Financial planning in UK - advice please

kikkime

Emily_Joy wrote: »

I am not quite certain why you are talking about Nationwide LISA, as it doesn't exist. LISAs = Life Time ISAs where you can pay up to £4000 a year and get a government bonus of 25% of what you've paid are provided by Skipton Building Society and the Nottingham Building Society, none of which require you to have an indefinite leave to remain to open the account. I suggest you open it as soon as you can as you become eligible for a bonus if you are to withdraw funds for the purpose of buying the property one year after account opening.

Oh dear it appears that I've confused myself! It was Newcastle BS with 1.1% AER. Now thinking back, I should not be so engulfed with their 1.1%AER. Though Skipton offers slightly less 1.0%AER, they also have £250 cash back upon completion of mortgage by July 2027 (unlikely for me but they might have similar cash back offers coming up in the future), or I could easily just switch to another service when I see better offers.

I'm happy that you've advised that I start LISA as soon as possible, as that's why I plan to do, gives me some assurance that I'm on the right track.

I currently have Help to Buy with Barclays 2.58%AER, and considering the fact that I cannot afford to set aside any more than £200 a month excluding my other regular saving accounts, I will keep it at that at the moment. I aim to open an account and transfer in my Help to Buy accumulation+interests by late March/early April 2020 and top up to £4000 to count for this tax year.

Considering that my H2B is opened 15/4/19, I will lose some interest if I transfer out to LISA on my 11th month rather than after 12 months, but I guess it's quite a small amount compared to losing my £4000 tax year limit for LISA.

Thank you for your tip. Definitely going with Skipton now, as Nottingham does not allow transfers.

Emily_Joy

kikkime wrote: »

Oh dear it appears that I've confused myself! It was Newcastle BS with 1.1% AER..

This makes more sense because Nationwide doesn't require Indefinite Leave to Remain either. Personally I don't see the point of 1.1% ISA at all... and since you already have Barclays HTB, you can't open another cash ISA this year, only LISA.

lopsyfa

You definitely don’t need to have ILR to open a LISA - I don’t have ILR and I have the LISA since 2017.

An investment LISA will probably be better if you are not buying a house soon (in the next 5 years). Maybe you can go the investment board for advice. It is not difficult, you can simply buy a cheap world tracker and leave it at that.

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Emily_Joy

kikkime wrote: »

Definitely going with Skipton now, as Nottingham does not allow transfers.

Open Skipton LISA now, with, say, £50 and top it up to £4000 (be very careful no to go over £4000 limit or they will return all the deposit) from your Chip savings in the end of March 2020. 25% government bonus beats up whatever you loose from a few weeks of 3% chip.

kikkime

Emily_Joy wrote: »

Open Skipton LISA now, with, say, £50 and top it up to £4000 (be very careful no to go over £4000 limit or they will return all the deposit) from your Chip savings in the end of March 2020. 25% government bonus beats up whatever you loose from a few weeks of 3% chip.

Do you reckon I can transfer from Help to Buy and then top up to make it £4000 using whatever I've got in Chip? I intend to keep Help to Buy account (for the interest) after opening LISA and maintain the habit of paying £200/mth and transfer at end of every tax year + top up. Since the H2B interest is not compound anyway, accumulated sum doesn't really seem to benefit me. Skipton has confirmed there will be no charge to transfer and no limit to the number of times I transfer. If I do this, I will not get the advertised 2.58% AER but the 2.55% variable, am I right?

kikkime

lopsyfa wrote: »

You definitely don’t need to have ILR to open a LISA - I don’t have ILR and I have the LISA since 2017.

An investment LISA will probably be better if you are not buying a house soon (in the next 5 years). Maybe you can go the investment board for advice. It is not difficult, you can simply buy a cheap world tracker and leave it at that.

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So do you have investment LISA? Can I transfer from a regular LISA to investment LISA? I haven't opened any account just laying out my options.