prize bonds

jmcc

BillyBobWinters wrote: »

As safe as a punt on the stock market can be.

Worth framing that quote.

Regards...jmcc

justforgroups

Maybe I'm paranoid but...

I've had prize bonds for about 10 years - so has a close friend. I won €50 about 2 years ago - my friend won the exact same amount at the same time. Recently I won €75 and guess what? Friend also won €75 at the same time.

Now we both have very small amounts - about €1k of PBs. It's very suspicious to me that we won the same amounts at the same time.

Is the PB company just allocating wins in blocks to keep people interested/reinvesting? The odds of both of us winning the same amounts at the same time are just too unbelievable really.

dayshah

Prize Bonds put the 'u' back into mUgs game.

They are a way for the govt to raise money without paying a decent interest rate.

If you had €1000 in the credit union for 10 years you'd get about €300 in interest. Don't treat them as an investment, treat them as a gamble with bad odds that aren't as fun as the greyhounds in Kilcohan.

scotchy

Very interesting thread.

But why is it in the Waterford city section?

:)

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Sully

Moving to a more correct forum!

Topic Moved

enviro

I had 50% of my savings in Prize Bonds at one time, I have reduced that down now to less than 5%. IMO Prize Bonds are good for a gift to someone on a birthday or at Christmas.
As a place for savings, not sensible. The true value of the bond will fall over the years and unless you win a significant amount, they are not an investment you will get a return on.

scotchy

I bought my first prize bonds in July 2009, and since then I’ve been buying them in lots of 20 every now and then. I now have about €1500 worth.

I’ve won nothing yet.:(



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deisemum

I won €3000 worth of prize bonds just over 18 months ago and have won €300 on them so far. I wouldn't get that in the credit union at the moment, it couldn't afford to pay out any dividend last year.

eimearcmh

My gran got me some for my christening. I never won much/if anything so i took them out when i got older. My mam had them as well but she said she never won anything.
You could be lucky but personaly i wouldn't get them again. I prefer to know that i will definitely get something on what i have invested.

jmalone2

I have a friend who has won 3 weeks in a row of €75 and they only have them 3 weeks

deelite

jmalone2 wrote: »

I have a friend who has won 3 weeks in a row of €75 and they only have them 3 weeks

I was always under the impression that you had to hold your prize bonds for 3 months before you were entered into a draw.

dobsdave

Had my first 75e win last week, after 1yr (125e bonds)

jerry2623

In the height of the Celtic Tiger I sold my little shop for a huge amount of money to developers I had to pay the tax man 120k in Capitol gains.
As I did not have to pay it to them for 3 months I bought prizebonds with it for the crack.
It returned about 6% for me. What was great fun was getting the post every week and getting a few cheques for a couple of 50s, 100s, and I thnk a few 1000s euros .
Alot of the other profit I invested in Blue stock shares :mad::mad: like RBS and AIB I should have put the whole lot in Prize Bonds but sure easy come easy go
ENJOY

enviro

deelite wrote: »

I was always under the impression that you had to hold your prize bonds for 3 months before you were entered into a draw.

3 months before you can cash them in. AFAIK they are in the draws straight away.

nice_guy80

remember there are millions of prize bonds in circulation, and every one of them is entered into every draw

scotchy

scotchy wrote: »

I bought my first prize bonds in July 2009, and since then I’ve been buying them in lots of 20 every now and then. I now have about €1500 worth.

I’ve won nothing yet.:(



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I'm up to about €5000 now....Still nuthin:mad:

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homer911

Based on the statistics here - would you be better disposing of and reacquiring your prize bonds every three months?

Seamus Clancy

I have prize bonds since 1970's. No win. My wife won €75 some years ago - nothing since.

oldyouth

My Mum & Dad give me €50 in prize bonds for my birthday ever since I was in black & white. Never won a bean. My Aunt has, however, won some sort of prize every year for the last 20years and her sister, another Aunt of mine, won €100k around 5 years ago

jmalone2

deelite wrote: »

I was always under the impression that you had to hold your prize bonds for 3 months before you were entered into a draw.

No you are entered into the draws straight away.

You cannot cash in your bonds for the first 3 months.

justforgroups

nice_guy80 wrote: »

remember there are millions of prize bonds in circulation, and every one of them is entered into every draw

In 2009, there was a little over €1 billions worth of prize bonds going into the draws. That's €1 billion entered into the draw every week and on average that number increases by 25% of sales every year (i.e. almost €300k of new PBs every year).

