Working from home seems like the ideal situation. There’s only one problem — you’re not quite sure where to begin. Not every job can transfer from a traditional workplace to a home-based office, after all. However, some professions allow you to work from the comfort of your own home without sacrificing any of the income to […]
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Nearly every email marketing platform promises the same thing: great deliverability, intuitive tools, designer-quality templates, and useful reporting so you can make the most of every email you send.
We looked at the best email marketing services and found that yes, they do all reliably deliver email, make it easy to manage your massive lists, and make sending emails more intuitive. But they’re not all the same. These are our four recommendations and how they stack up.
| ConvertKit | GetResponse | Mailchimp | Mailjet | |
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| Editor's Pick | Best Budget Workflow | Best for Beginners | Best for Collaboration |
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| Hands down the most intuitive way to edit emails and automation chains | A nice visual flow builder that's half the price of ConvertKit |
The forever free plan includes beautiful templates that are easy to use | The only email marketing service with real-time collaboration à la Google Docs | |
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| Visual workflow builder |
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If you’re a more advanced user — maybe you’re already dreaming of your complex automated email workflows and your robust tagging system — check out ConvertKit. Its workflow builder is the easiest to use, not only letting you visually map out your emails sends, but also editing the emails in those flows seamlessly. Instead of clicking back and forth between editing your workflow and editing each email one-by-one, you can edit them all from one space: the workflow simply slides to the side when you edit an email and slides back out when you’re done. It’s our most expensive top pick, but if you’re living in this software, it’s very much worth it.
Don’t have a big budget, but love the idea of a visual workflow builder and a robust tagging system? Consider GetResponse. Its workflow tool is easy to use, just not as amazingly intuitive as ConvertKit’s. At half the price, though, it might be worth the tradeoff.
If you’re new to email marketing, Mailchimp is a great place to start. Its templates are knock-out gorgeous. There’s helpful just-in-time information at every step. And just about all of its reporting, testing, and tools are free on the Forever Free plan. You’ll get up to 2,000 subscribers and 12,000 emails a month at that price. When you grow too big to stay free, it won’t be painful: Mailchimp’s pricing is competitive.
Finally, Mailjet: the Google Docs of email marketing services. Astonishingly, it’s the only option we found with real-time collaboration. We’ve lived in a world where design and copy and merchandising and a dozen more people are sending feedback to one sole email marketer like it’s 1999. Get everyone in the same email builder and collaborate. You’ll need to sign up for the Premium plan to access to this feature. If you choose Mailjet, we recommend the upgrade.
ConvertKit’s product is hands-down the best in its class. It’s intuitive in a way that we didn’t even know to ask for — like the game-changing way of the iPhone touchscreen. We won’t be surprised if more platforms start to copy ConvertKit.
How’s it so great? Updating the emails in a flow is phenomenally simple. You’re always working in the visual automator flow chart. Click into any email and the flow chart slides to the side. Edit the email, then click on any other email to edit that one. You can seamlessly move from one email to the next and save them all at once.
Imagine, for example, that you have an automated flow to sign up for a webinar and you’ve changed the price or the date of the webinar. You’d like to change it throughout the entire email sequence. This method makes it simple to move from email to email within the sequence without using a bunch of tabs, or trying to remember where you left off.
ConvertKit’s demo page has a good video walk-through of its best-in-class workflow.
If that alone wasn’t enough to win it our crown, ConvertKit’s tagging system is impressively robust and operates as its segmentation functionality. Instead of grouping your subscribers into multiple lists (where you’ll get double charged by most services), with ConvertKit, you have one list and many tags. You can manually tag subscribers with just about anything, and auto tag them based on source, link clinks, and purchases through integrations. Use those tags to target your emails to particular customers, or use conditional content tags to show or hide different pieces of information to subscribers within each email.
Here’s an example: You’re a skydiving instructor. You use your list to sell skydives with customers and potential customers, and run a Conquer Your Fears email course to get new leads. You also use your list to up-sell existing customers multi-packs of skydives, and you offer a six-week 40-skydive instructor training course.
As we discussed in The Definitive Guide to Marketing Automation, your job is to long-term guide each of your customers through the different points of your conversion funnel. The people who’ve signed up for the Conquer Your Fears challenge are not the same as the ones interested in the training course. You need a more complex system of tagging and segmentation. You need ConvertKit (or GetResponse, depending on your budget). You’ll be able to tag each of your subscribers with the number of skydives they’ve done — based either on purchasing from your web-store, or by clicking a link in an intro email.
We appreciate ConvertKit’s honesty in its blogpost 5 Reasons you should not switch from MailChimp to ConvertKit. Even though ConvertKit is our favorite email service provider, we totally agree! If you want beautiful, drag-and-drop email templates, you should stick with MailChimp. ConvertKit doesn’t have them.
Mailchimp has tons of beautiful image-rich templates and an inspiration gallery that’s truly inspiring.
ConvertKit only has three “templates” and they’re about as simple as an email you’d send to a friend.
ConvertKit highly encourages text emails that create the feeling that you just opened Gmail and sent a note. So, it only comes pre-loaded with three email templates: text-only, classic, and modern. The difference? Text-only has no pictures; classic and modern have pictures. Classic uses a serif font; modern uses a non-serif font. That’s it folks. There are no fancy email templates, no GIFs, no header images.
