# Moving money from UK to IE. What safe product to move the cash to?



## Tastebuds (7 Aug 2019)

Say you have a bunch of cash in UK deposit accounts that you want to move to Ireland as a Brexit protection measure...
The cash is supposed to be used to buy a house in the near future... where would you do move the cash to?

Irish bank deposit accounts have very poor interest
The stock market is too risky right now
In a current account, you are afraid of the sum not being covered by the bank guarantee
Any idea apart from the state saving products?

Thanks


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## Saavy99 (7 Aug 2019)

i would be inclined to leave it in the UK at this stage. You have left it a bit late to think of moving it now.


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## Marc (7 Aug 2019)

Sterling has lost nearly 1%pa compared to the  USD since 1955, we should hold on a little longer before we can spot a trend!


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## Leo (8 Aug 2019)

How near is the near future? That timeline might rule out most investment options due to entry or exit costs. If you're concerned about the bank going bust and all your funds not being covered by the guarantee, open multiple accounts across different banks.


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## so-crates (8 Aug 2019)

You aren't moving the money in order to make money on it, you are moving it in order to lock in a value in euros (esp. in case of any sterling slide) so as to purchase property with it. 

Look at it this way, you are already speculating and taking a risk because you are changing currency!


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## Tastebuds (8 Aug 2019)

Leo said:


> How near is the near future? That timeline might rule out most investment options due to entry or exit costs. If you're concerned about the bank going bust and all your funds not being covered by the guarantee, open multiple accounts across different banks.



re near future: I am waiting for the economy to settle before buying a house. Too many uncertainties at the moment in the economy: German recession, Brexit, USA-china war trade ...

re concern: yes, that is my worry. bank guarantee not covering the amount

Thanks


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## Tastebuds (8 Aug 2019)

so-crates said:


> You aren't moving the money in order to make money on it, you are moving it in order to lock in a value in euros (esp. in case of any sterling slide) so as to purchase property with it.
> 
> Look at it this way, you are already speculating and taking a risk because you are changing currency!



The money in those accounts is not in GBP. It is mainly USD and also some EUR
But of course, the USD part is speculation


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## Tastebuds (8 Aug 2019)

Saavy99 said:


> i would be inclined to leave it in the UK at this stage. You have left it a bit late to think of moving it now.



Why is it late?
If I am worried about post-Brexit consequences . Why would it be late to transfer the cash from UK to IE?

Cheers


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## Leo (8 Aug 2019)

Tastebuds said:


> Why is it late?



Late, not too late. The value of Sterling has dropped ~3.5% Vs Euro in the last 30 days


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## Tastebuds (8 Aug 2019)

Leo said:


> Late, not too late. The value of Sterling has dropped ~3.5% Vs Euro in the last 30 days



I don't have GBP so that d not affect me, but you guys are right about being late from a GBPpoint of view


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## EmmDee (8 Aug 2019)

Tastebuds said:


> The money in those accounts is not in GBP. It is mainly USD and also some EUR
> But of course, the USD part is speculation



Well - the EUR you can just transfer back to your account here no problem. The EUR rate won't be any better in the UK I can't imagine. I have a USD account with BoI. I'm sure most of the main banks will operate currency accounts. So you can probably transfer that as well. 

Generally they will pay rates based on the currency rather than the location of the bank.


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## Saavy99 (8 Aug 2019)

Tastebuds said:


> Why is it late?
> If I am worried about post-Brexit consequences . Why would it be late to transfer the cash from UK to IE?
> 
> Cheers


Sorry I thought you were transfering sterling, the time to do that was in the months preceding brexit.


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## Tastebuds (8 Aug 2019)

Saavy99 said:


> Sorry I thought you were transfering sterling, the time to do that was in the months preceding brexit.


Thanks Saavy99. You were just trying to help. It was a good point re GBP rate timing


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## Gordon Gekko (8 Aug 2019)

Just open multiple bank accounts at the guarantee level.

Don’t invest the money as you have a clear need for it within less than five years so you can’t take the volatility.

Just fire ahead and buy the house if it makes sense to do so from a practical real world perspective; Trump, noise in the media, Brexit are not relevant. It’s just hot air propagated by journalists and cynical fear mongers.


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## joe sod (8 Aug 2019)

Marc said:


> Sterling has lost nearly 1%pa compared to the  USD since 1955, we should hold on a little longer before we can spot a trend!



