What's the best way to buy a portfolio of Investment Trusts with a lump sum?

[Dod1010]

Boulerversee

One of Luni's baskets might be the way to go but in the absence of these (and they may be getting out of date by now) you need in general to watch the premium that quite a few are at at the moment, although if you are a long term holder it may not matter too much. I prefer though not to buy at a premium.

You appear to be looking at long term capital growth. Scottish Mortgage and Witan are fine, (subject to the premium at least in SM), Finsbury Growth and Income, Caledonia, RIT, City of London, Monks (missed the boat there although I would expect there will be more to come), Alliance and Foreign and Colonial. Then you are largely into more specialist trusts either by territory or style but British Empire and Scottish Investment Trust come to mind as maybe worth a look. Murray International and Edinburgh are both good income trusts with long term capital growth as well.

All of these trusts to my mind you could happily buy and forget but again just watch any premium when buying and DYOR.

Dod

[Bouleversee]

Thanks, Dod. Certainly long term so far as daughter is concerned; I doubt if I have one! She is more concerned with growth than income at the age of 48 but both would be nice. I bought SM and Witan in her ISA not that long ago and they are already showing a reasonable profit. Diversification and safety are what is wanted. Having lost my entire investment in Slater Walker and another IT many years ago, I have avoided them since so am not au fait with the whole range but thanks for your suggestions. Tied up with estate administration at present but will try to have a look.

[Dod1010]

Bouleversee (sorry for getting your name wrong in the previous post)
Posters will come up with plenty of other ITs, but they will be mostly specialists in one form of investing or by say country. Personally I try to avoid that because to my mind they need tending and like your daughter, (and mine for that matter, much the same age) I want my investment trusts to be there to act as ballast for the long term so that I can just leave them there to tick away without any real input on my part. The traditional generalists will largely do that.

Best of luck anyway.

Dod

[Bouleversee]

Quite right, Dod. That's what's needed as they certainly won't get watched, though as my previous losses showed, nothing and no manager is ever completely safe. We can only do our best and keep our fingers crossed.

[JamesMuenchen]

But, as fisher says, while the chance of loss is small, another risk with the all eggs in one basket approach is that of extended inaccessibility -- you know, like RBS/NatWest/Ulster Bank customers suffered for several weeks when they had an IT meltdown not so long ago. I'll bet a lot of those now have two (or more) current accounts....

Or Selftrade customers suffered when their accounts were frozen. I was threatened by them and sold out.

And brokers have been known to change the T&Cs and charging structure, and make you pay through the nose to transfer out.

Plus there is a small risk of theft/hacking from online accounts.

All in all I think there are enough risks that I would prefer to have multiple accounts, if they were high value or I were relying on them for expenses.