The best way to market online is to teach, to regularly deliver valuable content to your audience so that they will trust you and eventually want to purchase from you. So when you send an email, what part of the communication delivers the most value?
That’s right, the content. So we should be stripping away everything else that isn’t necessary in order to focus on the content. Multi-column layouts, background images, logos, and all the other nonsense that typically fills marketing emails doesn’t deliver value to the recipient. Instead it is all about you, the sender. Flip that around and start delivering value.
— ConvertKit Founder and CEO Nathan Barry
And, ConvertKit isn’t free. Even on its lowest plan, you’ll be paying $29 a month (or $24 if you pay annually up front) — which is still $29 or $24 more than you’d pay to get started with MailChimp. There is a 14-day ConvertKit free trial, but you’ll be paying up front, no matter how successful (or unsuccessful) you are at building a list of subscribers.
If you don’t have a list yet, you might want to start with MailChimp. And if you have one list, and plan to send to them all the same thing, MailChimp will serve you well.
| $29 / month | $49 / month | $79 / month | $99 / month | $119 / month | $149 / month |
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| 0–1,000 | 1,001–3,000 | 3,001–5,000 | 5,001–8,000 | 8,001–10,000 | 10,001–15,000 |
The best things about GetResponse are its visual flow builder (a less powerful version of ConvertKit’s flowchart style that doesn’t integrate with its email editor) and its landing page integrations. If you’re going to be doing any webinar marketing, these landing pages are already set up for you to crush it. And GetResponse probably won’t blow through your budget as fast, either.
“I’ve seen the workflow builder in action, and it is one of the more impressive click-and-drag interfaces on offer, yet it is extremely easy to use.” — Stewart Rogers in VentureBeat
GetResponse has the most complex pricing structure of our top picks. With MailChimp and ConvertKit, your price increases as your subscribers increase, but you aren’t necessarily unlocking a bunch of features or tools — you already had access to most of them. With GetResponse you pay based on the number of subscribers you have and the level of service you want: Email, Pro, Max, or Enterprise.
| Subscribers | Pro | Max | Enterprise | |
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| 1,000 | $15 | $49 | $165 | $1,199+ |
| 2,500 | $25 | |||
| 5,000 | $45 | |||
| 10,000 | $65 | $75 | ||
| 25,000 | $145 | $165 | $255 | |
| 50,000 | $250 | $280 | $370 | |
| 100,000 | $450 | $490 | $580 | |
| 100,000+ | -- | -- | -- | |
| 1 user | 3 users | 5 users | 10 users |
Monthly prices listed. Sign up for an annual plan to save 18%. If you go opt for two years, you’ll save 30%. No refunds if you cancel early.
If you’re looking for a free or freemium product, Mailchimp is the place to start. (You probably already knew that. As FastCompany says, Mailchimp is probably the biggest name in the freemium category.) You get access to almost all of Mailchimp’s features without dropping in any credit card information. Once you outgrow the free plan, you can upgrade easily.
It’s also an easy starting place for beginners. To Mailchimp, you’re not sending an email, you’re having an interaction with your recipient: It’s not an abandoned cart, it’s a show of deep interest in a product and an opportunity to capture their interest! As you scroll and build your interactions, Mailchimp acts like a cheery, helpful workbook with with pro tips, best practices, and optimization advice waiting for you on every page. (And it’s good stuff you’ll recognize from how to write emails that get results.) Don’t just send a receipt, MailChimp says, send some suggestions for other products they may want to add to their order! We concur.
The interactions you create will be beautiful. Mailchimp’s pre-made templates are beauties ready for images, GIFs, designed headers, the works. Its drag-and-drop tool isn’t necessarily impressive, but it certainly isn’t hard to use, and allows for simple customizations. Add a module, delete one, edit one, or swap the order.
| Free | Grow | Pro | Pay per use |
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| $0 | $10+ / month based on list size | $199 / month on top of subscriber fees | $0.01–0.03 per email |
| Up to 2,000 subscribers Up to 12,000 emails Per month No credit card needed to sign up Requires a MailChimp footer |
Unlimited emails to up to 500 subscribers: $10 5,000 subscribers $50 / mo |
Adds things like premium support, advanced segmentation, comparative reports, and multivariate testing | Purchase credits in bulk: 5,000 credits for $150; 75,000 credits for $750 |
If there are a lot of cooks in your email marketing kitchen — we’ve run campaigns that needed buy-in or comments from design, branding, copy, merchandising, PR, legal, and more! — then Mailjet Premium is going to be a game-changer.
Instead of funneling all email campaign changes through one person, emailing out a preview, and having that same person make all of the changes, everyone can hop into Mailjet and collaborate. Make comments, make changes, and even lock down sections that are already approved. Track changes and restore old versions whenever you’d like to rewind. Worried about letting loose the power of email sends to everyone? Add a “publication request” and automatically require manager sign-off before anything gets launched. It’s the stuff Google Docs has conditioned us to expect — and Mailjet is the only service that offers this option. For this reason, we recommend Mailjet for larger marketing and branding teams.
