Spectator money

If you’re looking for a balance transfer credit card deal, don’t be fooled into thinking you’ll save the most money by plumping for the card that comes with the longest interest-free period. Such cards usually charge a fee for switching your debt and can render the deal far less cost effective. The longest interest-free balance transfer period available at the time of writing is 42 months[1], as offered by both the MBNA Platinum 42 Month Balance Transfer Credit Card Visa and nuba Transfer Credit Card MasterCard. But these cards come with transfer fees of 2.79 and 3.29 per cent respectively. On a balance of £4,000, that would cost the cardholder

It is not usually feasible to put the great and good of the financial services industry together in a room and get them to agree on anything. Typically, they squabble like alley cats, arguing about everything on and off the agenda, even  the state of the weather. Occasionally, blows are traded. Yet a few days ago, I witnessed something of a financial miracle taking place in a swanky restaurant (1 Lombard Street) in the heart of the City of London. Fourteen individuals, representing different areas of the pensions industry, actually agreeing on a pensions agenda that the next government should follow. I was taken aback as I chewed furiously away

This week’s Best Buys, provided by Moneyfacts, are Easy Access Accounts without a bonus.

A record number of people are now paying the highest rate of tax thanks to wage inflation and the reduction in pensions tax relief. That’s according to figures from HM Revenue & Customs. While the proportion of people paying the 45 per cent additional rate is still small compared to the overall number of income tax payers (just 1.2 per cent), it is nonetheless a 10 per cent increase on the previous year. It also represents a 54 per cent rise since the tax band was introduced. HMRC says that, by the end of this financial year, an estimated 364,000 people will be paying the 45p rate of tax on income

Ah, butter. Salted, unsalted, English, French, garlic, spreadable, straight from the fridge – just thinking about the many forms of butter make me salivate. Then there’s what to pair it with – crumpets, teacakes, toast, jacket potatoes. The list goes on and on. So it comes as a blow to learn that butter is selling at record prices. Forget those low fat and faddy diets, butter is now a ‘big trend globally’. That’s according to Michael Oakes, a dairy farmer and spokesman for the National Farmers’ Union. He told Radio 5 live this morning that one major driver is the decision by McDonalds to use butter in it products again, eschewing

This week’s Best Buys, provided by Moneyfacts, are Remortgage Rates.

A property should have two bathrooms for every three bedrooms to maximise its value and desirability. That’s according to 70 per cent of real estate experts from across the UK who were quizzed by Direct Line Home Insurance. On average, they estimated an extra bathroom could add just under 7 per cent to the £174,340 average value of a three-bed property – a boost of almost £12,000. Of course, the figures change significantly depending on where in the country the home is located. For example, the extra bathroom could add £26,485 to the value in London but just £5,967 in Liverpool. With the average cost of installing a new bathroom

As we ready ourselves for what has become an annual pilgrimage to the polling booths, in terms of finance there is little doubt that housing is taking centre stage in this election. This was not always the case. It’s true that if you look back to newspaper coverage of the housing crisis in the late 1940s and 1950s, post-World War Two, some of the articles could be reproduced word for word in tomorrow’s nationals. But in the 1980s and 90s, back when the structural undersupply of new homes was just getting truly entrenched, housing didn’t seem quite so important. This is one of the reasons why it is escalating back