Hello

Apologies in advance if this has already been covered as a topic for discussion...

I'm considering investing in either Vanguard Lifestrategy 60 or L&G Multi Index 4 as a foundation for one of my portfolios over the next decade or so, drip feeding on a quarterly basis.

The fee for the former is 0.11% cheaper than the latter on HL's platform. However, the L&G fund appears to hold a more diverse spectrum of assets, including REITS.

Can they be compared? Is one preferable over the other? I'd be interested to hear your thoughts and comments.

they both have too much FTSE100 and too much corporate bonds. the L&G fund has almost as much in UK equities as the US. not for me.

You may not find this helpful but I think you are missing the point.

Choose the index you want to track and then decide the best vehicle to do that

Anyone who thinks the FTSE100 has much to do with UK is in for a shock

The top 10 as of yesterday was 43.58% of the index and none of them are UK firms....they may have a primary UK listing but only ONE reports in sterling and that has most of its business in US and Japan

You can track by geography, size, style or industry

and then you have to see how it is weighted.market cap, equak weight etc


There is no answer to your question

From someone who holds both:

- After a few decades of being 100% equities (largely index trackers), I started building core holdings in first Lifestrategy 80 and then 60 a few years ago (currently have about equal amounts in each) when I was doing some big SIPP transfers. Seemed a good one stop shop for starting to add a fixed interest element to my powder-keg portfolio and I've been happy with both since.

- More recently, for new cash going into the portfolio, I got worried about US valuations and Lifestrategy's large allocation to US equities. The L&G multi-index funds' asset allocation seemed to defuse this a bit, so I took a punt on an equal 4&5 split. This is just for new cash mind... I'm not selling my Lifestrategy holdings - which have done well from the US bull market - off to fund it. The increased "home bias" of the L&G asset allocation doesn't bother me too much currently... UK stocks may well turn out to have been very cheap right now.

A few more random thoughts:

- If you're interested in these sorts of cheap multi-asset vehicles, the Blackrock Consensus funds should be on your radar too.

- What I like about Lifestrategy over L&G multi-index is that Lifestrategy is a lot more transparent about how the portfolio is constructed, and changes have been infrequent I think. With L&G it's far more opaque what they're actually doing to achieve the targeted risk level.

-I think it's interesting that L&G does include an explicit allocation to "alternatives" (property and infrastructure) but don't have a strong opinion on it... you do hold those things in Lifestrategy too, but in proportion to their weight in the component indices rather than an explicit overweight. There's nothing to stop you buying Lifestrategy and adding your own satellite holdings in such alternatives if you want them. I think L&G multi-index might be influenced by things like the WMA and FTSE Private Investor Index series which are presumably representative of what Wealth Management types think a portfolio should look like and those do include an allocation to property and other alternatives.

- I'd suggest HL - an expensive place to hold funds - is unlikely to be the best value place to hold such a portfolio, especially once it's grown a bit bigger. If you're set on using HL you might well be better off using a world index ETF and a global bond ETF and rebalancing yourself, as suggested by some above.

- It's worth bearing in mind that a very significant difference between these funds is that the Vanguard funds' bond holdings are currency hedged, and the L&G's aren't. How much that matters to you will depend on how strong a view you have on where the pound is headed, and/or whether you subscribe to the view that because the bond component is supposed to be the stable part of your portfolio, currency movements should be hedged out.

- Only you can know your own risk tolerance and circumstances and where you think you are in the cycle of accumulation and decumulation. I assume you've considered carefully whether these particular risk-levels on the spectrum the products offer is the one that's right for you? (There's a risk you could be being too cautious)

Paying a whopping great 0.45% to hold funds on HL seems to me to be the real problem there.