If it’s just you working on an email campaign, real-time collaboration won’t matter at all, and we think you’d be just as happy with Mailchimp. There’s nothing else super special about Mailjet on its Free and Basic plans: you get access to drag-and-drop email templates and 24/7 support. Opt for Basic and Mailjet will drop its branding. Every Mailjet plan allows you to have unlimited contacts. Want to add a million people to your list? Go for it. You’ll only be limited by the number of emails you can send in a day or a month. On its free plan, that’s just 200 a day. (It’s really more of a trial than a plan in our book.)
| Emails / month | Free | Basic | Premium |
|---|---|---|---|
| 6,000 | $0 | $10 | $21 |
| 30,000 | -- | ||
| 60,000 | -- | $19 | $42 |
| 150,000 | -- | $69 | $97 |
| 450,000 | -- | $167 | $230 |
| 900,000 | -- | $334 | $399 |
Calm yourself: We’ve found a sweet solution.
Krispy Kreme is offering a free donut to folks in the holiday spirit this Halloween.
All you have to do is suit up in your Halloween costume and head over to your local Krispy Kreme on Wednesday, Oct. 31, to get a free donut.
Krispy Kreme goes all out for Halloween every year with a special collection of limited-time, Halloween-themed treats.
This year’s Halloween lineup includes two newbies: the Trick-or-Treat donut, a glazed donut dipped in salted caramel and covered in candy, and the Monster Batter donut, which is filled with cake batter and decorated with slime-green icing, monster eyes and candy confetti.
No purchase is necessary for this trick-free treat; however, the deal is only good at participating locations, so be sure to check with your local Krispy Kreme before suiting up.
Jamie Cattanach’s writing has been featured at The Write Life, Word Riot, Nashville Review and elsewhere. Find @JamieCattanach on Twitter to wave hello.
The Penny Hoarder Promise: We provide accurate, reliable information. Here’s why you can trust us and how we make money.
This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, which helps millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. The Inc. 5000 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the fastest-growing private media company in the U.S. in 2017.
Pension allowances and tax relief were left well alone, but there was some pension news for consumers to digest. Here are three changes that went under the radar.
The chancellor stopped short of major pension changes in his Budget speech, but the small print holds several significant pension announcements.
There was little or no mention of the P word in chancellor Philip Hammond’s Budget speech this afternoon (29 October). Pension allowances and tax relief were left well alone.
However, pensions were not ignored altogether, as a trawl through the Budget documents reveals.
Hammond has committed to a consultation later this year on the implementation of the Pension Dashboard, and to the inclusion of state pension information in it.
“While the 2019 implementation deadline still feels like a stretch, the fact a commitment has finally been made by the DWP to provide state pension information is a positive step in the right direction,” comments an AJ Bell spokesperson.
Steve Webb, director of policy at Royal London, adds: “It is a real step forward that the government has indicated that state pension data will be included in the design of what it calls ‘pension dashboards’.
“This greatly increases the prospect of dashboards which cover all the key pension information that consumers need to know. The additional £5 million a year for the DWP in 2019/20 is also a welcome symbol of the fact that the government is committed to taking this agenda forward, albeit more slowly than we would have wished”.
However, AJ Bell is less bullish. “For the project to have any chance of success, savers need to be confident the information available is both accurate and comprehensive. Anything less than this and people simply will not trust the information it shows them.
“For this reason it is highly likely the government will need to legislate to require older schemes to make their information available for the Dashboard.”
The government has hinted the 0.75% charge cap for contributions to companies’ auto enrolment schemes could be increased next year. It also promised to consult into encouraging pension funds to invest more into high-growth small and medium enterprises.
AJ Bell says: “While details are thin on the ground at this stage, it may be that the chancellor feels the existing charge cap potentially blocks schemes off from investing in the riskier next-generation companies he expects to drive growth in the future.”
However, there clearly needs to be a balance between stimulating returns from higher-growth businesses and maintaining value for money for pension scheme members.
AJ Bell adds: “Ultimately the aim of auto-enrolment default funds schemes is to maximise returns for retirement investors over the long-term rather than back particular sectors or businesses. If the charge cap were increased for certain types of investments, the trustees of that scheme would have to be confident the extra price paid by members was still money well spent.”
The government is publishing a response to its consultation alongside the Budget, and promises that it will shortly be implementing legislation to ban cold calling – an announcement that has been a long time coming.
It is almost two years since the government’s initial proposals to combat pension scams were announced, with the cold calling ban at their heart, but draft regulations were not published until this July.
Vince Smith-Hughes, retirement expert at Prudential, says: “Measures to ban pension cold calling can’t be introduced soon enough. Our research indicates that nearly one in 10 over-55s fear they have been targeted by scammers since the launch of Pension Freedoms in 2015. Offers to unlock or transfer funds are tactics commonly used to defraud people of their retirement savings.
“One in three over-55s say the risk of being defrauded of their savings is a major concern following Pension Freedoms. However, nearly half of those approached say they did not report their concerns because they did not know how to or were unaware of who they could report the scammers to.”
However, David Everett, partner at pensions consultancy LCP, points out: “There is a potential gaping hole, however, when it comes to enforcement of this if calls are made from abroad and not on behalf of a UK company. In those instances, the Government will find itself powerless. The Information Commissioners Office will need to have arrangements in place with international regulators to mitigate the dangers and irritations posed by such calls.”
We round-up the top winners and losers in chancellor Philip Hammond's latest Budget.
In what is set to be the last Budget before Britain leaves the European Union, chancellor Philip Hammond agreed to a series of new spending increases, claiming that the era of austerity was nearing an end.
