Proceeds from property sale

rosp

We are shortly to complete on a property sale. Our purchase fell through so we are moving into rented accommodation but hoping to find somewhere soon to buy. What should we do with the proceeds of our sale? Is there any option other than instant access since we don't know when we might need the money? I think we have 6 months grace on the savings protection as this qualifies as a "life event" but presumably if it takes us longer than that to find somewhere to buy then we'll need to spread the money around between accounts. Is that right?

bruich76

This happened to my other halves auntie and her husband. They asked for the monies back from their solicitor and ended up spending a good deal of it on new clothes, holidays, etc and then regretted it afterwards. Not saying its a bad idea or anything just make sure you aren't tempted to 'dip' as it's your equity you will be eating up. Solicitors can hold it for you as well on 'deposit' which means that they will put it into a savings account for you - but, you would need to enquire with them regarding rates, etc.

da_rule

As you say, you have 6 months where it will be classed as a 'life event' (up to £1million). After this has elapsed you will only have the £75,000 protection usually offered by the scheme. If you have more than the £75,000 limit after the 6 months then you will need to spread it around into different institutions if you want to continue to protect it. Obviously you need to be mindful of the fact that whilst a bank trades under different names they are owned by the same parent company so only count as one institution (Halifax and Bank of Scotland etc).

Rodders53

https://www.nsandi.com/income-bonds. 100% safe however long it takes.

You don't, however, want to hang atound if prices are still rising in the area you are buying. So 6 months should be long enough?

davidmcn

Rodders53 wrote: »

https://www.nsandi.com/income-bonds. 100% safe

Well, as safe as the UK government. Not sure I'd put that at 100%...

Davesnave

bruich76 wrote: »

This happened to my other halves auntie and her husband. They asked for the monies back from their solicitor and ended up spending a good deal of it on new clothes, holidays, etc and then regretted it afterwards. Not saying its a bad idea or anything just make sure you aren't tempted to 'dip' as it's your equity you will be eating up..

This isn't an answer to what the OP asked at all!

Indeed, it's presumptious of you to assume the OP is somehow incapable of self-control, especially when their post indicates a cautious approach to holding amounts above the protected level in instant access accounts, which is what this thread is about.

Perhaps you just misunderstood?

OP, we had our money spread around in £75k amounts and it wasn't too hard to gather it into one place again when required. We had the experience of having money in failing banks like Kaupthing and Icesave, so we were particularly worried.

You may already have read this link:

http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/safe-savings

rosp

Thanks for the responses. I do think we have sufficient self-control not to go blowing the money on flash cars and expensive holidays! We are very conscious that house prices are rising and the longer we wait the more our money will be devalued in purchasing terms. We are only in this situation because the vendor of our chosen property decided that they didn't want to sell after all and left us having either to pull out of our sale or rent, as we decided to do.


We will look at nsandi. Any other thoughts?

rosp

Davesnave wrote: »

This isn't an answer to what the OP asked at all!

OP, we had our money spread around in £75k amounts and it wasn't too hard to gather it into one place again when required. We had the experience of having money in failing banks like Kaupthing and Icesave, so we were particularly worried.

We had money in Icesave too. Once bitten and all that. Did you find it OK when you needed to gather the money together? I am concerned about there being limits on the amount that can be withdrawn in one go and that we end up taking a month to get the money in one place. I know we have had accounts where you can only withdraw £10k in a day.

rosp

Rodders53 wrote: »

You don't, however, want to hang atound if prices are still rising in the area you are buying. So 6 months should be long enough?

Yes we've no intention of hanging around longer than we have to. Unfortunately the timing of our purchase collapsing means that there is very little coming on to the market. Since the new year it has started to move a little and I'm hopeful it will pick up but there is nothing out there for us at the moment so we are leaping on every rightmove alert as it arrives!

Davesnave

rosp wrote: »

We had money in Icesave too. Once bitten and all that. Did you find it OK when you needed to gather the money together? I am concerned about there being limits on the amount that can be withdrawn in one go and that we end up taking a month to get the money in one place. I know we have had accounts where you can only withdraw £10k in a day.

There was a limit of £10k per transaction with some of the accounts. So far as I remember, I just did it in multiples, like £10k + £10k + £5k and it all came through fine.

AnotherJoe

rosp wrote: »

Thanks for the responses. I do think we have sufficient self-control not to go blowing the money on flash cars and expensive holidays! We are very conscious that house prices are rising and the longer we wait the more our money will be devalued in purchasing terms. We are only in this situation because the vendor of our chosen property decided that they didn't want to sell after all and left us having either to pull out of our sale or rent, as we decided to do.


We will look at nsandi. Any other thoughts?

For the longer term than 6 months, and needing instant access, your choices are very simple.
All in NS&I, or spread around to get a fraction more interest, but it probably isnt worth the hassle to do the latter.