What is the best saving account to open for our new baby girl

matt2877

Hi guys. As the title says we have just had a new baby girl. we have had some money given from family for her and would also like to start saving a little for her ourselves and just wondered if anybody had any advice on what the best sort of account would be? are there any incentives with particular banks etc. thank you

atush

AS a baby I am going to preusme you wont need to touch the money until they are over 11 (probably 18).

This means you have a 10yr+ investment horizon. Which means, unless youwant the money to shrink each year with inflation (even after interest) you should look to invest in equities. I did this for my 3, and the first has graduated Uni this year w/o debt. All with money saved for him at 25 a month.

I would look for a junior ISA with a good general investment trust firm such as say, F&C, Witan, Aberdeen, Invesco Perpetual. You can drip feed funds into this monthly (including what you have been given up to now).

If you want to have a children's savings acct alongside for cash from bday and xmas presents that is a good idea as well.

Eccles01

If you can raise enough cash to do it, buy her a gold bar. Price in 2002 - $380, price now - $1650.

atush

I have other investments bought in 2002 that did even better, and paid income in between.

Nothing wrong with buying them the odd gold coin for xmas, but I would invest for them in equities (which have outperformed gold in the last 112 years).

matt2877

thanks very much for the advice. Iam a bit of a numpty when it comes to things like this. Could anybody body explain how investing in equity works? Gold also a good idea, a coin sounds more realistic than a bar. how much would i be avle to get a gold coin for roughly. Would be a nice thing to have alongside a savings account

jimjames

matt2877 wrote: »

thanks very much for the advice. Iam a bit of a numpty when it comes to things like this. Could anybody body explain how investing in equity works? Gold also a good idea, a coin sounds more realistic than a bar. how much would i be avle to get a gold coin for roughly. Would be a nice thing to have alongside a savings account

Gold might be nice and shiny but just because it has done well recently doesn't mean that it will continue.

In my view the best savings for a baby are not a savings account but investments.

You can find more info on the F&C and Aberdeen websites about their share saving schemes which should answer a lot of your questions.

http://www.fandc.com/new/it/Default.aspx?id=78401
http://www.invtrusts.co.uk/aam.nsf/InvestmentTrusts/investchildren

xylophone

https://www.gov.uk/junior-individual-savings-accounts/overview
http://www.hmrc.gov.uk/tdsi/children.htm
See above.

Note the tax treatment of income arising on money given by parents outside tax privileged savings like the JISA.

The Halifax offer a good rate on the JISA if you want the cash option provided that a parent holds a cash ISA with them http://www.halifax.co.uk/isas/

With such a long time scale you might wish to use the JISA for stocks and shares only although you can use both (see guidance).
http://www.hl.co.uk/investment-services/junior-isa might be worth a read.