Here we round-up the top winners and losers from the Budget.
Hammond announced he would push on with raising the basic tax rate threshold, despite calls for him to abandon the Tory manifesto commitment.
The basic rate was raised to £11,850 in April. That will now be boosted to £12,500. At the same time, the higher rate will go up from £46,350 to £50,000. Raising these tax thresholds is an effective tax cut.
But there is a slight sting in the tail for pension savers, as this will result in previously higher-rate taxpayers slipping into the basic rate tax bracket.
As a consequence, the tax relief they receive when putting money into a pension will be halved from 40% to 20%.
For years economists have bemoaned the snail like pace of productivity growth in the UK, often linking it to equally slow wage growth. The chancellor claims that through capital investment, which will total 2.2% of GDP over the next five years, the slowdown in productivity growth will be reversed.
Hammond announced the largest ever roads investment package, confirming just under £30 billion would be used to upgrade the UK’s roads. Alongside building new roads, the money will be used to fix and upgrade existing routes.
The government has also set aside £90 million for the creation of ‘future mobility zones,’ within which new transport modes, services, and digital payments and ticketing will be trialed.
The chancellor also hopes to boost productivity by rolling out full fibre broadband nationwide.
As Hammond has previously noted: "For the 21st century broadband is to roads in the 20th, railways in the 19th, and canals in the 18th. It's the network infrastructure that will make this country work."
Over the past decade Britain’s high street retailers have seen the rise of e-commerce, among other headwinds, decrease sales and footfall.
In a bid to reverse this trend, the chancellor announced that just under half a million small retailers will be subject to business rates relief.
The chancellor also announced the creation of £675 million "future high streets fund" dedicated to improving high streets and boosting foot fall.
Despite speculation that the chancellor would tinker with pension tax relief, a better-than-expected revenue windfall meant Hammond has left it untouched for now.
However, says Steve Webb, director of policy at Royal London, this is likely to be temporary. He notes: “Having described the system as ‘eye-wateringly expensive’ it is likely to be only a matter of time before this Chancellor – or his successor – comes back for more. Today’s respite for pension tax relief is likely to be only temporary.”
Similarly, Jason Hollands of Tilney Bestinvest says: “With a potential Labour government in the wings no one should take the long-term continuity of such generous reliefs for granted because of today’s stay of execution.”
The Chancellor has announced a cut to stamp duty for first-time buyers of shared-ownership homes worth up to £500,000. The measure is restrospective, so anyone who bought a house since the last Budget will benefit. A further £500m is also being made available for the Housing Infrastructure Fund, to help build 650,000 homes.
During his speech, which took over an hour to deliver, he stated: “We can’t resolve the productivity challenge or delivery the high standard of living the British people deserve without fixing our housing market.”
In the absence of any international agreement, the chancellor said the UK would push ahead with their own tax on technology giants deemed to be paying less than their fair share of revenue.
Hammond said: “It is clearly not sustainable or fair that digital platform businesses can generate substantial value in the UK without playing tax here.”
The tax, says Hammond, would only target large established tech with global revenues of at least £500 million and is expected to rise around £400 million per year for the government.
Hammond claims that the tax won’t be felt by consumers, although there is always the possibility that tech companies will move to pass on the extra taxes they need to pay to consumers in the form of levying higher prices.
The chancellor announced a further £650m of grant funding for social care for English authorities from next April.
However, says Steven Cameron, Pensions Director at Aegon, while this increase in spending is welcome, it doesn’t go far enough in addressing funding for social care. He notes: “We need a long term sustainable structure for this growing and ongoing issue.
He adds the amount is “little more than a temporary, sticking plaster measure”. Cameron has called on the government to come up with long-term proposals to tackle the huge issue of funding social care costs.
He adds: “Our ageing population urgently needs a stable agreement on what the state will pay and how much individuals will have to fund themselves, based on their wealth, and crucially with an overall upper limit.”
The chancellor also announced that he would not be signing any more Public Finance Initiative (PFI) deals.
However, as Rupert Harrison, multi-asset strategies at BlackRock, notes, there are no PFI schemes in the pipeline.
It has been widely accepted that PFI contracts have failed to deliver what they promised: a more efficient use of public money. PFI projects, however have proven more costly. The Treasury Committee recently estimated that one hospital funded via PFI had cost 70% more to construct.
Hammond’s announcement was an acceptance of PFIs failure and demise.
There was some good news for first time buyers as the Chancellor extended the stamp duty exemption on first home purchases up to £500,000 where the property is part of a shared ownership programme (in England and Northern Ireland). The previous tax free threshold was £300,000 for all first time buyers.
The allowance will be applied retrospectively for property transactions up to the date of the last Budget (22 November 2017).
In a range of measures to address the housing shortage the Chancellor also announced £2 billion of new funding for the Affordable Homes Programme – this should give housing associations greater funding certainty over the next ten years, £1 billion of British Business Bank guarantees to support smaller housebuilders, plus an extra £500 million for the Housing Infrastructure Fund, which improves the infrastructure to enable new sites to be used for housing.
But though the stamp duty extension and investment in the housing market were welcomed, experts say it will help very few potential buyers.
Mike Scott, chief property analyst at estate agent Yopa, says: ‘This measure will help very few buyers. The new funding and support for house building in both the private and social sectors are welcome but will take years to actually deliver any new houses.’
