freezer.

Health issues

We all have teeth that get holes in them and eyes that go wonky, whatever our financial means.

So for dentistry, for example, each of the retirement living standards bands includes the cost of a check-up every six months and one treatment per year, such as a filling, as well as including the cost of replacing dentures every five years.

In an ominous sign of the times, contributors voiced fears about being able to rely on the State for medical treatment:

You need to be able to have money available in case you need [it] because you can’t rely on the NHS well unless you want to wait in pain for ten years or something.

Private healthcare is always a talking point for the study’s focus groups, but it apparently loomed extra large back in 2023. It was not included in the retirement budgets this time – but for how much longer?

Funding the NHS feels like another slow-moving car crash that we’re not grappling with as a society.

Are we prepared to pay more in taxes? Can we reduce the burden on the NHS by looking after ourselves more? (I mean by living healthier lifestyles that increase our chances of staving off chronic conditions, not DIY brain surgery!)

No amount of private health insurance will save us if we need urgent assistance but must wait two days for an ambulance.

Moolah for manscaping

At least if you’re hit by the proverbial bus, you might be more likely to have your best face on for it these days.

The various spending budgets have always included beauty treatments for women.

But now there’s a budget for men too at the Moderate and Comfortable levels.

The researchers note:

“a shift in social norms and expectations and that, as one participant put it, ‘they like it all these men nowadays, they are all grooming themselves aren’t they?’.

The budget included for women covered the cost of beauty treatments, such as manicures and eyebrow threading.

However the focus groups suggested the budget for men could cover the cost of ‘grooming’ such as a shave at the barber or a facial massage, as well as, for example, occasional physiotherapy appointments or sports massages.

While some may despair of ever escaping from society’s expectations about personal appearance, at least it seems positive that:

…in general, groups talked about retirement now being a far more active period and as a consequence there should be a budget to cover these sorts of treatments.

Social and cultural participation

Comfortables are spending 150% more per person per week on leisure activities than The Minimums.

The potential impact of that spending power on a life well-lived is captured in this quote:

It is really important for mental health and everything as well isn’t it? So you know even day classes or evening classes are everything. You don’t get much… I don’t think you get much less if you’re retired.

Interestingly, this budget area hasn’t increased much over time. Perhaps that reflects more flexibility within this category? Gym memberships can give way to running shoes and walking boots, for example.

Early Mr Money Mustache was a trailblazer in rethinking life’s riches so they don’t cost a packet.

I’m not sure anyone has replaced him in this respect? Let me know who I’m missing in the comments.

Tech tock

The social participation category also includes spending on technology – an ever-changing hit to our (increasingly digital) wallets.

DVD players are long gone, obviously. But streaming services are now considered an essential at every income level:

I was going to say it is for your mental health well-being as well, socially included because if you’re not able to watch Netflix you know a small series like that, I just feel that is you socially excluded as well.

Interestingly, ‘cleverer’ home technology such as passive cameras and smart speakers crept into the budgets and anecdotes as more of a necessity.

One participant explained in 2023 why she’d sorted out a smart speaker for her father:

A couple of months ago he did fall and had we set up in time he would have been able to call one of us because he couldn’t reach his mobile phone.

You can ask Alexa to phone so they are a good feature on that so they’re well worth the money to be honest.

But smart speakers were already considered surplus to requirements in 2024 as phones have colonised the space.

The spread of smartphones among retirees is notable in itself. All the Boomers in my life have upgraded, after years of resistance. Though they do still sometimes stare at the thing like a caveman facing a mortgage application.

Will an AI subscription be de rigueur the next time the research is overhauled?

“Hello Future Me”

Retirement is difficult to imagine until you get there. We plan it out on bland spreadsheets and struggle to relate our parents’ experiences to our own.

Making it even harder is that friendship groups tend to be intra-generational. I know more about the trials of my elders via Monevator readers than I do from real-life.

That’s why I found the retirement thumbnails in this research so fascinating. I heard things people don’t normally talk about.

