u/No-State-2962

How easy, and expensive, is it to find a place to rent for 6 or 12 months, to try living in Spain? Somewhere nice like Moraira.

I’ve run my business - small scale construction, 8 to 10 staff - for decades, after joining the family business at 17.

I enjoy it (most of the time), I’m ok at it, and I feel totally up to it at 56, both mentally and physically. However I’d like to go on to 70 , and I see people saying that working to 70 just isn’t doable. Is the gap between 56 and 70 really that dramatic?

My 19yo son is involved, and is great, but he wants to pursue a different career and so will probably leave in a year or two. Running the business is very much in my hands.

I’ve set my financial plans to that date, 14 years hence, and I’d like to see it through. Retirement, particularly enforced retirement, doesn’t hold any allure for me.

Any advice or experience welcome.

What sort of rates are the big roofing companies paying these days, for concrete interlocking tiles, fibre cement slates, hips/valleys etc.

We haven’t been involved in new builds for quite a few years.

I’m 55, live in UK, and have a couple of income streams. I run a small business with staff, and rent out some residential properties. People who know my situation assume I’m doing well. And I couldn’t work any harder.

But I think about money, and run the numbers, pretty much daily. My business hasn’t had a good last two years, the rentals seem to sustain rather than generate revenue (always a one off cost to sort). And now I need to find money to help my young adult kids, probably through leveraging. I absolutely don’t resent this in anyway, they’re such good workers, but more debt at this time wasn’t the goal.

I feel things didn’t used to be quite this hard.

I haven’t posted on here before but my life could reasonably be described as middle class I believe.

Up until a week or so ago I thought the big decision was which company will be the big winner in the AI race - Open AI, Anthropic, Google et al - but if humanity is to end in the next few years, I’m thinking I need to change my strategy.

There are always opportunities in disaster, but I’m unsure where to take a punt 🤔

Just what it says…. I have two kids, 19 and 22, and they’re both grafters who won’t squander a gift.

I really want to give them 100k (50 each) which would help them a lot, but selling or leveraging are my only real options at this time, and I hate selling appreciating assets. I have an unconnected business but it isn’t generating great profits this year or last.

I currently have about 430k debt on 1.1m BTLs.

I’ve built what I have on debt, yet I’m still quite frightened by it.

I’m in small scale construction - £1m t/o max - and I run the office side on my own.

I love AI and use it whenever I can. And I’ve found it frees up time, when it deals with mundane, repetitive tasks, and I’m just not as behind as I used to be.

A lot of the jobs I price are similar - not close enough to simply apply £ 300 a M2, and pump the quote out - but I can use pricing spreadsheets from a previous tender as a template.

It sounds like Cowork could streamline things further, but I’d be lying if I said I totally understand the difference between this and standard Claude.

Any advice very welcome.

I run a small company with ten employees on average. We work for builders, usually five to fifty employee size, but also lots of domestic work.

I’ve put most of my guys through the fairly onerous CSCS scheme, and financially it hasn’t been worth it. If I’d just turned down the projects where they insisted on them over the past fifteen years, it would have been less hassle. I also have one employee with a particular skill, and I always make clear that he doesn’t have CSCS, and has no intention of doing it, and he has NEVER been turned away. When they realise I have plenty of work for him, and finding another person with the same skills is now their problem, all obstacles are removed.

I also feel that it’s becoming less critical, not more. I’m sure it is partly because of the type of projects we’re on, but I’ve started working for a very large contractor - local authority work, amongst other things - and they don’t need CSCS. They do insist on Safe Contractor, but that’s simply a ball ache and cost, for me and ChatGPT.

I’ll try to be brief.

I’ve always owned a car personally. Mainly because in years gone by the tax implications weren’t great, and I didn’t want another vehicle to add to our small fleet of vans (I drive one of the vans).

Our car needs changing now - we only have one at home, which my wife drives - and I’m thinking of trying one through the company this time.

I’m not ready for full EV, I’m thinking of maybe Volvo XC90 phev, used not new.

Please don’t answer “why don’t you ask your accountant”, because this is simply a first foray to get others experiences. I will speak to the accountant as a next step.

I signed up to the Velux reward program and have started building a few points - I’m in UK - but it’s not clear what a point equates to.

For example, is 100 points equivalent to £ 100 M&S vouchers?

Do you go because you like the community, or the beautiful architecture, or just to get out of the house on a Sunday morning?

But you’re not a believer.

I’m not trolling. I don’t love Panda but that’s because I’m not a huge fan of Daytona, although I realise that it’s the go-to Rolex for many.

I realise that people just like what they like, but I can kind of get why Pepsi and Hulk might be so in demand, because of the in-your-face colours.

With Panda I can’t see why it commands a few grand premium over the black dial.

I’m probably just missing something. And I know nothing of the history of Panda Daytona. How long it’s been around etc.

I’ll try to keep it short, because I’m not looking for advice on my situation.

I run two businesses - one with staff, one just BTL - and they’ve always taken up a lot of time. Not 15 hours a day, but difficult to take long holidays for instance. It’s my life and I’m fine with it, in fact I find four day breaks are more enjoyable because we tend to fit things in, knowing we’re not there for an extended period.

Just wondering if others have a particularly hands-on business? Or, is my situation unusual.

I think it’s a strange phenomenon that we have celebrity cooks, and even celebrity waiters, these days, but I’ve always thought this guy feels he’s Bono, when he’s just a successful dog fixer.

But a friend of a friend, who I presume is a fan, went to one of his shows (for a vet, WTF) and came away saying she couldn’t even watch him on TV anymore.

Said the whole thing had a ‘cult’ vibe and he says weird stuff.

Interesting.

My 22yo son is flying from Gatwick with his friend, for a fortnight travelling the States, and neither have much money.

Want to book them lounge access to save them paying for food and drink at the airport, but there seems to be a few choices and I’m not familiar with them.

Small building company, long established, 8 - 12 employees, 1m t/o at best.

We started to struggle, after a good eight year run which included covid, January 2025. Somehow managed to not lose money last year, and first three months of this FY seemed a little better. But really hard again now.

I’m quoting everything, and quickly, but I’m reluctant to cut prices yet, as this rarely leads to jobs running more smoothly.

Interested to know how you’re doing. I’m hoping it’s just me, and I’m doing something wrong that I can correct 🤞

When the news story broke last week about the pension age rise from 67 to 68, being brought forward by seven years, they mentioned it would affect those aged 47 to 55 now.

I’m 55 and so borderline. I’m not really concerned, as I don’t intend to retire until 70, but I wondered if this would cost me 12 grand or not.

Is it net worth, liquidity, income, something else?

I tend to focus on NW because I don’t have the bandwidth to focus on balancing all the different elements, and this one is very simple to do (just an excel spreadsheet on my PC), I’m not sure it’s the best way to feel wealthy though, and maybe liquidity is the golden ticket.

We’re here for a good time, not a long time.

Started using Capital on Tap company credit card, and it is is going very well.

Could use the points for Avios, cash-back, or vouchers (eg, John Lewis or Lastminute).

Has anyone claimed the vouchers (will probably be £2000 - 2500 a year), and if so what are the implications?

I know I can ask my accountant but he’s such a doom monger, I thought I’d ask on here first.