The Chancellor said a new Help to Buy equity loan would be launched in April 2021 and would run for two years – available only for first time buyers and for properties with a market value up to a new regional property price cap (the maximum would be £600,000 in London, for example). The government has said it does not intend to continue with further schemes after March 2023.
Jeremy Leaf, a north London estate agent and a former RICS residential chairman, says: ‘The most disappointing aspect of this Budget is that nothing has been done to improve low transaction levels in the market, which is not just bad for the property market but even worse for the wider economy. Given the rapid expansion of the private rented sector over the past few years, more support to ‘Generation Rent’ would also have been welcome, such as sales of rental property to long-term tenants.
‘On the positive side it is encouraging that there will be no further taxes on landlords or homeowners or on land sold for development,’ Leaf adds.
The Chancellor announced an £8.5 million fund will be made available to enable more local people - who are often priced out of their own towns and villages - to buy homes in their area at affordable prices. The Localism Act allows people to come together to prepare neighbourhood plans and development orders to ensure they get the right homes in the right locations for local people. The government’s cash injection will support these schemes so 500 parishes can allocate and permission land to be sold at a discount.
The Budget introduces restrictions on the tax relief for people who rent out a property which was their main home at some point. There is never any capital gains tax (CGT) paid by homeowners when they sell their own home (their main residence) and until now there was some relief on the tax for people renting out a home that had once been their main residence. But from April 2020 they will only qualify for the relief if they were in shared occupancy with the tenant.
The final period exemption (the time you owned your home before selling which is exempt even if you were not living at the property) will be reduced from 18 months to 9 months. The government will consult on these changes. There will be no changes to the 36 months final period exemption available to disabled people or those in a care home.
The Chancellor of the Exchequer, Philip Hammond, has announced his new Autumn Budget. Here's a round up of what it means for you and your money.
A new 26-30 year-old railcard will be made available by the end of 2018. The Chancellor says it will save up to 4.4 million young people a third on their rail fares.
A special 50p coin to commemorate Britain leaving the EU will be issued next year. Read the full story.
Short-haul air passenger duty is frozen for the eighth year in a row. Long-haul duty will rise in line with inflation.
The Chancellor is expected to announce extra funding for broadband connectivity to households in rural areas. This comes in the form of a £250 million spending pledge for the most remote parts of the UK to gain access to super-fast internet connections.
The Chancellor has announced a 2% "digital services tax" on the revenue of large online businesses to generate at least £500 million per year globally from April 2020. The Chancellor says the tax will be designed to avoid hurting consumers and is instead aimed at large corporations that pay little tax in the UK currently. It is expected to raise £400 million revenue each year.
Tim Bennett, Partner at Killik & Co comments: “Fiscal Phil’s only real Budgetary firework is the announcement that the UK is prepared to go it alone with a digital sales tax from April 2020, in the absence of an international agreement on this issue.
"Setting Britain on a solo collision course with some of the world’s biggest technology companies may be interpreted as either brave, or a little foolish.”
The Chancellor will apply IR35 employment changes to private sector to large and medium sized businesses, having already implemented a crackdown in the public sector on employees who are paid via personal services companies to avoid paying tax. Currently, many workers function as self employed despite working only for one company, by setting themselves up as a 'personal services companies' (PSCs), as this provides a National Insurance tax break.
Angela James, director, contractor wealth & senior adviser, CMME comments: “The extension of public sector IR35 reforms to the private sector is disappointing at best.
"Although this is applied only to medium and large businesses at present, my concern is that increasing tax liabilities may spark a trend of the self-employed ditching their limited companies for umbrella ones, where all income will be PAYE. This disincentivises a fast-growing, entrepreneurial section of the economy."
Duties on petrol, as previously announced, have been frozen for the ninth year in a row. Mr Hammond says this will save the average car driver over £1,000 and the average van driver £2,500. Prime Minister Theresa May committed the government to this at the Conservative party conference.
Mr Hammond has announced that plans to raise income tax thresholds for millions of workers will be brought forward. The tax-free earnings threshold will be raised to £12,500 for the tax year beginning April 2019. The higher rate threshold will be raised to £50,000 from £46,350.
The Chancellor has announced a cut to stamp duty for first-time buyers of shared-ownership homes worth up to £500,000. The measure is restrospective, so anyone who bought a house since the last Budget will benefit. A further £500million is also being made available for the Housing Infrastructure Fund, to help build 650,000 homes.
Helen Morrissey, spokesperson at Royal London comments: “While the extension of this stamp duty relief will help first time buyers to get a step on the housing ladder we would argue that more can be done to make the housing market more liquid.
"While first time buyers can buy a home what of those further up the ladder who cannot afford to either move to a larger home to accommodate their growing families or those looking to downsize.
"We would urge the government to look at reliefs for those further up the housing ladder if we really want to free up the housing market.”
The help to buy scheme which was expected to end in 2021 but has been extended until 2023.
Kevin Roberts, director of Legal & General Mortgage Club comments: “Today’s extension of the Help to Buy scheme to 2023 has provided much-needed clarity over the scheme.
"Not only do housebuilders now have more certainty for longer-term planning and building the thousands of new homes our country so desperately needs, but it also gives potential buyers who are saving for a deposit the peace of mind that they too can benefit from the scheme over the coming years.”
