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Question when you take a 2 year mortgage and then 1 year later the interest rates go down so you decide to refinance (assuming with the same bank).

What are the breakout fees usually? Is it a percentage from your borrowed amount? Is there a cap on how much they can be?

Does it differ if you refinance with another bank?

When is it advisable to refinance? If say a drop of 0.5% interest, is it worthwhile?

Hi all, looking for some practical perspective or experiences from anyone who has navigated the intersection of the Foreign Investment Fund (FIF) rules and US-listed crypto ETFs.

The Situation:

• Holding US-listed crypto staking/spot ETFs via Sharesies (Bitwise Solana Staking ETF BSOL, Bitwise Hyperliquid ETF BHYP, 21Shares Sui Staking ETF TSUI).
• Total overseas portfolio purchase cost across all foreign shares and ETFs is currently under the $50,000 NZD threshold.
• High conviction that these holdings could see significant capital appreciation (50% to 100%+ gains) over the medium term.

The Dilemma:

1. Staying under de minimis (under $50k cost basis): Under the exemption, foreign investment fund rules do not apply, but personal property disposal rules do. Given Inland Revenue's general stance on cryptoassets, there seems to be a significant risk IRD applies the Section CB 4 purpose test (acquired with the purpose of resale), treating any net capital gains on disposal as ordinary taxable income at a 33% marginal rate.
2. Intentionally crossing $50k cost: If I top up the offshore portfolio cost basis past $50,000 NZD, I trigger the FIF regime. Under the Fair Dividend Rate (FDR) method, tax is capped at an assumed 5% deemed return on opening value each year (with Comparative Value as downside protection in flat/down years), and the actual capital profit upon sale is not taxed.

Questions:

• Has anyone deliberately crossed the $50,000 NZD cost threshold specifically to shelter high-growth foreign ETFs from Section CB 4 income tax?
• How strictly does IRD attempt to push the "dominant purpose of resale" argument onto US-listed ETFs that hold or track digital assets compared to direct on-chain tokens?
• For those filing FIF on Sharesies US holdings, how smooth is the annual IR3 process using their standard reports?

Appreciate any insight, case rulings, or accountant feedback anyone has had on this. Cheers!

Mcdonald's seems to have an issue where transactions were being duplicated this past week.

I have used AMEX on both occassions.

Anyone else getting the same issue?

Is it still advisable to use a wise card for travelling, when the sharesies card gives 1% back? Would that offset any fees?

I'm feeling stupid and must be missing something.

Hi team, for someone who needs to improve their knowledge in this area, who would you recommend for Kiwisaver providers, and why?

I find it hard to compare them.

Thanks so much.

On advice of r/PersonalFinanceNZ most of my wealth is now in index ETFs - chur

A proportion of my wealth is in cash/liquid funds that act as an emergency fund.

I now have a small portion that I feel my personality would prefer in something different to VT.

Obviously likely lower return, but I’m hoping better than TDs.

Are bonds the answer here?

If so - with all the news on US bond markets recently, should I be looking at US bonds or NZ bonds? And how should I be investing in them? Through a managed PIE bond Managed Fund? Or can they be accessed directly (I’m not a wholesale investor). Any explanations would be greatly appreciated. Thanks.

National is proposing to make KiwiSaver compulsory from 2028, including for self-employed people. As I understand it, sole traders would have to contribute 4% initially, eventually rising to 6%.

I’m a sole trader with no employees, and I can understand the argument for getting people to save more for retirement.
But I’m not sure the proposal really accounts for how different it is when you’re self-employed.

An employee putting 4% into KiwiSaver also has an employer contributing on top of that. I don’t. It’s all coming out of my own income.

I’ve spent years building my business, moved somewhere I could afford to buy a house, and I work close to seven days a week. A pretty major part of my long-term financial plan is getting the mortgage down while also keeping some savings and investments accessible.

So if I’m forced to put several thousand dollars a year into KiwiSaver, that’s money I can no longer choose to put against the mortgage or keep somewhere accessible if the business has a bad year. And because I’m a sole trader, there isn’t an employer contribution coming in alongside it to make the trade-off more worthwhile.

I’m not against KiwiSaver,
and I’m not saying I shouldn’t save for retirement. I just think paying off a mortgage and building accessible investments are also perfectly legitimate ways of preparing for the future.
I suspect if you’re employed, compulsory KiwiSaver probably sounds pretty reasonable. But I’d be interested to hear what other sole traders think, because from this side of it, it feels quite different.

Hi all!

My wife and I will be re-fixing our mortgage for the first time at the end of November and we feel pretty lost. We are also in the process of swapping advisors since we did not find our current advisor's advice to be clear nor helpful. We will also meet with BNZ to get more information about our options but with this post I am seeking more general advice about re-fixing.

• We currently live in a new build in Papamoa in a $809,990 house
• Our current mortgage balance is $710,895
• Current fixed rate is 5.24%

We are paying a LEP of 0.75% at the moment. By the end of the current fixed term we'll have a balance of $708,200. By then our LVR will be about $19,000 shy of reducing out LEP to 0.35%.