What have you got to say for yourselves? Please do flesh out the picture for all of us in the comments below.

Take it steady,

The Accumulator

P.S. It’s interesting to contrast the 2025 numbers above with the 2023 figures:

Weirdly, the Minimum lifestyle is cheaper in 2025:

£13,900 for a singleton outside London
£14,600 for London singles despite all those Tinder dates
£24,100 for couples in the capital
£22,500 for provincial double-acts. Not down but well below an inflationary rise from 2023

The drop occurred in 2024, when the researchers re-analysed the assumptions underpinning the Minimum lifestyle’s budgetary requirements.

It helped that utility bills fell after the energy crisis. But sadly people also allocated less money for the fun stuff like celebratory food and drinks.

The historical detail for 2023:

Financial Independence Retire Early.[↩]
The PLSA is a financial industry group. It includes asset managers, consultants, law firms, and fintechs. They’re so keen to get Britain saving for retirement that they commission this research from Loughborough University’s Centre for Research in Social Policy.[↩]
Disposable income is what’s left after direct taxes, such as Income Tax, National Insurance, and Council Tax.[↩]

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Weekend reading: If the drugs do work

by Frugalist on June 20, 2026

I was interested to see that Novo Nordisk’s Wegovy pill was approved last week by the UK’s Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency.

With the nation busily sitting on the sofa and shouting at footballers to run faster, it feels like appropriate timing.

Weekend Reading – featuring the week’s best money and investing articles from around the web – can be read by any logged-in Monevator member. Alternatively please subscribe to our free email newsletter to get future editions direct to your inbox.

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Investors are still Out of Office (and other REITs…)

by The Investor on June 18, 2026

Another disappointing result for DIY corporate financiers this week. Having hosted the ‘Fair Sale’ over itself nearly two years ago, Residential Secure Income (LSE: RESI) has announced that most of its assets are set to be acquired by the Social Housing REIT (LSE: SOHO).

SOHO will get RESI’s retirement home portfolio, with the rump of RESI’s assets going to a currently unnamed bidder.

The mostly paper-based deal values RESI at about 57p per share, depending on movements in SOHO’s share price.

There are a few moving parts to the deal. But the point to note is that RESI was priced at about 60p a share in October 2024 when it first announced it was winding itself down. Hence this has hardly been a barnstorming return for anyone who bought into the REIT ¹ in hopes of unlocking value.

Moreover, RESI’s tangible NAV ² was nearer 80p in late 2024, compared to c.63p at the last count. RESI did sell a different chunk of its portfolio in early 2025, but that all went on debt repayment.

So its managers have presided over a shrinking asset base that’s ultimately been sold at a still-meaningful discount to NAV.

The total return situation isn’t quite as dispiriting. RESI yields over 7%, so when you take dividends into account investors were at least paid to wait for their mediocre outcome.

RESI’s managers would no doubt stress too that shareholders who keep their SOHO shares after the sale completes will retain ongoing exposure to RESI’s attractive (and discounted) assets, via the newly enlarged parent.

But still, this is hardly the sort of outcome that Joel Greenblatt touted in his classic book You Can Be A Stock Market Genius, when he explained how ordinary investors can profit from corporate activity in the public markets.

REIT petite

I wrote about the opportunity in RESI for Moguls in January 2025. In the same post I also highlighted that Abrdn European Logistics Income (LSE: ASLI) was on the block, too.

The ASLI outcome was a bit better. Shareholders should eventually get around a 20% return from memory, once the protracted endgame is over.

(Surely we can also all rejoice any time an instance of the dreaded moniker ‘Abrdn’ is put out of its misery!)

But again, the ASLI wind-down did not release vast swathes of value. And that has been the trend with this REIT consolidation that began after the yield-driven rout of 2022.

Cut-price deals: everything must go

A.J. Bell recently published a handy roundup of all this REIT sales and merger activity, and the premiums – or otherwise – achieved:

Source: Company accounts / A.J. Bell

Note: Negative moves/premiums in brackets.