The Chancellor has announced that from April 2020, the government will limit lettings relief to properties where the owner is in shared occupancy with the tenant, and reduce the final period exemption from 18 months to 9 months.
Robert Nichols, chief executive of lettings agency Portico says: “Once again, private buy to let landlords have to get their heads around another tax change that will leave them worse off in the long run.
"The new restrictions on lettings relief is a further punishment to hard working individuals who have chosen to invest sensibly in residential property.
"Limiting lettings relief to properties where the owner is in shared occupancy with the tenant is as good as removing it in its entirety.”
The national living wage will increase from £7.83 to £8.21 from April 2019.
Despite speculation he might, the Chancellor has not announced changes to pensions tax relief.
Former pensions minister Steve Webb, now director of policy at Royal London comments: "The Chancellor’s windfall from better-than-expected borrowing forecasts meant that he did not have to cut back pension tax relief in this Budget.
"But having described the system as ‘eye-wateringly expensive’ it is likely to be only a matter of time before this Chancellor – or his successor – comes back for more. Today’s respite for pension tax relief is likely to be only temporary."
Pensions cold calling will also finally be banned, subject to parliamentary approval.
Kate Smith, head of pensions at Aegon comments: “Finally, the government is going to implement the ban on pension cold-calling. Although we still haven’t got a date, we welcome this commitment and are hopeful the ban will become a reality sooner rather than later.
“The pension cold-calling ban has been long-time coming and although it won’t be the panacea, a ban will go some way to protecting people from pension scammers.
“For the ban to be effective, it needs to be accompanied by a public awareness campaign. So we’re pleased to see that the government will work with partners to make sure people are aware that pension cold-calling will be illegal, once the ban is in place.”
The Lifetime allowance is set to rise, but the Isa allowance will stay at £20,000. Read our full story.
The government will introduce a new tax on the manufacture and import of plastic packaging which contains less than 30% recycled plastic. However, no tax on plastic cups, including coffee cups, will be introduced as of yet.
The Chancellor has announced extra business rates tax relief for businesses that make lavatories available to the public. He also says businesses with a rateable value of £51,000 or less will have their business rates cut by a third in the next two years, worth up to £8,000.
The Chancellor has announced an immediate £420 million in funding for local authorities to tackle potholes on UK roads. The Chancellor has also earmarked £28.8 billion for a 'National Roads Fund' to help fund new roads and maintain theexisting network.
Beer and cider duty has been frozen for the next tax year. Duty on spirits has also been frozen. Wine duty will increase in line with RPI inflation.
The Chancellor has announced a further £650 million in grant funding for councils in England to pay for social care in 2019-20. He has also announced an extra £45 million disabled facilities grant in 2018-19.
Steven Cameron, pensions director at Aegon comments: “The commitment to provide an additional £650m of funding for social care will offer some relief to councils struggling with ever increasing demands.
"However, this is little more than a temporary, sticking plaster measure and we urgently need concrete, long-term proposals in the promised Green Paper on how to tackle the huge issue of funding social care costs."
Work allowances under Universal Credit (UC) will increase by £1,000 per year. The government says this will help 2.3 million people who are in receipt of or will receive the benefit by £630 each per year. The government says it will also implement "enhanced transition measures" for those moving onto UC from old benefits, inculding additional protections for those on Severe Disability Premium to ensure their welfare payments are protected when they move onto UC.
Johnny Timpson, protection expert at Scottish Widows comments: “The increased funding to provide support when people migrate from legacy benefits to Universal Credit plus the increased work taper relief are welcomed.
"However, we ask that financial protection claim proceeds used to pay rent, utility services, council tax, broadband, and care costs be disregarded from the means-testing process. Doing this could mean that not only does work pay, it supports people in improving their financial resilience too.
“We also ask that, in addition to supporting consumers in better managing debt and pension provision, the new Single Financial Guidance Body helps households in improving their financial resilience, especially in relation to income shocks.”
Some of those orders, like the Benevolent and Protective Order of the Elks, also known as the Elks, are still an active part of society today.
The group created the Elks National Foundation, which invests in communities through a variety of programs and scholarship opportunities.
Every year, its Most Valuable Student scholarship program awards 500 four-year scholarships to the highest-rated high school seniors.
Scholarships range from $1,000 to $12,500 per year, for a total of $2.4 million.
There are two each of the first-, second- and third-place scholarships; 14 fourth-place awards; and 480 runners-up — all equally divided between male and female students.
The two first-place awards are for $50,000, or $12,500 per year; the two second-place awards are for $40,000, or $10,000 per year; the two third-place awards are for $30,000 or $7,500 per year; the 14 fourth-place awards are for $20,000 or $5,000 per year; the 480 runners-up will receive $4,000, or $1,000 per year.
To be eligible, you must be a high school senior, a U.S. citizen and have completed the ACT or SAT and plan on pursuing a four-year degree full time at an accredited U.S. university or college.
You do not have to be related to an Elks member to qualify. (Membership is open only to those 21 and older.)
The application process includes a report from your school counselor, a student aid report from your completed FAFSA (federal student aid application) and a resume that includes information about community service, extracurricular activities, honors, awards and jobs.
Last, you will have to write a 300-word essay on this topic: “Using one of the leadership roles or extracurricular activities you prioritized as being important to you, describe what impact the experience had on you, what you contributed, what you learned about yourself, and how it has influenced your plans for the future.”
