Savings Advice Needed

slambe10

i currently have around £3,000 in a cash ISA which i opened last year. I also opened a help to buy ISA in Dec 2015 but i am looking to move the money in my ISA to earn a better rate (it has dropped to 0.75%). I have had a look around but want some advice about where would be best to move my money to.

I was initially thinking about moving the cash to a 1 year fixed term savings account as it appears to offer the best rate and gives me an option to access the cash in 12 months. However, i want to know if:

- I could open a cash ISA this year and transfer from my ISA last year even though i have a help to buy ISA which i contribute to monthly?
- if i would be best opening a savings account with the new personal savings allowance instead?
- Do you get penalised for withdrawing the money from the ISA after 12 months rather than transferring to another cash ISA?

I do not want to transfer my current account to another bank as i have just changed my account.

Any advice will be appreciated.

YorkshireBoy

Open a 5% AER Nationwide FlexDirect current account, depositing £2,500.
Open their 5% AER Flexclusive Regular Saver, depositing £500 in month 1.
Month 2...transfer another £500 from current to regular saver.
Transfer out/then back again £1K each month (your new current account may be used for this).
Revisit your options in 12 months time when the FlexDirect rate drops.

Alternatively, look at TSB Plus. Same interest rates, but it'll take you longer to get all your cash making 5% AER.

Over 6 times your ISA interest rate over the next 12 months!

Keep the HTB ISA going.

Eco_Miser

To add to YorkshireBoy's advice;
OPEN the new accounts, don't transfer your existing account. You are allowed at least one account per bank.

slambe10

so would i transfer the 1K from the savings to the current account to fulfil the requirement to put 1K in each month?

Or would i transfer it to my original current account then back again?

katei25

Investment ISAs are mainly for used for stockmarket investments. They are worth if you want to save for longer than five years and are willing to take a risk with your money. You can switch the money you have in a cash ISA into an investment ISA but you can’t put money from an investment ISA into a cash ISA.

ColdIron

katei25 wrote: »

you can’t put money from an investment ISA into a cash ISA.

Yes you can

bowlhead99

ColdIron wrote: »

Yes you can

When a new user starts chipping into discussions with outdated comments that look copy pasted from elsewhere, and you look at their profile and see that they already given a link to their own website, you know they are just here waiting to build up a post count before they're allowed to start posting spam.

The user's only other comment was five minutes after this one, on the thread about how to go about selling old Unilever shares. The advice given by our helpful new user katei, included perhaps seeing a traditional stockbroker that could provide advice, or perhaps get a discretionary management service to take the decisions and sell for you.

The latter is ridiculous when the OP of the other thread just practically wanted to know how to sell an old share that had been bought years ago.

So it wasn't at all surprising to see the same person here talking about investment ISAs with outdated inaccurate information on a thread that's nothing to do with investments. They are probably paid by the line of text they post or the clicks they get.

I clicked the "this is spam" button, because, why not

jimjames

ColdIron wrote: »

Yes you can

When a user lists their location as USA then it's likely they have no idea on ISAs!


Join Date: Apr 2016
Location: USA
Posts: 2

ColdIron

I of course did none of that research, didn't even spot the USA location. I just rattled of a response before leaving for work because, well, why on earth not

badger09

slambe10 wrote: »

so would i transfer the 1K from the savings to the current account to fulfil the requirement to put 1K in each month?

Or would i transfer it to my original current account then back again?

You will have to bounce £1000 between your existing current account and your new nationwide FlexDirect account every month. If you don't, you won't get any interest on it;)

Best to keep that account @ £2500 all year, and pay as much as you can afford above that, up to £500 each month, into a Nationwide Flexclusive Regular Saver.

Effectively, in the first month, you have found a home with interest at 5%, for the £3k in you cash ISA. Any additional savings can also earn you 5%:)

badger09

ColdIron wrote: »

I of course did none of that research, didn't even spot the USA location. I just rattled of a response before leaving for work because, well, why on earth not

Don't beat yourself up ColdIron.

bowlhead99 is probably stuck on a train again:p