Master Later Life Lending - By Air

Lyndsey Charnock: Property, pensions & holistic retirement planning

• Will Hale • Season 2 • Episode 5

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In this Comprehensive conversation, our CEO Will Hale sits down with Lyndsey Charnock, National Sales Manager at Canada Life, this episode explores how property and pension strategies can work together to enhance client outcomes, strengthen intergenerational planning, and support advisers in delivering confident, future-focused advice that builds long-term value.

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SPEAKER_01:

So welcome to our next in our series of comprehensive conversations. I'm joined today by Lindsay Charnock, who's National Sales Manager at Canada Life. Welcome, Lindsay.

SPEAKER_00:

Thanks, Will. Thanks for having me.

SPEAKER_01:

So just to start off, tell the audience a little bit about yourself and your role at Canada Life.

SPEAKER_00:

Hi, yes. So as Will said, I'm Lindsay Charnock, National Sales Manager for Canada Life retirement team, which is equity release and pensions. So I've been with Canada Life for 15 years in total, previously retirement advantage as it was for a total of 15 years. So starting off as a BDM and then promoted to national sales manager about five, six years ago, I think it is now. So yeah, time flies when you're having fun.

SPEAKER_01:

Good stuff. So we've got the right person here to talk about, I suppose, um, later life lending and specifically sort of using later life lending products within sort of broader retirement planning strategies. So we're sitting here today, uh, sort of in Regents Park, fantastic venue. You've just delivered a brilliant um presentation at the Air Masterclass event, and and I wanted to explore some of the themes that you you covered today. So starting off and quite topical, um, there's a lot in the press sort of uh talking about what Rachel Reeves might do in the autumn budget around um taxes related to property. So I wondered what your advice would be for advisors dealing with customers at the moment around what they might do with their property in terms of their financial planning.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, as you said, you know, the there's lots of news in the press at the moment, and I think quite confusing as well for a lot of clients, you know, lots of different speculation involved and thrown into the mix. Obviously, we've got the changes coming in place with IHT um in April 2027, where pensions are now going to form part of a client's estate. So I think from a clients and advisors' point of view, it's for advisors just to be educating clients as much as possible as to what them changes might mean for them and their families. You know, so it's going to impact people very differently. I think a lot of clients will probably have thought about IHT in the past as, you know, a tax probably for more wealthy people, whereas no pensions are going to form part of that estate, that's not actually going to be um the case anymore. You know, lots more middle class families are going to be affected by that. And I think it's for them clients to be understanding as to, you know, how is that going to impact them, their children, you know, their kind of beneficiaries going forward, in having enough time to plan and prepare for that, as to, you know, different areas, different avenues that they might want to have a look through, and you know, talking more about this holistic approach to retirement income planning, in what might be the best strategy for that particular client's circumstances.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah, that's interesting. I suppose um it's a bit like when we talk to advisors about the rate environment. I suppose sort of taxes are similar and that it's very difficult to predict what the Chancellor might do in November. But I suppose would the message be that the most important thing is to make sure that you are including property within your financial planning considerations? Because I think a lot of advisors we speak to, if you're an expert in the later life lending market, it's probably fine. But but a lot of advisors who maybe are more focused on wealth or investment, property is something they perhaps sort of don't consider as actively as they might. And maybe they're not aware of all of the sort of new innovative later life lending products available. Would would that be fair?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think I think I'd definitely agree with you there. And you know, we haven't so many conversations with wealth management firms in IFAs around this conversation. You know, a lot of their strategies around this cash flow modelling tools that they use to, you know, have a look at various assets to provide that retirement income planning. And there's so many times that we have them conversations, you know, they'll be including the pension, they'll be including the rises and you know, different other investment strategies that they have, but not including property as part of that retirement income stream. And it's crazy, but I think it's it's just as you said, it's it's lack of education in a lot of areas. Unfortunately, property wealth and equity release has still kind of got sometimes that stigma attached to it as to how it can work in in later life. So yeah, definitely more education to be had there. In obviously the overall approach of that holistic planning again, as to you know, whether you take some from your pension, whether you take some from your property, or dilute it between all assets, um, ultimately to you know to save your clients' tax in the long run from obviously the changes that are happening within INHT.

