€140,000 with no mortgage or property: where to invest without risk

€140,000 with no property or mortgage: from the 3% on Treasury bills to the 3.38% on deposits

An estate of €140,000 from the sale of a family home and a monumental reluctance to take out a mortgage to buy a rental property. That is the starting point. The ING orange account barely yields anything, and the stated goal is simply to keep inflation from devouring the capital. The first reply in the thread comes quickly: 12-month Spanish Treasury bills (Letras del Tesoro) at 3%, simple and with reasonable liquidity. The problem, the same voice warns, is that inflation can eat up that yield with ease.

The conversation soon turns to interest-bearing deposits. According to one forum user, Santander and BBVA hover around 2.5%, while Cetelem and Renault Bank climb to 3.25%-3.35% APR over two and three years. Raisin allows you to sign up with the Spanish MiraltaBank at 3.38% over three years. The question of the IBAN and Form 720 (the Spanish tax declaration of foreign assets) hangs over the table: if the IBAN is Spanish, there is no need to report it to the tax authorities. Renault Bank has one. So does ING, even though its deposit guarantee fund is Dutch.

The conservative profile and the dividend temptation

The option of a short-term fixed income fund, with bonds of one to three years, appears as an intermediate step: an average return of 4.2% and daily liquidity, with somewhat more volatility than a deposit. For those who can tolerate more swings, a classic permanent portfolio is proposed: 25% money market, 25% global fixed income, 25% MSCI World and 25% gold. Gold and silver, according to another comment, are on offer and tend to perform well in inflationary environments.

Property is ruled out by near-unanimous consensus. The reluctance to manage tenants, defaults and repairs weighs more heavily than the returns. The alternative gaining ground in the conversation is a dividend portfolio: an initial 5% dividend yield, with growing dividends that within a decade could represent 8% or 9% a year on the invested capital, plus capital appreciation. The Spanish stock market is championed as a source of dividend-paying companies, long-standing oligopolies with few surprises.

The peace of mind of owing nothing

There is a strand of opinion that does not overlook the mortgage detail. Paying it off before investing a single euro is the priority for part of the analysis, which recalls cases of couples who lost both their jobs and their homes for lacking a sufficient cushion. Peace of mind, this camp argues, outperforms any index. Another voice contributes a personal experience: reducing the principal with every payment, even if the amounts are tiny, creates a virtuous circle that allows the loan to be settled ahead of schedule.

The conversation also flirts with cryptocurrencies and rotating out of artificial intelligence, though without enthusiasm. The idea that money that left cryptos for AI could return home if AI deflates remains bar-talk speculation. And a final warning: there is no such thing as a magic investment. Index funds, the kind that promise you can forget about your money and get rich, require very long horizons and can leave anyone who only holds on for three or four years badly burned.

The end of the thread leaves a prediction with reservations: if deposits at 3.38% and Treasury bills at 3% are still around, money sitting idle in the orange account has no defense. Unless inflation lets up. It hasn't.