How to manage a windfall: what to do with a £10,000 lump sum

The FCA has warned wealthy savers they have too much in cash, but beneficiaries of windfalls are still hugging safe havens and losing out

Person holds wad of bank notes after receiving windfall.
How to manage a windfall: what to do with a £10,000 lump sum
(Image credit: FJZEA via Getty Images)

A financial windfall, whether expected or out of the blue, comes with a choice – do you save, spend or invest it? What you decide could be the difference between doubling your money or missing out on thousands of pounds.

In what is being called the Great Wealth Transfer, an estimated £5.5 trillion of UK assets is predicted to be passed down between 2022 and 2050, the largest flow of generational capital ever seen.

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Average proportion of windfall people typically allocate to the following:

£5,000 windfall

£50,000 windfall

Save

38%

35%

Invest

31%

34%

Spend

17%

15%

Debt repayment

8%

7%

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Returns from investing a lump sum of £10,000 over the past five, 10 and 15 years

MSCI World Index (Total Return)

S&P 500 (Total Return)

FTSE 100 (Total Return)

5 years (30/04/20 - 30/04/25)

£17,592

£18,474

£16,383

10 years (30/04/215 - 30/04/25)

£26,534

£32,964

£16,073

20 years (30/04/05 - 30/04/25)

£60,654

£81,615

£30,022

Laura Miller

Laura Miller is an experienced financial and business journalist. Formerly on staff at the Daily Telegraph, her freelance work now appears in the money pages of all the national newspapers. She endeavours to make money issues easy to understand for everyone, and to do justice to the people who regularly trust her to tell their stories. She lives by the sea in Aberystwyth. You can find her tweeting @thatlaurawrites