While these actions spurred some worthwhile-ish share price pops, they have nearly all seen assets taken out at a big discount to NAV. Which I suppose isn’t surprising in hindsight, given the huge discounts that even the largest and most liquid UK REITs still trade on.

This suggests two things.

Firstly, there are not many buyers for these property assets – either from the public or private domains.

Secondly, neither the market nor the companies themselves consider these commercial property NAVs as anything like gilt-edged. They are more, as the pirate’s code puts it, guidelines.

Clearly, fears and uncertainties still abound – six years after Covid plunged the future of commercial property into doubt, three years after interest rate rises did a number on the economics, and a couple of years into A.I. making everyone nervous about what the future of humans at work really looks like anyway.

The REIT stuff

When a sector is this unloved, it’s hard to remember it wasn’t always so. But the real estate sector’s status as stock market booby prize isn’t a law of nature.

Throughout the 1990s and the early 2000s, property was lauded as a halfway house between bonds and equities.

The pitch? You got the attractive income of bonds and some of the capital gains of shares, with a dose of inflation-hedging thrown into the mix, too. Back then even passive investors saw the value of adding REIT exposure to their portfolios. They hoped for a bit of lower-risk additional diversification.

Property developers thrived as much as the steadier landlords. Money was cheap, and as global capital searched for more touchy-feely returns following the Dotcom crash, prestige skyscrapers began to sprout across the world’s major cities, minting millions.

It’s hard to believe nowadays, but many UK REITs and blue chip property developers actually used to trade at a premium to NAV!

Confident investors anticipated valuation gains and higher incomes, and they were happy to front run them.

Bargain buildings

That all ended with the financial crisis, however, and the asset class has never recovered. Big discounts to NAV for commercial property REITs abound.

Here’s how the UK bellwethers trade compared to their assets:

Company	Market cap	Price / NAV	Discount
Segro (LSE: SGRO)	£10bn	744p / 925p	(20%)
Land Securities (LSE: LAND)	£4.7bn	629p / 882p	(29%)
LondonMetric (LSE: LMP)	£4.3bn	182p / 201p	(9%)
British Land (LSE: BLND)	£4.1bn	401p / 590p	(32%)

Source: Company reports / Prices as of 18 June 2026

Imagine walking around town and seeing giant 30%-off labels slapped across the frontages of office blocks and shopping centres. That’s effectively what you get with most REITs – large and small – today. £10 of assets on sale for £7 or less.

LondonMetric – which has driven much of the sector consolidation that we began with – is on a narrower discount, true. Partly that’s thanks to its stronger balance sheet and tighter terms with tenants.

But I’d also argue LondonMetric has won investors over by telling a better story. That’s what the rest of the REITs need to do. (And ideally for it to be true, of course!)

REIT-sizing exposure

Even my co-blogger, The Accumulator, gave me stick about REITs the other day.

Apparently I’d persuaded TA that he should keep them in our Slow & Steady portfolio when he soured on the asset class.

It was a few years ago, but he hadn’t forgotten!

TA’s disenchantment with REITs will be driven more by revisiting the historical record than by the sector’s recent travails. All the same, if REITs were multi-bagging like semiconductor stocks I wonder if there’d be quite so much soul-searching?

Equally, I think I suggested we retain them more due to my bias against fussing too much with a model portfolio than out of conviction that the asset class was cheap.

Still, maybe this is another signal?

Most things in investing are cyclical. When even diehard passive investors are ready to throw in the towel, perhaps the bottom is near.

Most of the major REITs have been doing a lot better of late. Rents are up, and even office valuations are stabilising, if not rising. Albeit more for the top-end stuff.

The surviving players have navigated a once-in-a-generation interest rate shock, too.

Real estate investment vehicles invariably carry a lot of debt. So when interest rates spiked it not only made their dividend payouts relatively less attractive and pressured their tenants – it also stressed their own balance sheets.