The applicant is responsible for ensuring all required documentation is included.
Students will be judged on financial need, academics, community involvement and leadership.
Applicants must advance through local, district and state levels to reach the national competition.
The top 20 finalists will interview with national judges during an all-expense-paid, mandatory leadership weekend in Chicago from April 11 to 14, 2019.
To apply, visit the Elks Most Valuable Student Scholarship page and follow the “apply now” link.
The deadline to apply is Nov. 15, 2018.
If you don’t meet the eligibility requirements for this scholarship, check out our list of 100 scholarships that will help you pay for college.
Or you can like The Penny Hoarder Life on Facebook to discover other scholarship opportunities.
Stephanie Bolling is a staff writer at The Penny Hoarder. Shuffleboard is her social club of choice.
The Penny Hoarder Promise: We provide accurate, reliable information. Here’s why you can trust us and how we make money.
This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, which helps millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. The Inc. 5000 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the fastest-growing private media company in the U.S. in 2017.
Chipotle’s bringing back its Boorito deal, offering $4 entrees to customers who show up in costume.
No tricks. Just delicious, corn salsa-filled treats.
It’s super easy (and fun): Just show up to Chipotle in costume from 3 p.m. to close on Oct. 31.
You’ll be rewarded with a cheap, delicious dish.
Yes, Halloween falls on a Wednesday this year… but who doesn’t wear their costume to the office? And if you’re taking the kids trick-or-treating, this deal is a perfect, easy dinner.
Despite the promotion’s name, the Chipotle Boorito deal isn’t limited to burritos. Guests can get a bowl, salad or order of tacos for $4, too.
It excludes third-party delivery and catering orders, so you’ve got to actually walk your costumed self into the store.
The only scary part? You’ll probably still have to pay extra for guac.
No big deal, though, since you totally DIY’d your costume and decorations.
That’s why we hoard pennies, after all: Some things are just worth the splurge.
Jamie Cattanach’s writing has also been featured at The Write Life, Word Riot, Nashville Review and elsewhere. Find @JamieCattanach on Twitter to wave hello.
The Penny Hoarder Promise: We provide accurate, reliable information. Here’s why you can trust us and how we make money.
This was originally published on The Penny Hoarder, which helps millions of readers worldwide earn and save money by sharing unique job opportunities, personal stories, freebies and more. The Inc. 5000 ranked The Penny Hoarder as the fastest-growing private media company in the U.S. in 2017.
The Lifetime Allowance is set to rise in line with inflation from next April, but the Isa allowance will remain at £20,000.
As expected, the Lifetime Allowance (LTA) will rise in line with inflation (consumer price index) to £1,055,000 from next April, it was announced today in the Autumn Budget.
The LTA, essentially a stealth tax on investment success, has been progressively whittled away to boost the Treasury coffers since it was introduced in 2006 by the then chancellor Gordon Brown. But last year, when the LTA stood at £1 million, it was announced it would from now on be increased each year in line with inflation. Therefore, today’s announcement does not come as a surprise.
Elsewhere, the Individual Savings Account (Isa) annual subscription limits will remain at £20,000. The allowance has never been more generous nor has the choice, as savers and investors now seven different Isa types to choose from.
The Junior Isa limit will rise in line with CPI inflation to £4,368. This same limit will apply to Child Trust Funds (CTFs). In addition, it was announced the government will publish a consultation next year on draft regulations for maturing CTF accounts.
The lack of change to the Isa allowance does not come as much of a surprise. Two years ago the allowance stood at £15,240, before being raised to £20,000 in April 2017. The increase surpasses rises in inflation since the Isa was introduced in 1999, when the allowance stood at £7,000. Moreover, only small numbers of savers and investors make use of the full allowance.
“With the uncertainty of Brexit looming larger than ever over the public purse, it is unsurprising that today’s budget has proven to be a damp squib from a private wealth and capital taxes perspective,” says John Annetts, partner and head of administration of estates at Howard Kennedy.
The pension annual allowance will remain at £40,000, and chancellor Phillip Hammond has also resisted tinkering with the thorny issue of pension tax relief.
Chancellor Phillip Hammond cold-shouldered speculation that pensions would be meddled with in order to fund future spending pledges.
Various pension experts had feared a cut to the annual pension allowance, with many pencilling in a reduction from £40,000 to £30,000 as a means of raising the £20 billion of additional funding that has been promised to the NHS.
But in today’s Budget (29 October), Hammond resisted the urge to tinker with the allowance, meaning the allowance will remain at £40,000. Nor did he touch the current lifetime allowance of just over £1 million.
In a move that was more widely expected Hammond also opted against tinkering with the thorny issue of pension tax relief. For some time now there have been concerns higher-rate pension tax relief is in the government’s sights, but once again it proved to be merely speculation.
George Osborne, the former chancellor, consulted at length on possible reforms to the tax relief on pension contributions, although he stopped short of implementing change. However, the system is expensive, with pension tax relief costing the government £39 billion in the last tax year.
Steve Webb, director of policy at Royal London, comments: “The chancellor’s windfall from better-than-expected borrowing forecasts meant that he did not have to cut back pension tax relief in this Budget.
