Best place for approx £60k?

rathernot

Crikey, thanks for all the replies - didn't receive any email notifications so assumed the thread had gone dead.

I already have a couple of grand in funds via Interactive Investor and whilst that's almost "play money" it's taught me that I don't have the time or expertise to put tens of thousands into this, and it doesn't appear a sensible thing to do if I may need some or all of the money.

The 5.65% on my BOS savings account has just expired so I need to find somewhere to dump around £26k.

I dumped £25k into a Lloyds online saver which is paying 3% - not fantastic but it's instantly transferrable to/from my current account if/when I need access.

The problem here seems to be that you can spend a really long time looking at APRs but even on £50-60k the differences are "only" a few hundred quid a year, which is quite depressing really.

nicky_boo

Hi jamesd,

I have a similar problem, well actually a nice problem to have, investing a similar sum without any risk. I have a mortgage, but the interest is low, so I will leave it as it is. I have been waiting one of my old bonds to mature and during the wait, I missed MS&I 3.95% bond.

This thread seems to complicated for me to follow. What I am going to do is to invest all my savings in Marks and Spencers 4% bond. I find this bond very attractive. It is a 3 year bond, but you can close it anytime with only £100 penalty. On your investment of £60k, £100 charge is quite minor. Besides, if the interest rates start to go up again and they will definitely do, your savings are not tied up, just withdraw your money, get your interest, pay the penalty and go elsewhere with higher interest.

I cannot see a catch, can you? I just hope it stays open until I get hold of my savings next week.

Good luck with your investments.

Nicky_boo

nicky_boo

BTW, apologies rathernot and jamesd. Rathernot was the original poster, not jamesd. My reply should have been directed to rathernot.

D1zzy

nicky_boo wrote: »

Hi jamesd,

I have a similar problem, well actually a nice problem to have, investing a similar sum without any risk. I have a mortgage, but the interest is low, so I will leave it as it is. I have been waiting one of my old bonds to mature and during the wait, I missed MS&I 3.95% bond.

This thread seems to complicated for me to follow. What I am going to do is to invest all my savings in Marks and Spencers 4% bond. I find this bond very attractive. It is a 3 year bond, but you can close it anytime with only £100 penalty. On your investment of £60k, £100 charge is quite minor. Besides, if the interest rates start to go up again and they will definitely do, your savings are not tied up, just withdraw your money, get your interest, pay the penalty and go elsewhere with higher interest.

I cannot see a catch, can you? I just hope it stays open until I get hold of my savings next week.

Good luck with your investments.

Nicky_boo

Brittania is 3 years @ 5% and if you withdraw after 2 years you will still average 4% (restriction is that you can only withdraw in the 12th month of each year)

Newbie2saving

nicky_boo wrote: »

Hi jamesd,

This thread seems to complicated for me to follow. What I am going to do is to invest all my savings in Marks and Spencers 4% bond. I find this bond very attractive. It is a 3 year bond, but you can close it anytime with only £100 penalty. On your investment of £60k, £100 charge is quite minor. Besides, if the interest rates start to go up again and they will definitely do, your savings are not tied up, just withdraw your money, get your interest, pay the penalty and go elsewhere with higher interest.

I cannot see a catch, can you? I just hope it stays open until I get hold of my savings next week.

Good luck with your investments.

Nicky_boo

Nicky_boo, just so you know it is a max of £100, if you pull out sooner it is less...
Early closure option

If you need to access your money, you can close your Fixed Rate Savings before the end of the fixed term. There’s a single charge to do this – just £50 for a 1 year account, £75 for 2 years and £100 for 3 years. You cannot make partial withdrawals.

Just so you know M&S is part of HSBC so I believe you are only covered once with the FSCS £50k, just in case you have money with HSBC already...

nicky_boo

Newbie2saving,

The penalty of closure is lower for 1 and 2 year bonds, however the interest that you will get is lower too: 2.5% for 1 year and 3% for 2 years as opposed to 4% for 3 years. I am planing to apply for a 3 year bond therefore regardless of when I withdraw the money and hence have to close the account (as partial withdrawals are not permitted), even if it is a month after opening it, I should pay £100 penalty on closure.

bowlesbargain

I have just opened a three year fix with the COOP bank, just for info this is available at both the COOP and Brittania. I found the staff at my local COOP bank helpfully and easy to deal with. I took the money from a Bond that matured with Alliance and Leicester. I had problems with them all they wanted was for me to talk to there financial adviser which I did not want to do. In the end I had to demand a Cheque at the counter as they would not transfer the money by bacs transfer.

David2000York

I agree with nicky-boo. With £60k to stash M&S 3yr bond at 4% has the best mix of access and interest rate. With £100 penalty if you put £50k (max safe limit) in, effective instant access rate after 3 months would be 3.2%, after 6 months 3.6% and after a year 3.8%.

If you really don't think you need access at the lower end of the penalty scale is NS&I who pay 4.39% on 3yr, 4.59% on 5yr with just 90 loss of interest on closure. (See the MSE article on this website in the Savings Section - Fixed Rates)

At the other end of the scale check out AA 5yr paying 5.15%, you can get access but the penalties are massive ie total loss of interest if you withdraw in the first year.

With £60k to invest its worth a bit of time researching. A 0.5% difference in interest rates would net a standard rate taxpayer £240 over a year, not massive but a nice weekend away for not much effort.

geosaver

Newbie2saving wrote: »

Just so you know M&S is part of HSBC so I believe you are only covered once with the FSCS £50k, just in case you have money with HSBC already...

According to the M&S website, the FSA treats them as a seperate organisation from HSBC so you should be fully covered by the FSCS scheme up to £50K