Best way to move GBP to Hungary for property purchase??

[Deleted User]

Hi all. I am about to purchase property in Budapest, using funds currently in the UK. I'm looking for advice on the best way to send the money. The property is priced in local currency i.e. HUF.

I will be sending around £150k. This is currently in Stocks & Shares ISAs, and I plan to move this money to my First Direct GBP account, and then to Hungary.

I have an existing & active Hungarian account with Raiffeisen.
I have a Wise account, with GBP, EUR and HUF accounts.
I don't have e.g. Starling or Revolut, but obviously could open them if necessary.

Or should I be looking to use a specialist currency broker? xe.com???

All thoughts, ideas, etc welcome. Many thanks!

AlexMac

We read the article about international money transfers here on the Moneysavingexpert website and then used Moneycorp. We only had to transfer £30 k odd and accepted that unlike a Bank, The cash ain’t secure if they go bust during the process, but they’ve been established for many years so we reasoned that they ain’t about to fold. Brilliant service and you could speak to a nominated case gambler; in our case a charming and lucid woman. Lots cheaper and I suspect, more efficient than my high street Bank 

eddddy

Maybe take a look at this page: https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/banking/foreign-currency-exchange/#larger

(But scroll up towards the top of that page to see the risks.)


And check the broker will accept the money in daily chunks - for example, £50k per day, if that's your First Direct daily transfer limit.  Or you could do multiple transfers of £50k (or less) instead.

You could wait until each chunk has arrived before sending the next chunk (to reduce risk) - but you might not get such a good exchange rate for smaller chunks.

For larger amounts, you might be able to get the best rate by booking a transaction date in advance.


I don't know how rigorous anti-money laundering checks are in Hungary - but you might have to jump through some extra hoops to prove that the money is legit, if it's arriving in your HUF account from a 3rd party bank account (i.e. from a currency broker's bank account).

GDB2222

When I looked at transfer into Euro, the high street bank I used wanted several percent. In the end I used MoneyCorp. 

Are some of these firms backed by the FSCF?

markin

Certainly not with Revolut far to many horror stories.

[Deleted User]

Thanks for the replies all, they are useful inputs. I think we will go with Wise.

martindow

AlexMac said:

We read the article about international money transfers here on the Moneysavingexpert website and then used Moneycorp. We only had to transfer £30 k odd and accepted that unlike a Bank, The cash ain’t secure if they go bust during the process, but they’ve been established for many years so we reasoned that they ain’t about to fold. Brilliant service and you could speak to a nominated case gambler; in our case a charming and lucid woman. Lots cheaper and I suspect, more efficient than my high street Bank 

A gambler's a gambler, no matter how charming!