Something to note... Stoozing into Offset accounts

dfarry

Hi again...

Just thought I'd mention.... in case anyone wondered..... in the case of the Woolwich, if you are Stoozing into an Offset mortgage and have a larger balance than you owe "Over-Offsetting" as they called it.... then you do not earn any interest on the the proportion of the balance that is more than what you owe.

They told me that should this happen they recommend that you set up a non-linked savings account and pop some of the money in there.....however this is not an automatic thing.

I'm not sure if other flexible/offset companies would operate in the same way...but this is likely to be the case with Barclays too..

smartsaver

Same with Britannia. Need to keep an eye if you are offsetting the whole mortgage as the balance decreases quite rapidly, which is obviously otherwise good..

Reaper

I think they all work like this. The "savings" part never pays any interest, it just cancels out interest on your mortgage.

Galstonian

As with all accounts you should always read the T&C. Some offset accounts have limits less then 100%, I'm sure I've seen one with a 90% limit.

humbug_4

The One Account pays interest if you go into credit but it's only a miserly 2.5%. Still as you get a credit card with the account it does make it easy to balance transfer from.

dfarry

I'll just have to take out some more debt from my Reserve amount (equity on the home)...that way I can still save the full interest but also maybe spend the extra money on a new motorbike.... a new Honda Fireblade or Triumph SpeedTriple is looking quite appealing right now

Martinslovechild

dfarry wrote:

I'll just have to take out some more debt from my Reserve amount (equity on the home)...that way I can still save the full interest but also maybe spend the extra money on a new motorbike.... a new Honda Fireblade or Triumph SpeedTriple is looking quite appealing right now

A new stoozemobile?

Galstonian

dfarry wrote:

I'll just have to take out some more debt from my Reserve amount (equity on the home)

But surely that is still debt?

TheDink

IF pay interest on any credit balance once your whole debt is offset. The rate is their current interest rate (4.75% if you have a savings account, 2.75% if you only have a current account).

The interest is paid on the account/jar opened most recently.

You can get better rates elsewhere, but at least it's something!

Pricy147

I'll vouch for that - Ive been with IF for over four years - and their interests arent bad (with the savings accounts) and they do pay interest on all you surpless offset savings. Cant be bad!

dfarry

Galstonian wrote:

But surely that is still debt?

Hehe...indeed... I wouldn't really do that... I'm not stoozing for the sake of stoozing