Help to Buy ISA - what happens when scheme ends?

garfield33

Hi everyone

I was just wondering – if you don't use your Help to Buy ISA before the scheme ends, what do you think will happen to it? I know this is a way off yet.

I’ve been reading around – you can pay into them until 30 Nov 2029, and you have until 01 Dec 2030 to claim the bonus, but nothing about what will happen to “unused” accounts after that. I guess they’ll be converted to another account, probably a ‘normal’ ISA?

Only asking because I’m a touch nerdy and I have a spreadsheet forecasting estimated future savings interest…

(Also, I plan to use the money long before 2029, if not I would be putting it somewhere better in the long term.)

masonic

It's up to providers what they do. I suspect most would convert them to their default maturity account (usually a low rate easy access cash ISA). They could at their discretion keep them the same, but they'd effectively be regular saver ISAs with no special status in law.

eskbanker

garfield33 said:

I plan to use the money long before 2029, if not I would be putting it somewhere better in the long term

Have you considered opening and using a Lifetime ISA instead?  They're superior to HTB ISAs in many ways, one of which is that there's no scheme expiry date, and you can transfer your HTB money into a LISA in £4K chunks per tax year, so if you're not likely to be buying before about 2025 then it would probably be financially more advantageous....

garfield33

eskbanker said:

garfield33 said:

I plan to use the money long before 2029, if not I would be putting it somewhere better in the long term

Have you considered opening and using a Lifetime ISA instead?  They're superior to HTB ISAs in many ways, one of which is that there's no scheme expiry date, and you can transfer your HTB money into a LISA in £4K chunks per tax year, so if you're not likely to be buying before about 2025 then it would probably be financially more advantageous....

Too late for me, too old