How To Maximise Interest, Unsure What To Do

no1wf

YorkshireBoy wrote: »

It would seem your best option is a Santander 1-2-3 account, for lots of reasons...

1. You're already with them
2. It keeps things really simple
3. Yes, you'll pay £2 a month but this will be offset by cashback generating DDs once you've bought the house.

However, this does not meet your thread title objective of maximising interest, so just how serious are you about maximising returns? Serious enough to open several accounts? Between you, you could get 5% AER (maths lesson: that's nearly twice Santander's 3% AER) on up to £13.5K, and then 4% AER on the next £15K.

So, how serious are you?

Not serious enough to open several other bank accounts, I just feel like it wouldn't look good on paper when applying for a mortgage and since I'll only be doing that once in my life I want the best chance at it.

Santander 1-2-3 account sounds good though the monthly fee puts me off but I don't have any direct debits to have coming out of there right now. Maybe once we have a house we can have a joint 1-2-3 account that has the bills coming out of, but right now it's just both our savings and wouldn't be fair for me to setup DD when it's his money too

YorkshireBoy

no1wf wrote: »

Not serious enough to open several other bank accounts, I just feel like it wouldn't look good on paper when applying for a mortgage and since I'll only be doing that once in my life I want the best chance at it.

You'll only have a couple each, maybe 3 at the most. That will have no negative effect at all in my opinion, and if you're asked the reason you have so many you'll say, truthfully, that they offered the best return whilst you were saving for the deposit.

Santander 1-2-3 account sounds good though the monthly fee puts me off but I don't have any direct debits to have coming out of there right now. Maybe once we have a house we can have a joint 1-2-3 account that has the bills coming out of, but right now it's just both our savings and wouldn't be fair for me to setup DD when it's his money too

The initial £7K will be generating around £12 a month after BR tax and the £2 fee. To get £12 a month from a 'clean' account you're going to need one paying 2.5% AER gross...and there isn't one!

The DDs are easily sorted by opening a couple of joint Tesco savings accounts (so his money remains his money), but somehow I don't think that will change things with you.

So where are you going to put the £7K now?...and the £x per month you're going to be saving in the lead up to the house purchase? May I suggest a Tesco savings account where you'll get around 1.35%...for a year? Then again...if you open a Tesco savings account you may as well open the Santander account as well and more than double your return...plus get some cashback on your mobile phone bills?

Archi_Bald

no1wf wrote: »

Not serious enough to open several other bank accounts, I just feel like it wouldn't look good on paper when applying for a mortgage and since I'll only be doing that once in my life I want the best chance at it.

one or two current account applications will make no material difference to your creditworthiness, especially if you don't apply for an overdraft. The search data will drop off your file in a year, and not having any markers on several current accounts just proves that you can handle money.

no1wf wrote: »

Santander 1-2-3 account sounds good though the monthly fee puts me off but I don't have any direct debits to have coming out of there right now.)

Even if you had to pay the 2%, your money would earn a lot more than 0.10% interest in a 123 account. But don't you pay council tax? Don't you have bills for phones, gas and electricity?
http://www.santander-products.co.uk/banking/calculator/123dual.html?gclid=CNS7hbihycUCFWf4wgode18AvA

There are also Santander Retailer offers. These are not reliable offers but it can add up. I have earned £46 so far this year.

As a 123 current account holder, you can also get the 123 credit card for free for 12 months. It's got nice cashback offers that may be of interest to you.

I have more ideas, not involving Santander, but I'll stop here as you might not be interested.

no1wf

We don't have any househod bills at the moment as we still live with our parents. Our plan once we move in together is to keep our own personal bank accounts but get one joint one for the bills to come out of and just transfer over our half.

Hopefully he will be offered a permanent job at the end of these 6 months so really I'm just looking to see if there's another bank/savings account that can get us a bit extra towards the savings

jimjames

no1wf wrote: »

Hopefully he will be offered a permanent job at the end of these 6 months so really I'm just looking to see if there's another bank/savings account that can get us a bit extra towards the savings

There is, as already explained but you don't appear to want that bit extra towards your savings. It takes effort but it's worth it to maximise your savings.

YorkshireBoy

Best current accounts:

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/banking/compare-best-bank-accounts

Best savings accounts:

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/savings-accounts-best-interest

I'm out!

no1wf

jimjames wrote: »

There is, as already explained but you don't appear to want that bit extra towards your savings. It takes effort but it's worth it to maximise your savings.

How come these accounts with a decent % interest have such a low cap on them, so that you have to open up 4 different ones?

saintalan

More like how come savings accounts pay 1% if you are lucky?

bigadaj

no1wf wrote: »

How come these accounts with a decent % interest have such a low cap on them, so that you have to open up 4 different ones?

Because they aren't supposed to be operated as savings accounts. They are generally loss leaders for the banks, with the intention they can then make money from you by selling other products, from mortgages to insurance etc

guitarman001

Well it's happened...
I've got money spilling out of accounts earning NO INTEREST now. I've used up the major schemes and every month I've got > £2k adding to a pot earning nothing.
I put a little into P2P and I'm not willing to put any more into the stock market.
What do I do!?!