Journal
What belongs in a household cashflow before you raise ISA contributions
Increasing investments while the current account runs dry every month is a common pattern — and an avoidable one.
Whole-of-wealth advice often begins in an unglamorous place: the monthly money that actually leaves the account.
List the irregular costs
Annual car insurance, Christmas, school trips, and boiler services wreck “surplus” calculations that only look at rent and groceries. A useful cashflow includes those peaks.
Then test the contribution
Once the irregular costs are visible, raising an ISA transfer by £150 may still be right — or it may explain why every March feels tight. Clients are often relieved when the recommendation is to pause a contribution for six months rather than stretch further.
Link cashflow to the advice file
We keep the cashflow sheet beside pension recommendations so a later review can see why a contribution level was chosen. Numbers without that context invite someone to rewrite a plan that was already balancing real life.