This is Money Podcast

In this five minute guide to what you need to think about when writing your will, This is Money editor Simon Lambert explains what he discovered when he wrote his - and the things you need to consider.

How soon will you be driving an electric car? The Government laid out its Road to Zero plan this week, adding some detail to previous announcements on how it wants to drum petrol and diesel cars off our streets. But is there enough in there to show how we will get from electric and hybrid cars currently making up a 2.2 per cent market share to 50 per cent by 2030? From 2040, new cars running only on petrol and diesel won’t be able to be sold and a decade after that we’re all meant to go electric. The crucial question though is what happens in the near future. How long before your next car is electric? Simon Lambert, Lee Boyce and Georgie Frost look at what it will take to tempt us into electric cars, where they will be charged and how long their range needs to be for drivers to take them seriously. They also look at how much a second-hand electric car might cost you. Also on this week’s podcast, Lee reveals a savings trick that could get you a 7 per cent return on £1,000 and we ask whether fixing your mortgage for a decade is wise. BT raising the cost of old email addresses to an astonishing £7.50 a month is also on the agenda. And finally, football isn’t coming home (yet) but has England’s good run at the World Cup boosted the economy? Enjoy.

The world of savings could be set for a shake-up when a new player comes to town – Marcus. Marcus is an online challenger bank and an offshoot of investment banking giant Goldman Sachs, and may just put a bit of welcome pressure on rates in the savings market. But that’s not the only change afoot in savings. Virgin Money is launching an account where interest is earned in air miles, best-buy fixed rate deals are at a two-year high and Monzo has seen losses quadruple. There’s a lot going on. On this episode of the This is Money podcast, consumer affairs editor Lee Boyce and assistant editor Rachel Rickard Straus join presenter Georgie Frost to discuss all this and what it means for savers. They also talk through hotel booking websites, their tricks and whether they work for or against holidaymakers. The trio also discuss how much we need to save for retirement, why a raffle to win a Brixton flat has just been extended, and finally… could success in the World Cup really boost the economy?

If you are selling your home you need to make it look as good as possible. And that starts before you welcome any potential buyers through the door, as to even get them to consider visiting it needs to look great in estate agent's photos. In a world where people go online to hunt for properties, how can you do that? In this excerpt from the This is Money podcast we give sellers some tips to make their home shine.

The National Health Service is 70 years old this year and most of us are proud of the British institution, leaning on it in our times of need. However, we’re living longer with more complex problems and the service keeps crying out that it needs more money. Where does it come from? Do we make cost-cuttings or plough lots of money in, do we increase income tax, make the rich pay, or introduce a new special ring-fenced tax? Theresa May announced plans for £20.5billion-a-year cash boost – but was a little short on the detail. She hinted at tax rises and mentioned a ‘Brexit dividend’. This is Money editor Simon Lambert, along with consumer affairs editor Lee Boyce and presenter Georgie Frost look at ways to fix the NHS in the latest podcast.

What's the most important thing when you want to move home? Should you worry more about getting the best price or simply about getting your home sold? On this week's podcast we delve into the art of home selling, looking at how to make sure the price is right, whether to do work before you sell, or just a quick spruce up and why what's happening in the property market near you should be a deciding factor. Another month and another set of mixed messages about the state of the housing market is revealed. First-time buyers who have a deposit and home movers in the North are doing fine. But London is on the ropes and second and third movers are staying put, bringing the market to a standstill. According the Halifax, prices nevertheless managed to rise £3,000 last month in this ‘subdued’ market. Editor Simon Lambert, assistant editor Rachel Rickard Straus and money broadcaster Georgie Frost get into the aural attic to unbox the facts. The villain of the piece, they agree, is stamp duty. It used to be a 1% tax on purchases but it got tweaked into a giant cash cow for the Treasury by successive Chancellors. Stamp duty is stalling the market and needs to change but how? And is it really worth putting in a new kitchen before you put your home on the market if things get desperate? Also on the show: Paddington Bear 50p Gate. An exclusive This is Money report this week found an enterprising student in Caerphilly who had been handed a not-yet-released Paddington Bear 50p coin in her change. The shop happened to be down the road from Royal Mint, where the coin was made. The coin happened to end up on eBay with bidding topping £15,000. Find out how this happened and whether it’s true, spoiler alert: it is, what ridiculous lengths the Mint went to try to get its coin back and how you can get your hands on one. Finally, the clamour to tackle inner-city pollution has taken an unexpected twist with motorists in a huge new area of London bearing the brunt of a proposed new fee. Owners of reasonably new cars that don’t meet the emissions standards of brand new ones, face a £12.50 charge every time they drive - even if they live in the zone and need to take the kids to school. Not everyone is happy. Especially as it looks like the explosion in numbers of online shopping delivery vans and not cars might be the major cause of pollution. Enjoy,