Out of that amount, just under a pitiful €28m was paid out. In terms of winnings, from that €1 billion in the draw, these are the statistics for the whole of 2009:

Number of Prizes: Value €
8 : 1,000,000
4 : 500,000
40 : 20,000
260 : 1,000
520 : 250
221,877 : 75

In summary, this shows that if you win anything other than €75, you are very lucky indeed! Even the Euromillions give better odds than this!

colsku

BillyBobWinters wrote: »

Freebird, put €5,000 on Bank of Ireland shares. Now get them at €9.21 - down from a high of €18.50 last year. Never a better opportunity to buy them than now - Dividend around 6% but should hold for minimum 5 year period.

As safe as a punt on the stock market can be.

I bought €10,000 worth before the crash at €13.50 - not a bad drop considering the unforeseen crash so should gradually get back to that level no problem.

BB

Oh dear!

ravima

one of the €1m winners last year was in Cork, and teh bond was bougth within the past 12 months.

I gave a friend some on the birth of her child and within a month, she had won €75

I do accept however, that there are others who hold a small no of bonds since Moses was a boy and the Dead Sea was known as the Sick Sea and who have won nothing.

I think its all about bulk. The more you have, the better your chances.

justforgroups

ravima wrote: »

I think its all about bulk. The more you have, the better your chances.

...but not much of a chance! See my post above. Excluding the sucker €75 wins, only 832 people for the entire year of 2009 won anything!

That's only 832 people out of the tens/hundreds of thousands of people that own bonds :eek:

Their website says "A customer with €1,000 invested has a 3.9 to 1 chance of winning a cash prize in a 12 month period.". So correct me if I'm wrong in my reasoning, but there are 52 draws a year (1 every Friday) so you have a chance of winning something (most likely €75) only 13 times in 365 days?

Methinks the government is onto a good thing here - free money & not having to pay any interest to the vast numbers of 'depositors'!:mad:

tommy21

justforgroups wrote: »

Methinks the government is onto a good thing here - free money & not having to pay any interest to the vast numbers of 'depositors'!:mad:

So are you though, you still have your money in the end. Are the chances incredibly remote of a big win -yes and if you are correct even more so than the lotto.But there is something nice about being able to have that little bet and still get your money back in time. No interest though, so I think it is only worth it for small amounts.

Farls

I have something over 1k worth of them for about 3 years now won €75 twice so far.

Father has prize bonds from way back in the day and never won a thing.

mw3guc

Seamus Clancy wrote: »

I have prize bonds since 1970's. No win. My wife won €75 some years ago - nothing since.

Same here - all of my large extended family have them for donkeys' years, and none of us have ever won anything on them It was the done thing for us in the past to buy/get them for birthdays, Xmas etc - not so much now. At a guess, I'd say we have at least €3k worth amongst us. Maybe we're just very unlucky people ...

Domaca

From my limited experience with prize bonds it seems there are "lucky" numbers and "unlucky" numbers. I had €200 prize bonds years ago, never won a penny. Got a gift of €75 prize bonds last year, have since won €75 twice. I know from other people that some numbers win repeatedly while other's never win anything! If anything, this suggests a very un-random draw, kinda like the way my ipod, when set to shuffle, will always plays certain songs and never play some other songs.

Mr Bleech

Basically if you have less than 1k in bonds, then forget about winning a prize. For 1k, you have 25% of winnning 1 prize in 1 calender year, so that may mean you only win 75 euro.

if like me, i've put in about 30k, and win 75 euro on average once a month, which is better than a deposit account and have instant access to cash them in now, and they're 100% safe.


i'd recommend it for serious money, rather that under 5k, i just wouldn't bother.

justforgroups

Mr Bleech wrote: »

Basically if you have less than 1k in bonds, then forget about winning a prize. For 1k, you have 25% of winnning 1 prize in 1 calender year, so that may mean you only win 75 euro.

if like me, i've put in about 30k, and win 75 euro on average once a month, which is better than a deposit account and have instant access to cash them in now, and they're 100% safe.

i'd recommend it for serious money, rather that under 5k, i just wouldn't bother.

On average €75 month? I seriously doubt it :P They are a complete rip-off. For example, there's no €1m prize draw if someone wins the €100k!? The whole scam is designed not to pay out.

And as for being "100% safe", your PB money is actually held (you hope!) in the Bank Of Ireland. Draw your own conclusions from that on how safe your money actually is :-P