What do I do with all of my $$$ ?

Settlement visa has been issued. Moving to Wales in a little under two weeks to be with my husband. I have quite a bit of money in my bank account. How do I bring it with me?

I want to close my bank account and take all of my funds with me but am having a hard time figuring out how to go about doing it without spending loads of money in the process. When visiting Wales, I brought traveler's checks but can't imagine that being a feasible option when moving over. Also, taking it all over in cash makes me feel like barfing. I'd be a nervous wreck!

So what do I do? Wire transfer? What did you do? Please help!!

I plan on consolidating my US account with our joint US account.  We figure we'll be here twice a year and we can use it to wire money to ourselves when (if) the exchange rate ever gets super good again.  I'm also keeping my ING account as that is what my student loans come out of. 

If you want to just sever ties and you don't have any bills in the US I would sugest keeping the account for now but either wiring (use paypal, whatever) to transfer the money over when you have a UK bank account established.  It's not as expensive as you may think.  Get it down to just the miniumin to keep it free.  Then the next time you come to the US close out the account completly and just take whats there in cash. 

I will have bills remaining in the States, unfortunately. Blah. My husband and his family says I should just ditch them but I don't feel comfortable doing that. My monthly bills consist of student loans (I plan on deferring them for however long I can) and a damn credit card from college that I completely forgot about and now owe to a debt collector.

So I guess for the time being I will just leave everything in my account and add my dad or mom to my account in case I ever need them to wire anything to us. Blah. We were hoping and planning on bringing all my cash over there and putting it in my husband's savings account. There's enough in my account for a decent down payment for a house after a few years of interest accrual! Plussss, I would get SUCH great satisfaction walking into my bank and closing out my account. I LOATHE THEM.

Sorry, but when I saw the subject of this thread my first thought was "Give it to me?" LOL.  I soooo wish I had this problem. 

Just as a suggestion - some global banks have the ability to open up a foreign currency account or international account.  This should enable you to get to your money more easily when moved over.  stop in and speak to one.  It will probably be ALOT easier to open it from the US where you have accounts, than to when you come over.  I know HSBC is big here, as well as Santander.  If you are relocating to London, there's Citibank as well.

Walking away wouldn't be smart.  If you ever came back it would just follow you.  Plus, you will still need to pay your US taxes and maybe it could effect that as well. 

I haven't found much in the way of any banks in Oklahoma that offer international banking services. I think what I'll do is leave a chunk of change in my current account so I can set up monthly deductions for my current bills and if necessary, put more cash in when we come back to visit to cover any future payments. Figure we'll visit Oklahoma at least once or twice a year.

I'm going to look further into transferring funds via paypal. Seems pretty straight forward. Stupid currency difference!

(use paypal, whatever) to transfer the money over when you have a UK bank account established.

 That's a good idea to use paypal. I have an account there, thanks for the tip =)

Well, what I did was just keep my bank account open until I had spent all the money that I'd had in it, and then wrote a letter to my bank to close my account once I'd withdrawn all the funds. That way I wasn't carrying a lot of cash with me, and also if I needed a debit card for anything before I'd gotten to the UK and set up a new account, I wasn't stuck.

I've found it quite handy to keep my US account, if that's an option for you. I do banking online, and when I need some cash, I stick my card in the wall. I don't know about your bank, but mine just charges $1 per transaction. By far the cheapest, easiest, quickest way to pull money over, £200 at a time.

It's also nice to have that US account so you can keep US iTunes accounts, buy goods on US web sites, etc.

If you have that much money in your account, why don't you just pay off the credit card?

It's also nice to have that US account so you can keep US iTunes accounts, buy goods on US web sites, etc.

If you have that much money in your account, why don't you just pay off the credit card?

Excellent point!

Also, I don't want to pay it off because I would much rather pay a few hundred dollars a month spread out over a few years as opposed to paying thousands of dollars all at once. Interest isn't being accrued anymore on the balance so it's not like I'm going to end up spending more by paying it off slowly. It makes sense to pay it all off but I don't know. It's a big chunk of change and I want to hold on to it just in case anything happens and we need it more for an emergency. It makes sense in my head.   

Paypal takes out way too much in fees for my liking. We are going to setup an account with a foreign exchange company, such as XE.com. They give better currency exchange rates, and not as much in fees. Its worth looking into. That way, no one has to go into your bank in OK and initiate a wire transfer for you. You simply log into your XE account and initiate it yourself.

I was going to suggest the same thing as balmerhon and say just pay off the credit card or even your student loans if you had enough money. That way you wouldn't have to worry about sending money back here every so often to continue the payments. But I understand your fears on spending that large a chunk of money all at once. Maybe you should consider something in the middle - make larger than the min payments to get it all paid off sooner.

I would defo keep the account open to be able to use it on US websites, or when you come back to visit you can use that account for purchases, instead of paying foreign transaction fees on your UK account. Thats what we plan to do.

I just checked my online banking to see how much I was charged to withdraw money using an ATM when I was over in March. I was only charged $1! Uh. I get charged more for using an ATM here that's not affiliated with my bank. How does that work out? Needless to say, I'll be keeping my account here and will just withdraw whatever we need when we need it! Excellent suggestion!!

Through Fidelity Brokerages, using their debit card I get charged no fees, but 1% of the transaction at an ATM.

Once I get a U.K. account established it'll cost nothing to transfer back and forth.