Whatever happened to bitcoin? After the mania at the end of last year when the price spiked to almost $20,000, the cryptocurrency took a tumble but more noticeably attention has drained away. You need no greater sign of that than figures showing bitcoin Google searches are down 90 per cent. That adds weight to the argument that much of the late 2017 big leg-up was driven by mainstream punters jumping on the cryptocurrency bandwagon. So with bitcoin largely out of the headlines, is that it for the cryptocurrency or is it time to buy for the long-term when things are quiet. On this week’s podcast we take a look at who’s buying, who’s holding and who might be waiting for the price to rise again and greater fool theory to deliver someone who will take their bitcoin off their hands. Simon Lambert, Lee Boyce and Georgie Frost also take a look at gold – and why people aren’t buying this traditional form of investment portfolio insurance – and the most consistent investment trusts of the past decade. And finally, the Government’s policy currently appears to be to confuse motorists as much as possible, with new MOT rules recently joining the car tax muddle. Are drivers now being held to ransom by mechanics over ‘dangerous’ faults – surely no garage would do that? Enjoy.

Global financial markets have been flying up and down and all over the place this week and it’s all got to do with one boot-shaped country in the Mediterranean. Italy has found itself embroiled in a power struggle between Eurosceptic populists – winners of the March general election – and the pro-EU establishment. The ramifications have spread across the globe and will affect Britons from big-time investors to anyone building up a pension pot. As we write this a coalition deal has been reached in Italy, likely to avert a proposed snap election. But this story is moving so quickly that just hours ago when we recorded the podcast there was no deal on the table. Even more reason as things helter-skelter forward to step back and work out what is going on and how on earth we got here – as This is Money editor Simon Lambert offers in his back-to-basics explainer. Also in this episode, Simon, presenter Georgie Frost and personal finance editor Rachel Rickard Straus talk about what you can do to stop your dream house move falling through, and whether proposals to make tax on savings and dividends simpler will work – or just see savers pay more tax. And finally, in troubled times for the high street, they look at one retailer bucking the trend. Enjoy.

Ever heard of money flipping? It’s a new scheme doing the rounds on Facebook and social media that promises to turn your £50 into potentially thousands. So how do you do that? Simple really, you pay others to get onto the bottom rung of a pyramid and then recruit more people to move you up a level and get paid yourself. What makes it so dumb is that it doesn’t even try to have the legitimate veneer of famous pyramid schemes of the past. It’s a Ponzi scheme, plain and simple, but what is one of those and who was Charles Ponzi, the man the scams are named after. On this week’s podcast, Simon Lambert, Lee Boyce and Georgie Frost step back to America in 1920 to find out how Ponzi soared and then crashed – and look at the new money flipping scheme that has brought a trick as old as time to today’s digital age. Also on this week’s podcast, we look at TSB customers who are unfortunate enough to get scammed themselves after the bank’s meltdown and how it is failing them. And we take a look at whether the FTSE 100’s sudden 14% rise on its way to new record highs can still mean it is an unloved investment – and find out where pension millionaires invest. Enjoy.

High house prices mean that the biggest barrier to buying a home in Britain is raising a deposit. With mortgage interest rates at near record low levels, many would-be homeowners could afford monthly payments - but saving the average £30,000 deposit would take years.  For a lot of first-time buyers that means a trip to the Bank of Mum and Dad, but what if that's not an option? It is possible to buy a home without raising tens of thousands of pounds, if you take a 95% mortgage. With one of these deals, a first-time buyer able to pass mortgage affordability tests could put down a 5% deposit of £10,000 and buy a £200,000 home. But is that a good idea? Didn't small deposit mortgages crash the economy a decade ago? Are they not leaving themselves heavily overexposed to falling house prices? In this week's podcast, Simon Lambert and Georgie Frost dig into the world of buying a home with a small deposit mortgage, busting the myths and considering the benefits and the risks.  They also look at whether giving buy-to-let landlords a tax cut to encourage them to sell could provide first-time buyers and home movers with a leg up, if a £10,000 bonus for all 25-year-olds would help, and after the dead cert rate rise that never happened, when will the Bank of England move? Enjoy.