Best Way To Invest/Save c£8k now and £1k/ month

GM1880

Afternoon all,

Never having been particularly good with money I've never been particularly familiar with the saving options open to me.

I'm 38 and plan to buy my first (so bad) house with my better half (she's owned before) in about 18 months. I have about £8-10k in a savings account at the moment with Barclays Plus a Help to Buy ISA with about £2k in it.

I have about £1k a month spare from my salary to save too.

Given we're about to buy a house in a year or so I don't want to tie up the money for too long. Given our house purchase is likely to be above the price limit for a Help to Buy ISA, I was going to switch to a Skipton Lifetime ISA to get the double government bonus. Then keep the rest in a savings account.

Any thoughts from you more knowledgeable folk?

Alexland

Yes assuming the HTB ISA is entirely from this tax year and you have enough remaining in your £20k annual ISA contribution limit then it would probably be easier to open a new Skipton LISA and deposit up to £4k before 6th April to get the 25% bonus. You could then add another £4k on 6th April for a further 25% bonus. The account needs to be open at least 12 months to use for a property purchase without penalty.

You could either keep the HTB ISA going for the interest rate or close it. You would need to close it when purchasing a property with the LISA as you would no longer qualify to hold a HTB ISA.

For the rest of it consider the 5% Nationwide Flex Direct and associated 5% regular saver. Your partner could do the same and you could even have a Joint FlexDirect too.

Alex