best place for £50k

sarajane

Hi there,

We've been lucky enough to become debt free after 15 years .

We now have £50k stuck in our joint savings account & always have £2k in our now overdraft free current account.
We now want a decent rate without risk. I have read MSE Best advise for savings & am aware of the top rate accounts about. What a minefield.

So currently, Barclays 'generously' pay 4.42% AER pa on the savings account & they charge us for the current account.

What is our best course of action please??

dunstonh

4.42% is only 0.3% above inflation. Not exactly going to make money with that.

Risk is not an on/off switch. It is a sliding scale and sometimes you have to take a bit more risk with some of the money (which doesnt mean you have to jump to the extremes) to get more over the long term.

sarajane

I understand. we're off 2moro to see the bank manager to discuss their best offer. After 15 years of debt, it is finally a relief to be free & i'm still not sure that the bank will have our bast interests at heart, after all, they just announced billions of £'s profit recently.

home_alone

You could do a split 25K in icesave and 25K in Birmingham Midshire or Northern Rock or similar, I have a high 6 figure sum with icesave I do not think its a risk or worse than anywhere else.

gary

Cannon_Fodder

Dont forget Cash ISAs...you can put £3000 into an account EACH, per tax year, so by 7th April that would be £12000 in tax-free high interest locations.

i.e. 7% at Alliance and Leicester if you fancy moving current account at the same time...a nice promise to make to the Bank Manager if he's deaf to your requirements.

5.8% at NS&I if not...or 6.1% fixed at Newcastle BS if you think rates have peaked.

Then put the rest in the ordinary savings accounts as suggested...Icesave, Birmingham, Scarborough, A&L. Several around 5.7-5.8%...

jamesd

Forget your bank manager. You will get terrible sugggestions from one, limited to their own products, which won't be competitive. Or go, listen, tell us what is suggested then let people here point out the flaws.

If you want low risk start with 3000 each now in the best buy cash ISA and the same again in the new tax year.

Beyond that your either have to pay tax on the interest or use the stocks and shares ISA allowance, possibly choosing lower risk investments like commercial property and corporate bonds.

sarajane

thanks for all of your info. I'll show to better half 2nite. We'll go to bank as arranged but I know we'll be moving accounts.

thank you again

Connected_2

HSBC have an Online Saver offering 5.75%. As you can gather from the name, it's only operated via the internet.

If you open a HSBC current account, you can also gain instant access.

However, no interest is payable on the full balance in any calendar month in which a withdrawal is made

Maximum investment of only 50k.

http://www.hsbc.co.uk/1/2/personal/savings-investments/savings/online-saver?WT.mc_id=HBEU_TouchClarity_HPMain_SaveCampaign_OS