SPEAKER_01:

Yeah. And I suppose tax is one of the sort of fundamental pillars, isn't it, of financial planning? You know, helping your your customers manage their affairs in a in a tax-efficient way. So so coming back to a point that you made um sort of earlier in the conversation, I I think that there's definitely this theme, isn't there, that whereas inheritance tax was a problem that really was the preserve of the high net worth individual, yeah. I think because of the changes we're seeing in treatment of pensions, as you mentioned, you know, this is becoming a problem for for most families, isn't it, now? So I suppose uh again, how how do we address that as a financial planning advice community? Because we've still got this advice gap, haven't we, in terms of a lot of customers not finding their way to an advisor. So how can we address that and and get more of the advice that's needed into the customers that need it?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, I think we've spoken today, aren't we? You know, people are still very much working in them silos. So it's been bringing the industry more together so we can have conversations, you know, whether it's with mortgage advisors, whether it's with tax specialists, whether it's with IFAs and and wealth management firms, whatever you know, brings that client to basically have the overall final result that they need. So it's just I think bringing the industry together. You know, we've got a lot of different um introducers already within the market, but it's just everybody, I think, understanding each other's field in a little bit more detail, and obviously we can pass that knowledge and that advice on to our clients then. You know, you might not necessarily just need one advisor to advise a client through the retirement journey. There might be different advisors involved in that process, and that's fine. We're just all ultimately helping each other to help that client's um financial needs.

SPEAKER_01:

I think that's really crucial actually, because it's very difficult to be a specialist in everything, isn't it? So you know this need for holistic advice, I think, is right, but that doesn't mean that holistic advice needs to be delivered by one individual, it might be a team of advisors delivering that solution. I mean, one of the things I'm always struck by is this um the stats in terms of the number of uh customers that um are helped by a mortgage advisor. So I think it's about 90% of mortgages are uh sold through an intermediary. But when you look at sort of pensions and investments, I think sub 10% of customers have actually received sort of pensions or investment advice. So it feels to me like mortgage advisors actually have a huge opportunity here because they may well be the starting point for these conversations. And if they've got good referral relationships in place with specialist tax advisors or specialist investment advisors, what a great way to act out for your customers and to create more income for your business as well. So a Canada Life sort of helping um sort of educate advisors in that way?

SPEAKER_00:

Yes, we're trying our best to educate advisors along the whole retirement model. So that's why we brought the sales team together in terms of the pension team and the equity release team to have them conversations of more of this holistic approach to retirement income planning. And we still see advisors, you know, at separate sides of the market sometimes. You know, we have the IFAs who concentrate on pensions and investments, and obviously we have the equity release advisors that specialise more in later life and in mortgages as well, but it's just kind of bringing them relationships closer together, you know, having them introduce a conversation as to you know, this is the solution for your client, engage with XYZ advisor in and have that conversation to deliver the outcome that the client needs. Um but it's having that educational need from both sides to to educate you know the wealth management side in terms of what later life lending products can can bring for your client and vice versa for the pension side as well. And I think especially now we're all forming you know part of the estate for IHT, then conversations are gonna have to be had now more than more than ever, really.

SPEAKER_01:

That's great to hear. And so it takes me back. I had a very good conversation with Rebecca Gladstone back in sort of January about your retirement 100 report, yeah. Followed up sort of later in the summer with with um Pete Madden talking again about sort of what Canada Life are doing in that space. And it feels like Canada Life as a brand really uniquely well positioned, because you cover all of those different parts of the retirement landscape, aren't we?

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, that's it. So, you know, from a client who wants to take a pension or a annuity and then obviously to equal to release, we do the wealth management side as well in terms of offshore bonds and trusts and tax planning on that side. So it's kind of bringing everybody together. Um, but yeah, I think it's just more of that educational piece as a sector and just making sure that we're re-educating them clients and the advisors all the time. And also when we're talking to wealth management advisors, bringing them into the equity release space. I think we've spoken today as to you know, we need to generate more interest from advisors to actually join this space. There's going to be more and more people that are going to need equity release at some point throughout that retirement journey. Um so it's re-educating as much as possible.

SPEAKER_01:

So I think that's probably a great place to end actually. That that need for more advisors to come into the later life lending space. And you know, as you very eloquently sort of talked about, there's so many drivers, whether it's from a tax planning perspective or a wealth generation perspective, that advisors should be looking at this space. So thank you for your time today, and uh thank you to everyone for for joining us in this latest of our comprehensive conversations.