“But having described the system as ‘eye-wateringly expensive’, it is likely to be only a matter of time before this chancellor – or his successor – comes back for more. Today’s respite for pension tax relief is likely to be only temporary.”
That’s all the more likely as critics say the system favours the wealthy, as higher rate and additional tax payers gain the biggest tax relief on contributions.
A radical move to introduce a flat rate of pension tax relief has been mooted for some time, but as things stand today the proverbial can has been kicked down the road in regard to how over the long term people are incentivised to pay money into pensions.
M1 Finance is a robo-advisor, but it may be the next step forward in robo-investing. It works like a robo-advisor in that it provides automated account management, like automatic rebalancing and dividend reinvestment.
But it also allows you to select the investments you’ll hold in your account, giving you a mix of self-directed and automated investing.
It may disrupt the robo-advisor world in much the same way the robo-advisor concept has disrupted the investment universe.
Founded in 2015 and based in Dallas, Texas, M1 Finance is a unique robo-advisor, one which will work for a lot of investors who like the robo-advisor concept but want more direct control over their investments.
M1 Finance gives you both. You choose the investments in your portfolio – or actually several portfolios you can build – based on predetermined investment templates.
These are referred to as “pies”, each of which is basically a self-contained portfolio.
You can create several different pies to include in your account. Some pies are prebuilt, but others can be built from the ground up.
The robo-advisor side of M1 Finance is based on Modern Portfolio Theory (MPT), which is true of all robo-advisors, meaning once you select a pie, or create one, it’s then fully managed by M1 Finance. It will be rebalanced regularly to maintain the target allocation of the pie.
M1 Finance doesn’t actually hold your portfolio.
Instead, they’re held with Apex Clearing Corporation. Apex acts as both the clearing firm and custodial bank.
M1 Finance departs from traditional robo-advisors in several important respects:
The M1 Finance methodology works based on what they refer to as “pies,” with different types of pies available. “Expert Pies” are predetermined, and will be recommended for you, each designed to help you reach a specific goal.
M1 Finance offers more than 60 expert pies. You can also create custom pies, which can be built with ETFs and stocks of your choosing, but within the framework of investment templates.
Each pie can contain as many as 100 “slices,” with each slice being either an ETF or a stock. A slice can also be another pie – that’s how much flexibility the platform provides.
With custom investment selection, your choices aren’t unlimited.
There are a couple of limitations:
As you add funds to a pie, M1 Finance will go into robo-advisor mode and invest the funds within the scope of the desired target allocations for that portfolio.
When you decide on a pie – expert or custom – you’ll be able to set percentage allocations for the pie. Those allocations will be maintained as you add or withdraw funds from your account.
The company gives an example of a portfolio invested in the so-called FAANG stocks (Facebook, Apple, Amazon, Netflix and Google).
If you choose this pie you can go with an even allocation between each of the five stocks, at 20% each. But you can also change the allocation within the pie.
For example, if you want 35% each in Google and Amazon, you’ll then have 10% each in Facebook, Netflix, and Apple.
You can also create pies based on market sectors. This can include socially responsible investing, healthcare, utilities, and even foreign countries. In fact, you can create an unlimited number of pies within your account.
When you first open your account, you can establish investment allocations.
For example, when you contribute $1,000 you can set how much will go into investments, and how much will be held in cash. This will enable you to minimize cash drag (uninvested funds that earn no investment income).
One other area where M1 Finance departs from many robo-advisors is that they don’t offer tax-loss harvesting.
But they do use a tax lots strategy when securities are sold. It works to reduce the capital gains taxes you’ll pay.
M1 Finance uses an algorithm to determine which securities are sold when you withdraw funds from your account.
The priority works as follows:
M1 Finance offers users several notable features:
With M1 Finance you can borrow up to 35% of the value of your portfolio for any purpose. What’s more, your credit will not be checked, and you will not be declined.
And once you borrow money, you can pay it back on your own schedule.
Borrowed funds can be used to used to pay off other debts, buy a car, or virtually any purpose you choose. The interest rate as of October 23, 2018, is 4.00%.
If you take advantage of M1 Borrow, be aware you will be subject to a “maintenance call” to put up more funds if your amount borrowed falls below 30%.
If you want to open an account with M1 Finance, you’ll need to meet the following qualifications:
You start the application process by entering your email address, then creating a unique password. You’ll then be asked to provide personal information, such as your name, address and phone number.
The next step is to choose the pies you want to invest in. Once you do, you’ll link the account to your bank account for funding purposes.
And once you’ve linked your accounts, you’ll be able to transfer funds back and forth between the two accounts electronically.
The M1 Finance platform easily links to a large number of banks, but if yours is not one of the choices, you can link your account by adding the name of the bank, the type of account (checking, money market, savings account, etc.), and of course, your bank routing and account numbers.
M1 Finance is almost unique among robo-advisors because you have a large amount of control over the investments in your account.
It’s a robo-advisor, and it manages your account just the way a robo-advisor does, but you have greater investment control than on most competitors.
It’s virtually a mix of robo-advisor and self-directed investing. It may be the next level up in the evolution of robo-advisors.
You don’t even need any funds to open the account (though you’ll obviously need money in the account to begin investing).
And as your account grows you can take advantage of M1 Borrow to access at least some of your account balance as a low-interest loan.
If you’d like more information, or you’d like to sign up for the service, visit the M1 Finance website.
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