The past three years saw debts refinanced and restructured though, and to my mind the big REITs now look pretty solid. They’ve even begun to invest in new developments.

Improving cashflows underpin generous dividend yields of 4-7% for the REITs in my table. I’d say that’s attractive, given there’s an inherent ability to respond to inflation (compared to vanilla bonds) and the prospect – eventually – of more capital growth.

Priced for imperfection

While I might keep my shares in SOHO when the RESI deal completes, I think I’m more inclined to look at the stronger REITs than to punt again on the little guys being taken over.

With hindsight, it was optimistic to expect the smaller prey to get acquired at close to NAV when the big predators themselves were still badly limping.

Sector consolidation was necessary – too many sub-scale REITs were launched in the near-zero interest rate era. But investors aren’t being rewarded for the extra risks.

In contrast, the big REITs will hopefully see continued strong dividends and eventually some more share price growth. And there’s the prospect of a double-whammy gain if property valuations increase even as discounts narrow to meet those rising NAVs.

Of course, there are risks – everything from the sorry state of the UK economy and politics to the need to upgrade old offices to comply with environmental standards to AI threatening to send white-collar workers to not-work-from-home forever.

But the discounts likely reflect a lot of these dangers, given the underlying metrics are now improving. And to the upside, with oil flows set to resume through Hormuz and inflation risks hopefully contained, we might eventually even see more interest rate cuts.

That’d really help refurbish the appeal of property. Just ask Donald Trump!

Real Estate Investment Trust[↩]
Net Asset Value Per Share.[↩]

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UK dividend tax explained

Updated by The Investor on June 16, 2026

Dividends are taxed more generously than savings interest.

The last few years have seen dividend tax rates steadily rise.

At the same time investors have seen a massive reduction in the already miserly tax-free dividend allowance.

Let’s update ourselves on where dividend tax rates and allowances now stand. We’ll then briefly consider how we got here, and what you can do about it.

Dividend tax rates and allowances

The rate of tax you’ll pay on your dividends depends on your income tax band.

UK dividend tax rates are currently:

Basic-rate taxpayers: 10.75%
Higher-rate taxpayers: 35.75%
Additional-rate taxpayers: 39.35%

The basic and higher rates were increased on 6 April 2026.

Note that depending on your total earnings – and where it comes from – you could pay tax at more than one rate on your income.

Importing note: we’re talking here about dividends paid outside of tax shelters. Dividends paid within ISAs and pensions are ignored with respect to tax. Are you adding up your dividends for your tax return? Don’t include dividends paid in ISAs or pensions – forget about them when it comes to tax! (Remember them when it comes to reinvestment to get rich.)

The tax-free dividend allowance 2026 to 2027 and beyond

Back in April 2024, the annual tax-free dividend allowance was halved to just £500.

It’s still stuck there today. Yet another frozen tax threshold!

The good news is that this £500 dividend allowance means you at least escape dividend tax on your first £500 of dividend income.

Dividends you receive within this tax-free dividend allowance are not taxed, irrespective of how much non-dividend income you earn and your tax bracket. But breach the allowance and the rest is taxed, as per your income tax band.

Like other tax allowances such as the personal allowance for income tax, the dividend allowance runs over the tax year. (From 6 April to 5 April the next year).

(Incidentally, if you recall the allowance being much more generous, you’re right. It has been slashed over the past few years. More on that below.)

What are dividends, anyway?

Dividends are cash payouts made by companies:

You may be paid dividends by shares listed on the stock market or by funds that own them.

You might also be paid dividends from your own limited company, as part of your remuneration.

As mentioned, dividend tax is only applied on dividends paid outside of a tax shelter.

Hence using ISAs and pensions is key to shielding your income-generating assets from tax for the long-term.

What tax rate will you pay on your UK dividends?

If your dividend income exceeds the tax-free dividend allowance, you’ll pay tax on the excess.

This liability must be declared and paid through your self-assessment tax return.

For example, if you received £6,000 in dividends in a year, then tax is potentially charged on £5,500 of it. (£6,000 minus the £500 tax-free dividend allowance).

