What to do with cash from sale of house in the short term

[adieh]

Mrs adieh and I are about to complete on the sale of our house and have yet to find the next house in a new area.

After all commitments are settled, we need to stash about £800k for an estimated 6 to 9 months.

It does seem that most standard savings accounts have limits on amounts that can be deposited and there are limits on protected amount is £120k (£240k for a joint account).

I think our options are:
1. Open 4 joint savings accounts that allow deposits up to £200k - but which ones?
2. Open a single joint savings account which allows the full deposit amount and risk the protected limit not being called on
3. Some combination of Cash ISA, Savings, Premium Bonds

I'd like to keep it simple and would really appreciate input from those that have experienced similar situations.

What would you financially astute people recommend?

[AllyM]

For 6 months you needn’t worry about being over £120k

https://www.fscs.org.uk/making-a-claim/claims-proc...

[The Leaper]

Here's good market info from a respected source:

https://www.moneysavingexpert.com/savings/savings-...

R.

[_Hoppers]

Until she sorts her finances out, my wife has sold her rental and has just got a chase account which gives 4.5%. IIRC you can put up to £3m in the account?

Edited by _Hoppers on Monday 10th August 12:27

[LooneyTunes]

Just dump it into NS&I. Their instant access account can take more than that and is fully protected.

[alscar]

LooneyTunes said:

Just dump it into NS&I. Their instant access account can take more than that and is fully protected.

This assuming the 6 months is a minimum time need as then no need to swop afterwards after it ceases to be temporary.

[alscar]

_Hoppers said:

Until she sorts her finances out, my wife has sold her rental and has just got a chase account which gives 4.5%. IIRC you can put up to £3m in the account?

Edited by _Hoppers on Monday 10th August 12:27

But only protected to that £1.20m if single or double to £2.4m in effect if joint but only for 6 months - that said not an issue if nothing happens to Chase !

[_Hoppers]

alscar said:

_Hoppers said:

Until she sorts her finances out, my wife has sold her rental and has just got a chase account which gives 4.5%. IIRC you can put up to £3m in the account?

Edited by _Hoppers on Monday 10th August 12:27

But only protected to that £1.20m if single or double to £2.4m in effect if joint but only for 6 months - that said not an issue if nothing happens to Chase !

Don't you mean £120,000?

[alscar]

_Hoppers said:

Don't you mean £120,000?

Temporary balances are increased to £1.2m single /£2.40m joint and then back to 10% of those limits post the 6 months period.

[bobj42]

If going beyond 6 months then one option is cash savings platforms like Raisin and Flagstone, which offer easy access savings account switching so you can chase interest rates. So you could have say 400k in Raisin and 400k in Flagstone with 4 savings accounts in each and stay within FSCS protection. (You would want to use at least 2 savings platforms to get the best rates in each platform - there is also AJ Bell Savings Hub and Hargreaves Lansdown Active Saving but they're newer and have less choice of savings accounts atm.)

None of these savings platforms are whole of market, so the rates will never be as good as manually moving the money around by yourself every time rates change. If the best easy access savings rate in the whole of the market is 4.5% you'll probably get rates of between 3.6-4%, but the ability to switch easily as bank rate changes can more than offset this. It's also worth noting that a lot of the banks they list are bbb fitch ratings rather than a+, though that doesn't really matter as long as you stay below the FSCS limit with each.

(Disclaimer: I'm not a financial adviser, just some random bloke of the internet.)

Edited by bobj42 on Monday 10th August 14:05

Edited by bobj42 on Monday 10th August 14:05

[adieh]

I want to keep it simple so will probably go the Chase account route - I'll research that account some more and look for similar.

However, the idea of the savings account 'broker' platforms that enable easy switching is new to me and I will research those options too. If it makes opening and managing the accounts simple, then it could be the answer.

Thank you all for the suggestions and information provided, it is very much appreciated.

[YouWhatAgain]

adieh said:

I want to keep it simple so will probably go the Chase account route - I'll research that account some more and look for similar.

However, the idea of the savings account 'broker' platforms that enable easy switching is new to me and I will research those options too. If it makes opening and managing the accounts simple, then it could be the answer.

Thank you all for the suggestions and information provided, it is very much appreciated.

I put the money from my house sale into Chase for a year. I had no concerns with the chances of Chase going bust, but it took me 6 months to convince them it was my money, because of their ridiculous Anti Money Laundering process.

[ukwill]

I was wondering about the exact same thing this morning.

Seems mad to me that there isn’t a much easier solution to this (although the Chase option sounds good).

Also, the tax on the interest is going to sting. I think I need to look more into this.