Is that not just timing though, because sterling is at multi year lows now, and the dollar near its highs now, the dollar is flattered in that statistic. I doubt that statistic would work back in 2012 when the dollar was dramatically lower and sterling at its highs. You could also do a similar statistic for other european countries seen as the euro is also at multi year lows against the dollar . Like all statistics the starting and end points are the most important factors


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## Marc (9 Aug 2019)

It doesn't seem to make that much difference












This is my central argument, Sterling has lost value consistently since the 1950s


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## joe sod (9 Aug 2019)

But you would probably see an even more dramatic depreciation, if using French franc, Italian lira. Spanish peseta as your base currency. Is it not just a reflection of the dominance of the US economy and technology in relation to the old European economies. Europe was much more dominant economically before the 1950s therefore the depreciation of currencies in relation to dollar is not UK specific.
It's worth remembering that the euro has depreciated 30 percent against the dollar since 2012. Then all the talk was about the death of the dollar and it was the hated asset, nobody wanted us dollars, it was all about euros, Canadian dollars etc.


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## Marc (9 Aug 2019)




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## joe sod (9 Aug 2019)

fair play marc, im a bit surprised actually, I knew germany and netherlands were outliers being strong industrial performers but still surprised their currencies appreciated so much against dollar, whats the story with belgian franc !! were they trying to ape germany by shadowing the deutchmark, it looks like the belgian franc was an overvalued currency then. Really surprised the british have actually been currency devaluers all this time along with spain and italy. 
It looks like that is the british gameplan devalue even more to counter the effects of brexit, that poses a huge problem for us. We will have to prostrate ourselves even more to american capital while our indigenous industry withers on the vine if the pound continues to devalue.
Very informative thanks


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## Tastebuds (10 Aug 2019)

Gordon Gekko said:


> Just open multiple bank accounts at the guarantee level.
> 
> Don’t invest the money as you have a clear need for it within less than five years so you can’t take the volatility.
> 
> Just fire ahead and buy the house if it makes sense to do so from a practical real world perspective; Trump, noise in the media, Brexit are not relevant. It’s just hot air propagated by journalists and cynical fear mongers.



I think that state savings and/or multiple bank accounts might be the way to go

I am planning to buy a house within the next couple of years so not speculating with that money is a good idea. Prices are high at the moment and there is a chance they might go down, but I agree with you that a house has personal real-life value.

My compromise/plan is monitoring the economy and being ready to buy within the next 2 years. If prices decrease, I'd buy, and if they don't with all the financial turbulences going on... I'll accept the prices, buy it based on personal value anyway and don't look back


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## AileenWalsh (14 Aug 2019)

Tastebuds said:


> Say you have a bunch of cash in UK deposit accounts that you want to move to Ireland as a Brexit protection measure...
> The cash is supposed to be used to buy a house in the near future... where would you do move the cash to?
> 
> Irish bank deposit accounts have very poor interest
> ...


Leave it in the UK for the now as i think you have left it a bit too late by now


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## cremeegg (23 Aug 2019)

Marc said:


> This is my central argument, Sterling has lost value consistently since the 1950s



My reading of your graph in post 16 would be that between the late 1960s and 1975 Sterling lost heavily against the Dollar. Since then it hasn't moved too much from the 0.6 level.


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## cremeegg (23 Aug 2019)

AileenWalsh said:


> Leave it in the UK for the now as i think you have left it a bit too late by now



And you know this how ?

If the OP intends to buy a house in Euro I suggest that he or she transfer the money now.

Because it brings certainty, not because I know anything about future exchange rate movements.


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## Drakon (2 Sep 2019)

Deposit rates aren’t just low in Ireland, they’re low across the Eurozone. 
Mario Draggi leaves the ECB after eight years at the helm. In that time he hasn’t raised the ECB rate. His successor, Christine Lagarde, is cut from the same cloth. There could be another eight years of the ECB rate at rock bottom.
It’s a bad time to be a saver. It’s a good time to be a borrower. 
I’m on a tracker mortgage for a house purchased towards the end of the Celtic Tiger. My mortgage repayments are half of what they were in 2007.  I’d love another eight years of rock bottom interest rates. 
If I were you, I’d make hay and buy that property in the next twelve months.


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## NoRegretsCoyote (2 Sep 2019)

If you want to buy a house, buy a house.

Cash on deposit in Ireland nets you basically nothing.

Cash spent on a house means you have a house to live in.

The short-term economic outlook isn't going to change this arithmetic much.


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## Drakon (3 Sep 2019)

I used to have shares and cash in the USA in an account that I've had for about 30 years.  Over time it's got more difficult to have that account.  The security put in place has been a nuisance and the soundings of US tax policy makers suggest it'll be more difficult in the future to hold that account.
Oh, and they regularly do clear-out of accounts that don't meed the minimum balance, which I'd been teetering on.
Last year I sold all the shares (bar one holding, long story, won't go into it here) and used it to move/buy a house.

In a way the decision had been half made for me by an external party.  I'm glad I went with it.


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