The rate you’ll pay depends on which tax bracket your dividend income falls into.

Beware of being bounced into a higher tax band

If you own dividend-paying shares outside of an ISA or pension, then dividends may increase your taxable income. Perhaps by enough to push you into a higher tax bracket.

If you own funds outside of tax shelters, you could also owe tax on reinvested dividends. Choosing accumulation funds doesn’t spare you the tax rod – unless they’re safely bunkered in your tax shelters.

The lesson again is to avoid taxes reducing your returns by using ISAs and pensions.

Watch out for withholding tax on dividends

If you’re paid dividends from overseas companies, you may be charged tax on them twice. Once by the tax authorities where the company is based, and again by His Majesty’s finest in the UK.

You may even pay this withholding tax on foreign dividends held in an ISA or pension.

However there are reciprocal tax treaties between the UK and some other countries. These can reduce the total amount of dividend tax you pay.

Your broker should take care of this for you. (Check though!)

Some territories do not charge withholding tax on dividends received in a UK pension. The US most notably. (This kindly treatment doesn’t apply to ISAs. Choose where you shelter your US shares accordingly.)

Again, make sure your platform is paying you any US dividends in your pension without any tax having been charged.

It can all get a bit fiddly. See our article on withholding tax.

Why was the old dividend tax system changed?

Then-chancellor George Osborne revamped UK dividend taxation back in the summer budget of 2015.

Osborne apparently wanted to remove the incentive for people to set themselves up as limited companies and then use dividends as a more tax-efficient way to get paid, compared to salaries.

Osborne also said the changes enabled him to reduce the rate of corporation tax.

Whatever his intentions, today’s regime applies equally to all dividends – whether received from ordinary shares or from limited companies.

Even worse, an initially fairly-generous dividend allowance of £5,000 – designed to prevent small shareholders being taxed on legacy portfolios – is now just £500.

At the same time dividend tax rates have ratcheted higher. Notably in 2022, when the rates were increased by 1.25 percentage points, and then in 2026, when the basic and higher rates were lifted by another two percentage points.

I hope you’re keeping notes at the back.

Admittedly, small investors have generaly not been hit by these changes. That’s because most of us hold our shares within ISAs and pensions, so we’re not affected by dividend taxation.

However there are exceptions.

Business owners paid a dividend by their limited companies now pay more tax. Their salary-sized dividends quickly chew through the £500 dividend allowance.

There is also a dwindling cohort of older investors who built up big portfolios of income shares outside of ISAs and pensions. They’re paying far more tax on dividends, too.

Always use your tax shelters

For years I urged such dividend-focused investors to move as much money as possible into ISAs.

They could have done this by defusing gains to fund their ISAs every year, for example.

Early action was important because the annual ISA allowance is a use-it-or-lose-it affair. Hence you must build up your total ISA capacity over many years.

Yet inexplicably to me, some of those unsheltered dividend investors argued – even in the Monevator comments – that there was no point.

Dividends were not taxed until you hit the higher-rate band, they said. So why bother?

Well, that was true under the old system. And maybe there was a hard choice to be made if you also had massive cash savings. In that case there was competition as to how to best to divvy up your annual ISA allowance.

But taxes on dividends were always vulnerable to change, like everything else in our convoluted tax code. And eventually they did.

At that point, the people who had declined to move some or all of their portfolios into ISAs – just to save a few quid – began to be hit with large tax bills.

I hate to say I told you so. (Truly – I run this blog to help people.)

ISA sheltering costs nothing. Even back then there was at most a trivial cost difference between an ISA and a trading account. Nowadays there’s usually none.

The moral of the story is to get any non-sheltered portfolios into an ISA (and/or a SIPP) as soon as possible.

Not only because of dividend tax, but also to shelter from capital gains taxes and future regulatory changes.

Note: Comments below may refer to old (or incorrect) dividend tax rates and allowances. Please check the dates if unsure.

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