Cash Isa's

"Everything can be done on line in advance" - exactly! It is a long time since I actually went into a bank / building society, let alone queueing at the door. Smacks of life in the early 60s, waiting for the banks to open on a Friday.

Some of us are non taxpayers so getting involved with ISA's is pretty pointless!!

We payed ours off when we both took early retirement at age 50!
Reminds me, I'm retired?

We also had an accountant who told us not to go mortgage free when we moved to a smaller property - but as DH was self employed we decided we preferred the security of knowing the house was ours

Riverwalk, I also have a stocks and shares ISA and have been very happy with the performance.

Sounds in some ways similar to us Mishap. We had to leave a place we loved and a house we had made a home but we made the best of it and decided to look forward and not back and just get on with it. When there is no choice what else can you do? Our latest move will hopefully be the last as we love it here.

Movedalot - the paying off of the mortgage was both good and bad as the downsize was due to OH's ill health and the need to have some cash behind us to face the future with 3 children and him about to leave work at age 42. The move took us away from a house we loved; and necessitated school upheavals too.

But we discussed it wth our children and they were behind us - and learned a valuable lesson about the things in life that really matter.

But things picked up a bit and we were able to move to our current lovely cottage eventually. I went out to work and OH did some part time and we got over the loss of our lovely home. So things could havce been a lot worse.

Knowing the house is ours for over 20 odd years has been good for the peace of mind.

I think my Isa is stocks and shares.
My financial adviser whose also a family friend tries to stop me spending money while I say that that's what it's for!

Stansgran I don't loathe stocks & shares ISAs - they made over 9% this past year, tax free!

Absent

Totall agree ment with Movedalot and and then with mishap. I,loathe stocks and shares Isas and would prefer to spend on keeping the house in good nick for when I downsize and making sure I don't look too shabby so that the DGCs won't be ashamed of me and of course taking the odd holiday which will have the DDs reeling with shock (I mean Tibet or Bhutan not nudist camps)

Buy a lighter mattress?

Thanks for the heads up Frank.
Absent you made me think. It was hard work lifting the mattress but I managed using the clothes prop (give me a lever and I'll move the world) and I've counted out the £11,280 and am off to the bank now.
Any advice on what to do with the rest?

Gosh Mishap I envy you paying off your motgage so long ago! It must be about 25 - 30 years since there was a tax advantage to having a mortgage. There still is in The Netherlands.

I do not bother with them - it just makes life too complicated having bits of money in different pots. We did the maths and decided that the gain was so small that it was not worth the hassle. We are buying hassle-free life with the money we lose - worth every penny! We have so little to play around with anyway.

As long as we can eat and pay the bills and have the occasional holiday I just let it all wash by and gaze at our beautiful view. I have never been into all this financial shenanigans. And having lots of money has never been our priority.

I remember when we paid our mortgage off (after down-sizing) we had an accountant then who kept telling us not to pay it off because of the tax advantages - we just said that the peace of mind of knowing the house was ours meant more to us.

The only thing I do is to change the savings account where our money is every year so as to take advantage of the first year bonus rate. We haven't even done that this year as the interest rate is so miniscule that it barely covers the loss of interest having the money floating about in the ether while making the swap.

Maybe it's crazy - but it suits us.

That should be the end of March not Feb..

I can't even remember the last time I actually went into a bank or building society I'm sure with many others I do the whole thing online , no queuing or filling in forms. I usually wait till the end of February and see what new 'deals' are being advertised then decide where I'm going to put 'new' money and where I'm going to transfer old ISA . I would plump for a 2yr fix too 5yrs is a bit of a risk.

It is not always a good idea to take out your ISA at the beginning of the tax year as the ISA market often gets more competetive at this time of year. It may also not be such a good idea to take on a 5 year fix as interest rates might well rise during that time and you could be stuck on a low rate. The pundits are currently suggesting that 2 years only fix might be sensible.

Hunter it can all be done online, ahead of time, as I'm sure you know

I can manage without that, I think. But my financial consultant has everything worked out. (three cheers for Theseus)

What about stocks and shares ISAs Hunter? And then of course there are the GCs ISAs. Let's not forget moving our savings from accounts where the interest rates have dropped. Have we paid off our mortgages? What about giving away £3k a year to save on IHT? I could go on and on boring you but don't really think it is up to us to patronise others and tell them what to do

Hi Ariadne

If you do not open the account until the Monday you will lose 2 days interest.

Frank

All seen to anyway, and I would not dream of queuing outside a bank, or even going into a town on a Saturday!

Hi glammanana

Don't forget to be waiting outside the door of the bank / building society 15 minutes before opening time on April 6th when the new tax year starts to open yur next ISA.
Its is a Saturday so I think they will be busy that day.

Frank

All done so no need to worry on our behalf.