Best for building a deposit?

sholt

Hi all,

My partner and I are almost in a position now to start saving for a house deposit - I'm finally within reach of paying off my credit card, which will mean I have no debts and can start to put money aside.

We're both going to get the Help to Buy ISA when they launch - but you can only save £200 per month in that, and I'm planning to put away £500 per month - so I need somewhere to store the other £300. I obviously can't put it into another ISA as the Help To Buy ISA won't allow it - so what I'm wondering is, does anyone have any tips on where would be the best place to build up savings of £300 per month?

Basically every account I've looked at with a decent interest rate isn't really suitable - it either has a maximum monthly deposit that's too low (say, £100), it's a current account with a minimum monthly deposit that's too high (say, £1000) or it's only available to existing customers, with a bank I'm not with.

I'm with Natwest for my current account (and would like to stay there if possible) and a Natwest Instant Saver account which pays around 0.50% AER. I do also have an old savings account with Santander that pays around 0.10%, and a Virgin Money ISA, which I'm going to close probably as it is empty and I can't use it anyway.

So basically my question is - am I best just chucking the extra £300 in the Natwest account for the 0.50%, or is there somewhere else offering a better deal? Ideally I'd like to take advantage of one of the 3-6% deals I've seen but none would really be eligible with a £300 set monthly deposit.

Thank you!

jimjames

Lots of issues none of which are really a problem.

If you need to be an existing customer to qualify for an associated account then open an account with that bank.

You can save up to £9000 at 5% as a couple with tsb and nationwide. Yes you need to pay money in but it doesn't have to stay in the account. So pay in £1000 and take £700 out. Regular savers may pay slightly more but are less flexible.

westy22

You can have a Help to Buy ISA each at £200 each per month provided you are both first time buyers - that takes care of £400 per month.

Edit: on re-reading your post maybe you mean that you yourself have £500 per month to save in addition to your partner's £200 HTB ISA saving

YorkshireBoy

jimjames wrote: »

You can save up to £9000 at 5% as a couple with tsb and nationwide.

With 2 sole and a joint at each, the total is £13,500 at 5% AER. Even better!

Sam_J12

First Direct and Marks and Spencers both do 6% regular saving accounts that you can put around £250 per month into (can't recall exactly how much). You have to have a current account to open either, but it is easy to open both. That is the highest interest you can receive.

bigfreddiel

The best thing you can do to save for a deposit, before even looking into interest rates, is to see where you are wasting your money, for example;

Coffee shop visit everyday
Gym membership
Pay TV
Netflix
Mobile phone contracts
Car loan

You would be surprised how much you can save by boning the non-essentials

Cheers fj

Lolly88

The best place would be first direct regular saver which allows you to deposit £300 per month and pays 6% interest. That would nicely take care of your remaining savings after the help to buy ISA.