Mr C from Dublin is in the enviable position of having £7,000 in cash to invest plus an additional £300 a month to put away "in order to get the best return". He needs some advice about what options are available.

His e-mail was short on details about his private life, except to say that he was married and his wife also worked. Since it is so difficult for anyone to give definitive investment suggestions on such scanty information, we have, instead, put together a list of truisms, suggestions and nuggets of advice made over the past six years by various advisers Family Money has consulted.

Here is a compilation of that advice:

think in terms of holistic financial planning rather than single product purchases or tax driven investments;

establish how much risk you can live with and accept that the higher the risk, the greater the reward;

ask yourself what you want from this investment - long-term growth and capital gain, or an income;

protect yourself and your family first with life assurance, permanent health insurance, serious illness cover and a pension and then consider additional investment options;

establish how long you are prepared to save or invest and choose your savings/investment product accordingly;

few life assurance related savings products are suitable for short term (i.e. under 10 years) investments;

deposit products, guaranteed bonds (especially traditional with-profit ones) and tracker bonds are suitable savings vehicles for low-risk investors who are sure they will not need to encash their funds before a specified maturity date;

higher-risk investments include direct stock purchases, unit trusts (and virtually any other unit-linked product), property purchases, and some tax-based schemes such as BES - though these have attractive tax breaks which translate into guaranteed returns;

if the cost of servicing your debt is higher than a return on your savings, you should consider using your savings to pay off the debt;

if you are self-employed, you should aim to fund your personal pension to its Revenue approved limit of 15 per cent of your gross income. Because of the tax relief and the tax-free status of the investment fund, pensions are still the best value long-term investment;

paying off the capital on a mortgage sooner will save considerable impact on future interest payments;

accelerated mortgage payments can be used to pay for short-term capital expenditure (such as school fees due to be paid in a few years) and still result in the homeloan being paid off on schedule;

don't over-extend your debt, or your savings. Too many people take out front-loaded savings plans and cannot maintain them; encashing them early nearly always results in a financial loss.

If Mr C has a medium-risk profile, his finances are in good shape generally and especially if he has no dependants, he may want to put his lump sum into direct share purchases, a unitised fund, a Special Personal Investment Account (SPIA), which must invest a proportion of the fund in smaller Irish companies. He may wish to top up his pension if his existing retirement provisions are insufficient. If he has a mortgage, he should consider paying it off sooner.

If Mr C and his wife have children and eventually want to send them to private school or college, they may wish to use some of the lump sum to pay off credit card debts, term loans or overdrafts where the interest being charged can be as high as 24.6 per cent.

If their other debts are low, they may want to pay the lump sum into their mortgage, thus avoiding the interest that would have been charged on £7,000 worth of capital debt.

Finally, Mr C would do well to consider seeking out independent, advice from a trained, professional financial adviser who will be able to look at his complete financial position and recommend suitable protection and investment options.