Second home owners will need to file applications by 31 July if they are to qualify for the relief, which allows owners to offset losses they make on running costs against their other income, and defer paying capital gains tax (CGT) charges.

The changes bring rules for home owners with properties in the European Economic Area (EEA) in line with those for those with properties in the UK.

But the tax reliefs for properties in both the UK and the EEA will be abolished in April next year, under the plans outlined in the Budget.

The EEA rule change however, applies retrospectively, covering the 2006/7 and 2007/8 tax years, although home owners looking to claim for 2006/7 will need to meet the 31 June deadline.

The current rules allow holiday home owners who rent out their properties to delay paying CGT on the sale of other assets until they sell the property.

With unemployment rising and expected to reach 3 million by the end of the year, Government borrowing aimed at stemming the job cuts and stimulating growth expected to surpass any levels set in history and stock markets, property markets, corporate bonds and commodities all trading at very distressed levels, what does the future hold.

Well, no-one can say with any certainty what will happen, but it is realistic to believe that when the effect of Government spending, low interest rates and economic stimulus does begin to take effect, assets that are trading at very distressed levels may rally strongly.

When this may be is the million dollar question, but with money on cash deposits attracting little or no interest, these other assets are looking very attractive with much higher yields than cash and with the potential for capital growth over the medium to long term.

Savers should take independent financial advice and re-assess their investment options.  The point is that at present, investors are being well paid in, terms of yield, to take risk.

Download our free brochure Coping with the Credit Crunch and feel free to contact us if you require any help or advice.

The scheme covers up to:

£48,000 per investment such as Unit Trusts, Open Ended Investment Companies (OEIC’s) and investment based ISA’s.

100% of the first £2,000 plus 90% of the balance on all pensions and life assurance contracts including investment bonds.

For further information on the FSCS click on the following link to the relevant page of their website: http://www.fscs.org......he_scheme/compensation_limits/

Many financial institutions have already folded with thousands losing their jobs and livelihoods, but how safe is your money?

The Governement has recently announced that it is extending the guarantee on money held on deposit with UK regulated financial institutions from £35,000 to £50,000.  For a couple holding a joint account, the protection is £100,000.

Although this will protect many people, it will not cover everyone.  The important thing to do is to spread your risk between a number of financial institutions so that the guarantee scheme applies across each company giving you multiple guarantees i.e. if you had 10 joint accounts across 10 separate financial institutions, you would be protected up to £1million.

However, don’t get caught out by depositing money with two seemingly different companies that are actually a part of the same parent company and licenced in the UK under that parent because you will only receive one guarantee!

For more information on which companies are part of the same parent check out the This is Money website by clicking this link http://www.thisismon.....le_id=440726&in_page_id=7

This has been a goal of the company for some considerable time and it is our understanding that we are the first independently owned firm of retail based Independent Financial Advisers in our region that has this authority.

This means that we are now authorised to make investment decisions and action them immediately without first seeking permission from our clients, which will enable us to act quickly and to take advantage of short term market conditions.

As an advisory only firm, which most IFA’s are, we had to obtain consent from clients to switch their money around.  This has long represented a major issue for us because by the time clients respond it can be too late and the opportunity has gone.

There is still some way to go before we can move our clients across to our ‘Discretionary’ service, but we are planning to launch the first phase by the end of July 2008.

Boiler rooms are where slick telesales people make their calls from in an attempt to sell shares in non existent companies, effectively taking money from unsuspecting individuals and providing a share certificate that is absolutely worthless.

The BBC state:

‘Boiler rooms are staffed by teams of salesmen who cold call unsuspecting investors to offload worthless investments. They use a mixture of telephone bullying and sophisticated sales tactics gleaned from legitimate business.

Working Lunch viewers Ken and Barbara Fudge from Dorset are among the thousands who have already been targeted this year. They paid £40,000 to a share salesman who phoned out of the blue from Luxembourg.’

Our advice is to never buy shares over the telephone! 

Read the full article by following this link:

http://news.bbc.co.u.....mmes/working_lunch/7375384.stm 

This milestone has been reached on schedule as a part of our firm’s commitment to continuing professional development of personnel and enables the firm to apply for authorisation from the Financial Services Authority to act as ‘Discretionary Investment Managers.’

Most retail based (dealing with the general public) IFA’s are advisory firms, which means that they are not able to switch or move client money without client authority.  This leads to the IFA missing out on short term opportunities in the markets.

As Discretionary Investment Managers, Watermark Financial Solutions Ltd. will be able to take advantage of such opportunities with the intention of enhancing investment performance and reducing portfolio volatility for clients, and all at low cost relative to larger instiutional managers.

During the second quarter of 2007, it became apparent that financial institutions around the globe were embroiled largely unwittingly with the problems of the US housing market.

Thousands of US homeowners had taken up fixed rate mortgages at extremely low rates in 2005 when the Federal Reserve had interest rates at low level of around 1%.  Two years later when these homeowners came off their fixed rates and went onto much higher loan rates they could not afford the repayments and lost their homes.  This, combined with an already over supplied and falling housing market led to the implosion that followed.

So, how does all this affect us here in the UK?

Well, it’s all about the big ‘money-go-round’.  You see, banks lend money to each other, but that money is only as safe as the other bank to whom they lend.  UK and other banks around the world were lending money to US mortgage companies that had huge exposure to the ’sub-prime’ mortgage market.  When the sub-prime bubble burst and those mortgage companies went into liquidation, the banks around the world that lent the money to them lost their money and had to write it off as losses.

Subsequently, banks are trying to raise money to bail themselves out by issuing bonds (and no doubt we will see ‘rights issues’ in the near future), but due to the current uncertainty in the markets they are having to pay a much higher yield to investors.  Barclays have recently issued a bond at 8.25%, which is good for investors, but will stay on Barclays balance sheet and will reduce the company’s profits for years to come.

Stock markets react on emotion in the short term and on fundamental value in the long term.  I don’t doubt that companies will make less profit over the next few years, but with a dividend yield of around 4% across the FTSE All Share right now, there is good value to be had.  When the bad news is all out and companies have drawn a line under their sub-prime mortgage exposure, investor sentiment will return to the fundamental good value rather than being swayed by emotional uncertainty.

Although this has been a torrid time for investors across the equity and property markets, it has given rise to numerous buying opportunities for investment fund managers.

Those investors that have the courage to hold tight in the knowledge that their long term investment strategy will deliver, and those new investors in the market, will do well over the next two to three years and beyond.

We are not out of the woods yet and there may be some more turbulence to go through this year, but the worst is over.

Our view is that the stock market will remain volatile for the foreseeable future and the sudden dips and spikes will offer buying and selling opportunities for fund managers to enhance performance over the medium to long term.

The fundamentals show that the UK stock market is at similar relative value in terms of price/earnings ratios and dividend yields, to the decade low in March 2003.  Therefore, value represents opportunity and we suggest that now is a good time to invest, or increase stock market weighting within portfolios on a year to 18 month view.

With a substantial correction in UK Commercial Property values in 2007, this sector is beginning to look as if it has reached the bottom, although there may be additional write downs this year.

The old adage of ‘buy low, sell high’ remains firm.