LISA - shall I max or not?

J1one

Hope someone can help me
please! 

I have £2600 in easy access savings, as part of my house deposit. This is the amount I need to max my LISA

I do hope to buy before the 1 year anniversary of opening my LISA. 

Should I max out my LISA now, to get the bonus OR should I leave my money in my easy access? 

It seemed like, to my layman’s understanding, that they give me the bonus of 25% after April. Meaning if I then DID need it early, they’d only be taking their 25% back? Or have I got that completely wrong? 

eskbanker

J1one said:

It seemed like, to my layman’s understanding, that they give me the bonus of 25% after April. Meaning if I then DID need it early, they’d only be taking their 25% back? Or have I got that completely wrong? 

If you access LISA money within a year of opening it, then you only receive 75% of the withdrawn amount back, which will be less than you paid in, i.e. it's not just loss of the bonus as (for example) £4K contributions would be boosted to £5K with the bonus but would only result in £3750 being returned (ignoring any interest earned).

J1one

I got you! 

Thank you so much