Quote Originally Posted by BeeBop View Post
Agree, but for me the GBP is the final resting place for the money: independent school fees, hopefully university fees, and most probably a house all to be paid out for in the UK. I think we are lucky (at the moment) with the benefit of a USD income stream - on the right side of timing.

Also happy for the current USD/NZD exchange rate too, makes a bit of a change from around six years ago!
My preference is holding USD in these turbulent times. Can't say much about the GBP as it's been relatively flat to the NZD for the past 5 years, though there's more potential for the GBP to plummet over Brexit.

School fees? What's wrong with public schools?

The NZD is weak to the USD because the NZ economy isn't doing well and potentially we could see under $0.50 in the next 2 - 5 years. How does this translate to the person that has lots of USD or GBP cash? Well you may benefit on the exchange rate but you realise that you do live in NZ and everything you consume and do will go up in price. Inflation is tied to NZ's currency because we simply can't produce everything and since most imported products are based in USD, the retailers are forced to raise prices, and thus inflation becomes a problem.

On the grand scheme, NZ residents won't be doing as well as overseas residents like in N. America. We are plagued with over-regulations, FMA, FIF, AML, etc. The only charm NZ has left is investing in real estate, where the gains can be tax free. But for most places around the world, the principle residence is tax free.