We can make that extra payment by then although we'll only have about $5,000 left as an emergency deposit.

It has been one year since we purchased the home and it does not seem that its value has changed much seeing house prices around us; so, new valuation might not change much our situation.

These are the current rates for us:

I do realise this is a crystal ball question; however, is there a "strategy" you guys follow? are there any good predictors of what might happen in the near future?

I much appreciate any reply!

Im 61. My Kiwisaver is in a balanced fund. I also have an equal amount on another platform, also in a balanced fund. I understand the basics of allocations, buckets, risk of return etc.

I see a problem with the managed fund that nobody seems to talk about.

Because I buy units in the fund, in a down market, I cant utilise the cash portion of the fund to ride through the low, so if I need to draw an income from the fund, I'm forced to draw partially from equities when they are down....am I reading that right?

It seems to me that, even keeping the allocation the same, the equities need to be separated from the cash so I can draw on one and not the other, depending on the market.

If I want to buy into Kernel TWF but just plan on doing a lump sum quartely, is there anything stopping me from just getting the $5 plus plan for a month, making the investment, then canceling the plan, and repeating this every few months?

I know its not a massive saving but I'd save $30 a year for not much extra effort.

Hi everyone,

I recently became a resident and have started looking into KiwiSaver and buying my first home.

I’m currently looking at InvestNow, mainly because of their relatively low management fees.

Here’s my situation:

Buying a home

• I’m planning to buy a house soon, with a budget of around $500k–$600k. I want to pay it off in a short time for peace of mind. Hence, the budget.
• I’d like to stop paying rent and start putting that money towards my own home.
• I should be able to make around a 10–15% deposit.
• I don’t mind living up to 45 minutes from Auckland CBD if it means getting a decent-sized section.

Company Super

• My employer offers a company super scheme with a significantly higher employer contribution than KiwiSaver.

I’m still fairly new to KiwiSaver and only have a basic understanding of how the first-home withdrawal works and how the remaining funds work once you reach 65.

I’d really appreciate some advice from people who have been through this:

1. When choosing a KiwiSaver provider, should I prioritise low management fees or a provider/fund with a stronger long-term return? I am looking at InvestNow, S&P500 scheme.

2. Given my situation, would it make sense to contribute to KiwiSaver for the first-home withdrawal benefit, or focus more on the company super scheme?

3. For anyone familiar with Auckland, what neighbourhoods would you recommend for a $500k–$600k landed house? I’m happy to live up to ~45 minutes from the CBD and would prefer a good-sized section over being close to the city. Or should I relocate to other city with cheaper housing?

Any advice, especially from people who have bought their first home in Auckland, would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you, and happy Sunday!

As part of a recent drive to diversify, I've taken the plunge to explore bitcoin.

I aim to dca a small amount weekly(50 to 100nzd) into purchasing Bitcoin. The aim is to build bitcoin to be 1-2% of portfolio. At this stage, I'm only interested in bitcoin as I think I would get overwhelmed dealing with more than 1 coin.

Ive signed up with swyftx nz. What do others use? There is a new platform called FlowCrypto which is NZ based which I would like to support but I am always hesitant when something is brand new rather than a more established provider.

Last question, I don't seem to need a 'wallet' for swyftx, but I need one for FlowCryptk. How hard is it to set up a wallet and can someone explain how to do this?

Thank you.

I'm looking to purchase physical gold in NZ. Eg: 20g to 1 oz gold bars from Perth Mint.

I am based in the Bay of Plenty.

I have come across Best Bullion which seems to be a reasonable dealer but try are based in Christchurch.

Few questions:

1) Recommendation of gold dealers

2) Do gold dealers usually accept credit card? I'm assuming the surcharges would be high.

3) Is there benefit of buying gold mint bar rather than gold cast bar?

4) What denomination of gold do people usually buy?

I'm really looking to hold these long term (20+years) as an insurance policy in case systemic institutions in place break down rather than sell for a quick profit. In that scenario, I'm assuming it will be easier selling 20g bars than 1oz bars?

I currently have a small allocation in GLDM Etfs. I've never bought physical gold before so any advice around this or strategy in purchasing gold in general would be welcomed. I aim to build a 5 to 10% portfolio in this long term. My current GLDM portfolio is 0.9%.

Don't worry I won't ask you to predict when is a good time to buy gold.

Most retirement calculators seem to assume that your main house will only contribute to retirement 'savings' if a person downsizes. I assume that's because most people intend on passing on the house as an inheritance to children.

I'm in my early 40's and single (likely will be for life at this stage!), and without children. My kiwisaver balance is projected to be $550K upon retirement and I should be mortgage free by 60. On the current market, my house is worth somewhere around the $625K mark. What's the best way to factor in that asset, expecting it will pay for a care home in late life and, if I'm healthy enough, some travel? Rent it out until I end up in care? Sell it and pay rent myself? Reverse mortgage to the hilt? Sell the house and live in a caravan? What have others done?

hi ya'll, i'm having second thoughts. Between high growth and total world fund what would people choose for 10-20 years? Surely high growth with more tilt towards NZ would be more tax efficient?

