Friends Provident is urging homeowners to review their plans for financing retirement, if they have been banking on raising cash from property to provide a nest egg at the end of their working lives.The firm’s head of pensions, Jeremy Ward, warns that if house prices continue to fall, people could find themselves in serious financial [...]

More: Home ownership no longer a pension option

I wonder how independentt this warning / advice is? investment in property is a long term thing and over 5 to 10 years, property will make more money than the pension fund. An example is a property bought in 1997 for £80,000, is worth £225,00 even in today's gloomy market. Unlike private pension funds, there are no running cost (and either you are living there or getting rent from it) and if you hold your nerve (if things go bad in property market) you won't be in the same boat as the pensioners who invested in Equitable Life !
PLEASE NOTE THIS IS NOT PENSION ADVICE, BUT MY PERSONAL VIEW.

The only thing with property is you can leverage your money more, you don't put 100% cash up, where as pensions etc you do.

Property will continue to follow the pattern of similar graphs - http://www.propertyforlife.com/image...use-prices.gif

Just like wages: http://www.epi.org/briefingpapers/177/figurec.gif

I think people need to be more careful on solely relying on equity increase, but spread the risk within one investment.

If i was a propery investor, i wouldn't be to worried, structure each property so you don't need to rely on it, and you'll be fine, if your buying to let, then make sure the property is an asset and not a liability, this will ease the stress in the long term!

Since when have pension fund managers ever had a real reputation for competence in managing investments?

according to me you should concerned to your bank they give you better advice as per your requirement.