Change banks ? BAD banking habits to debt free

Glittery wrote: »

Thank you for this info!
Santander was one of the banks recommended for self employed mortgages.
So may be helpful having the cash in there and adding to it over the next year

Have your 20K in there and then see if they have a suitable savings product for anything more - or as others have said take a look at Marcus. there's no sense in having any more than the threshold for interest payments in an account as everything past that point is earning you nothing.

Personally I'd drop that O/D limit a bit - we keep a small facility in place on each of our accounts but it's there only to take account of a small miscalculation meaning we go a few £'s over.

If neither of you have owned a property before then a Help To Buy or Lifetime ISA might be worth looking at for savings as well.

There's an excellent guide about HTB ISA's on the main MSE site - that should tell you all you need to know. I believe the bonus is still payable even after 12 months? If so - then yes, it would be if you can't get a higher equivalent in interest elsewhere.