Pay off cards with available funds or continue paying minimum and invest available funds?

tizzy71

What to do?!
I have credit card debt of around 25k, these are 0% until 2025.
Through fortune I have available funds to clear these cards, but would it be better to keep the 25k in a high interest account and keep paying the min on the cards?
Will hopefully be looking for a mortgage in the near future. Would this plan have an adverse affect on being accepted? 

cymruchris

If the debts are on 0% - and you can trust your money management (I mean that in a nice way!) then leave the balances as they are paying off the minimum payments allowing you to earn interest on the savings. Go instant access (you'll get 5% plus currently) - and then when the mortgage nears, you'll potentially find that one of the agreed actions will be to pay off the balances by the time the mortgage is issued. Will you be using an advisor?

Nebulous2

Will you be close to your borrowing limit on your mortgage? 

I took out £30k on 0% interest to stooze, then decided I wanted to buy another house. I went to the Nationwide and found a friendly advisor, who told me what I could get. He told me that I needed to reduce my debt to £10k to get the mortgage I wanted. Each £10k of debt knocked over £40k off the amount they would lend. 

Of course different lenders may have different approaches, and things may have changed in the 5 years since I did that, but existing debt will still impact on your ability to borrow. 

surreysaver

I wouldn't invest your available funds, as there's no guarantee you'll make a profit. Better just to stick it in a savings account 

Barkin

surreysaver said:

I wouldn't invest your available funds, as there's no guarantee you'll make a profit. Better just to stick it in a savings account 

The OP's thinking was to... 

"keep the 25k in a high interest account"

Where did investing come from? 

crumpet_man

Barkin said:

surreysaver said:

I wouldn't invest your available funds, as there's no guarantee you'll make a profit. Better just to stick it in a savings account 

The OP's thinking was to... 

"keep the 25k in a high interest account"

Where did investing come from? 

The post title is:

"Pay off cards with available funds or continue paying minimum and invest available funds?"

Some people use the term investing when they mean saving.

surreysaver

Barkin said:

surreysaver said:

I wouldn't invest your available funds, as there's no guarantee you'll make a profit. Better just to stick it in a savings account 

The OP's thinking was to... 

"keep the 25k in a high interest account"

Where did investing come from? 

The thread title?

Barkin

OK, but I suspect that most people, before they've been told off here, use a simple definition of "invest" to mean entering into a financial arrangement in order to make some money. Or something. 

I'm sure the OP feels better now that they've been advised not to do something that, from the initial post, they quite obviously didn't intend doing anyway. 

WYSPECIAL

Why do you have £25k of credit card debt?
If it isn’t due to overspending is there now a budget in place to address this?
Was there a plan in place to repay it without this windfall?
If there was then stick to that plan and gain the extra interest. If there wasn’t then you may want to look at that first so that the money you have now doesn’t get eroded.