Did i make the wrong move?

These plans... Sigh. If they are so good, these agents will fully subscribe for themselves. That's my feeling.

Hais. Thank you for your reply. I’m starting to feel the same way. How naive of me back then

Not really ba, $250 over 25 years at 10% average interest gets you about $295k invested in a broad based ETF. Liquidity is an issue if you need the money urgently as these plans have penalty for early withdrawal.

Thank you so much for your reply 🙏🏻 I’m really bad at calculating all these but i feel slightly better now i guess haha

Ok la, relatively small sum, hope she's chio

Haha funny thing is i bought it from an army mate

You did well. It’s a savings plan not a ILP. You can start your ETF journey now and have another 30 years to accumulate.

Thank you so much for your encouragement 🙏🏻🙏🏻🙏🏻

if it's a cash value insurance plan, surrender and move on to VWRA/IMID etc. Don't get hung up and lose potential future returns because of sunk cost fallacy. Just accept that it is what happened and move on. What would be silly is to continue to get that rather than moving it to a higher expected returns ETF.

Thank you for your advice and i just learnt what a cash value insurance plan is. Luckily mine is not it haha

All investment plans from insurance companies are generally not great, because you're paying a hefty cut to the agent and the insurance company. The projections don't mean much and ultimately it's a question of what will you actually get Vs what the market has achieved

Yes i agree. If only i knew more back then 😵 thank you for your comment

Just treat that as saving plan. Don’t buy more. Usually insurance companies’ investment or savings plan are not more optimal than you doing your own.

Yes hais. Tbh i settled my big ticket items already and was thinking to get another savings plan. Luckily i found out abt ETFs and started my journey. Then it got me thinking abt this topic haha

How much returns per annum is the guaranteed portion?

Hais i just checked. A measly 1.94% fml

Frame your mindset differently then, and give yourself a pat on it still. It’s better than some other financial instruments, and it’s the downside protections assets of your whole portfolio of wealth. No problem. Grow your income. Adjust the percentage of your investment asset within your portfolio of wealth accordingly.

Honestly, rare case is to just keep. 1. Small sum 2. 6 years in already

Thank you so much for your advice 🙏🏻 i also thinking just suck thumb and keep and take the lower returns

Yes, you did. But at least this sounds like an endowment plan and not an ILP. ILP is more evil. Endowment plan is low risk low reward, like CPF OA to SA type of returns. You could earn more with ETFs, but $250/month is not huge, and the endowment plan is protected from crashes in the stock market.

Thank you so much for your comment. Yes from what i know, mine is an endowment plan as i specifically wanted it 6 years ago as i thought that was the best option. (What a joke looking back now). Thank you for your perspective, i guess i can feel better thinking of it this way haha

you would have 60% unrealized profit if you had invested in VUAA from that point ie if you invested and sold your shares now you would have gained 12k out of the 18k total you invested

Hais ya lor. Thats why now i just started my ETF journey, i thinking what it would have been if i started 6 years ago instead of this nonsense insurance plan

In a bull market, everything looks rosy but can you stay invested during a 30% drop in your portfolio during a market crash?

Consider that as your safety net , you may consider to start allocating into ETFs as long term investment . When it rain , it’s better to have an umbrella ya ?

Thank you so much for your advice. Yes i guess shall treat it as my safety net. Then probably use that cash first when i retire and let my ETF continue working or whatever the plan is next time

Why not share the name of the plan? Is the death benefit 101% of the premiums paid?

Ehh tbh idk too much of the deets but the plan name was Retire Happy Plus under AXA. But now under HSBC alr i think

You should go and look at the Benefit Illustration. No death benefit but there is an option to add in riders (require medical underwriting). Not sure if your plan has that.  https://dollarbureau.com/blog/axa-retire-…

Hi OP! Same age! I also just discovered ETF. Always remember the best time to invest is when you were born. The second best time is now. Congrats on finding out abt this now. If you google “compound interest calculator”, and input monthly as 250 for 25 years, the stated guarantee + non guarantee return is between 5.6% to 9.3%. For simple reference, most people use annualised return of 10% for S&P 500 and 6-7% for global, based on past performances. Anyone who is more familiar with the numbers, feel feee to correct me if that’s wrong! So anyway, you should always assume the worst and look at just the return of the guaranteed portion. Another thing that makes passive ETF a more cost effective choice is the low fee. You can look at bogleheads wiki’s “how much do you lose to annual fees” for more details. All the best OP!

Never sign plans just invest urself setup recurring monthly investment into world etf low cost, it’s the same thing but the cost is way lower…

Well, at least you have a guaranteed component and you’re saving I guess. It’s not great because it’s illiquid, you’re paying management fees which erode your opportunity cost in gains, and questionable if they even generate a good return. It’s not the worse. Financial literacy seems poor in general society wise so, just let it be

You did a good job. You knew you had to do something as opposed to letting it sit in bank. You took the lesser of the evils from all the professionally managed financial instruments and tried something with it. Regardless of what everyone else says about “if you chose QQQ instead, you would have gotten more”. The point for me is not how much more you would have gained. You had the initiative to try and do something about it with whatever resources and knowledge you had, despite the decision being suboptimal. And that is the key takeaway I had from your post. You should give yourself more credit.