Child Trust Voucher

JBsplit

this must have been asked a thousand times before but im going to ask again(sorry)......where is the best to put my sons £250 child trust voucher from the government. ive had sooooo many offers and things in the post im now stuck with where to invest it and totally confused, i dont want a yearly fee and i need to be able to top it up monthly...please help before my waiting time expires.

Savvy_Sue

You're right, it has been asked before and I'm sorry I don't know where and I don't have the answer! But I just noticed the bit about topping it up monthly: by all means put in whatever the minimum is to get the govt to give a bit more (I hope I'm getting this right because mine are too old so I haven't taken a LOT of notice), but think carefully before you put in a lot more than that. Because once it's in, it can't come out until the child is 18, and more importantly you will then have NO CONTROL if s/he decides to take it all out and splurge it on a fast car / motorbike / dossing round the world 'finding him/herself'.

Whereas if you open a completely different savings account in joint names with the child you can put money in AND TAKE IT OUT if you need to, say if the child shows a talent for playing the violin and wants a Stradivarius for their 10th birthday. AND if you keep the passbook in a safe place YOU can hang onto the savings until you are ready to hand them over, which you may decide is best left until they are 21 or 25 or whatever!

I hope that makes sense. In answer to your original question a search for Child Trust Fund across the different boards should give you a more helpful answer. Or has Martin written an article yet?

bylromarha

Lots of articles and chats have been written here, but more about the idea of CTF and less recommending products.

After reading around lots (and there were SOOOOO many products to go through!!!!) I went for the HSBC stakeholder CTF. Martin tentatively recommended it and also a few other financial bods did too as the share portfolio has a good range on offer.

However, like Savvy-Sue says, I don't think it's such a good idea to use CTF for extra savings for your sprog as they'll get sole control of all the cash when they're 18. As much as I love my boy, I doubt he'll have the wisdom to not spend the money at that age, bless 'em.

Mado

Put ours in the Nationwide.
If you add up £240 /year, the interest on the account is 6% (variable).
Not bad for a risk-free placement.
Hopefully he will have some sense and will need the money for Uni when he reaches 18.

fatboyonadiet

Read Martins Article on this: http://www.moneysavingexpert.com/cgi-bin/viewnews.cgi?newsid1108986373,87407,