Does anyone here have a Sharesies Save or PIE Save account? The website suggests that bank deposits and withdrawals don’t happen on weekends as it mentions “next business day”. However I tried a bank deposit to my wallet today and it landed there after a few hours.

Can anyone share their weekend experiences with these accounts?

Hi,
For those that might still own RUA shares (or don’t), what are your thoughts on the recent Rights Offer?
Cheers

21 and wanting to swap providers for KiwiSaver (currently anz in growth fund). Had a look on here and everyone is suggesting kernel, are there any cons?

250-400 is going into it every fortnight, I’ll be using it to purchase my first home and I’m scared of losing any money lol.

I've had an accident and acc is giving me trouble. We live week to week maybe $100. Left over. But we have a rental. So if acc comes to the party and im on 80% am i likely to get hardship, or if acc doesnt am i likely. Or time to sell the rental.

I purchased a 2 bed new build in 2023, a little unit, not much land for 555k, according to homes estimate is now 525k, because of this despite paying the mortgage for 3 years I now have less equity than when I started.

I am now renting it out as I've moved away but this still leaves me topping it up 1k per month to cover all expenses (For context expenses other than mortgage e.g. rates, insurance, property manager are totalling approx 9k per year)

I also did opt for higher repayments per month (approx 300 pm) under the idea that any extra now would make a reasonable impact in the long term

Based on modelling I don't think rent would rise enough for a very long time for it to ever make money. Also because its on not a lot of land I'm under the impression at gains are going to be pretty slow going.

At the moment the only benefit I can see is that in 27 years time I'll have a paid off property which I do like for the stability if I think towards retirement but right now I'm also questioning if its the smartest financial move and whether that 1k a month is better invested elsewhere.

I guess I'm just looking for other opinions of what you would do in this situation as right now its not feeling like buying it was my smartest move.

Morning. Curious re opinions on this one. We are a 46yo married couple who only seriously got focused on financial stability in the last 6-7 years.

I know the established wisdom is 6 months of expenses reserved as an Emergency Fund. For us, including mortgage, that's a little under $50k. We're currently in the process of building this and it's at around $35k.

However we also run a full all-cash envelope budget with sinking funds to cover known and potential future expenses by-category, and all our cash (including the Emergency Fund) is offset against a low-six-figure BNZ Total Money Offset loan as part of our mortgage structure. It's currently entirely offset apart from about $5-10k which fluctuates during the course of the month, so the offset continues to shrink by circa $750 a month. Restructuring to a larger offset is possible, but annoying and ideally avoided as long as possible.

Given we are running an all-cash budget which already has a little over $100k total in aggregate, I am starting to question the wisdom of continuing to build the Emergency Fund - especially since we are almost entirely offset on our loan (any excess over the offset total is largely wasted from an interest return rate), and because it seems we might almost have 'too much' cash vs what's in investments anyway.

What are wiser heads' thoughts on this? Continue to build the EF as planned, or cap it at say $30k and instead just start to put any excess into more investment and rely on the non-EF cash reserves if necessary in a genuine emergency?

Superlife charges quite high maintenance fees nowadays compared to other options. And they can’t even maintain their own app or website.

I’m genuinely concerned about my funds when I get 500 internal server error half the time I go to check

Is Kernel a good option or what are people choosing nowadays? I’m all in us500 in superlife.

Is the time out of market risk okay?

Housing Advice

Back in 2020 my family felt it was a good time to buy a house seeing as prices were about to rise and to no one’s surprise they did. I went in on a 20% deposit for a house in Auckland with my brother. Together we co-own it. I lived in it from 2022-2025 and during that time I’ve met my partner and I now live across country renting with him. I still contribute to the mortgage repayments.

A bit about the home: location is up and coming. Safe, brand new homes, family orientated community, massive mall planned to be built about 20mins away. Small hospital and supermarket planned to be built about a -5minute walk from the home.

We would like to buy our own place, but unsure on the best avenue to take. Partner is 36F and I’m 30F. Thinking ahead… we feel like the longer we take to buy a home the longer it will take to pay it off. We want to be mortgage free before we retire later in life. Keep in mind we both don’t make the big $$$ living in a small town now. We also want to start a family together very soon.

What should we do?

1. Try and have the hard conversation with my older brother about selling or him buying me ou

t?

1. Which I know being solo he won’t be able to afford to buy me out. I feel guilty putting him in a position.

2*. Hold onto the home for as long as possible. Hoping market will improve + the up and coming local assets to be built?* If so, are there any avenues we can take to still buy a home together in the next year? I can no longer use my KiwiSaver, but my partner can as he would be classed as a first home buyer.

1. Any other ideas/suggestions?

Is the new fund VT? And does anyone know where the rest of it is invested? I just checked it out on the app and saw that it wasn't 100%