Safe place for 50k because of debts

[Amsterdam123]

Hello, I just made this profile and would like to ask for help about the following issue. I am Dutch citizen who lives by travelling around the world as a long term backpacker. I have a problem in my home country (the Netherlands) and therefore need to be careful where I keep the money I have ( 50 000 euro). This money is completely legally owned cash (40 000 from inheritance and 10 000 own savings). I have some debts and I am trying to make an agreement to pay it back in small monthly installments. But at the moment I am still at the real risk of my bank account being frozen and losing my money (my salary from my last job got frozen and I don't have a job or business at the moment so I must live with this money). I would like to ask an advice what is the safest way to keep this money safe. I am planning to spread it around at least 5 different places of between 5000 and 15000 per place. I am travelling so I don't have a house where I can keep cash. These are the options I consider:
1. Open account at online bank such as Monese, Revolut (UK), N26 (Germany), Dukascopy (Switzerland). While they share information under the CRS, I don't know if this means that freezing of account is possible because of this exchange. I know of legislation from 2017 that made it easier to freeze bank accounts in other EU countries.

2. Keep some money in EMI such as Wise, PayPal, Neteller, Skrill or prepaid debit cards such as Viabuy of International card services.

3. Use privacy safety deposit box outside of the banking sector. I have had contact with several companies in Switzerland (around 500 euro per year) where I was guaranteed that absolutely no information is shared with any institutions, payments are in cash, no need of bank account. I found similar private deposit box in Germany (around 140 euro per year) where they also guaranteed nobody ever will be informed. Also in UK (100-120 GBP per year) where they unfortunately ask for prove of address and payment by own bank account.

4. Opening bank account in non CRS Serbia. I have called several banks and believe now that a passport and a byala karta (white card for registration) is enough to open an account. I am quite familiar with the Balkans since I have lived there and am familiar with the language, culture and society.

So I am thinking what could be a good way to split these 50k into several places? Obviously I don't mind to carry 5k cash with me but need to secure the rest untill I have reached an agreement about paying back the debt in installments.

Best regards,
S. Dijk

 

[gengiskhan]

Cryptocurrency. BTC/Stablecoins?

 

[daxbr]

Gold bullion and cash.

 

[clemens]

For sure stablecoin, get a hardware wallet like the ledger wallets and store your money there. If you open an bank account in any country your name will be on it. Since it is only 50K you have, it makes not much sense to setup a offshore company that could protect you from the lenders.

 

[diatessaron]

Stablecoins. Just make sure you get some without the bank knowing you got stablecoins as they can come for those too.

 

[Amsterdam123]

Well, I have never heard about stablecoins. Will try to understand what is it and how it works.

 

[diatessaron]

Well, I have never heard about stablecoins. Will try to understand what is it and how it works.

Stables are crypto tokens tied to real money. 1 USDT = 1 USD, 1 EURT = 1 EUR and so on. You can get those by buying through an exchange like Kraken.

 

[Jerry1911]

Well, I have never heard about stablecoins. Will try to understand what is it and how it works.

Just don't put it all into Tether (USDT)! You can also keep money (EUR) on an exchange, Kraken for example.

 

[backpacker]

I have some debts and I am trying to make an agreement to pay it back in small monthly installments.

You plan to pay back your debt. That's great!
Since you have the money, why not make much better deal with the creditor and settle the debt once and for all ... .

 

[uplana]

Well, I have never heard about stablecoins. Will try to understand what is it and how it works.

USDC or USDT - if you click the highlighted keyword above "stable coin" you will find a nice article about the same!

 

[Sols]

If you travel around a lot, pick a place and call it your home. Probably better if it's outside of EU. Become enough of a local resident there that you can open a bank account. Deposit the money there.

Puerto Rico is also an option but be mindful that the banks there have a tendency to lose correspondence accounts left and right. Getting the money out might not be trivial.

If you want to go one step further, open a company in a jurisdiction like Samoa or St Kitts, invest the money in the company, and leave it there. This will cost a few thousand to arrange and getting the money out can be tricky, depending on where you live and how much time has passed.

Well, I have never heard about stablecoins. Will try to understand what is it and how it works.

The name can be deceiving. They aren't as stable as it may seem. Be careful and don't put your money into something you don't understand.

You plan to pay back your debt. That's great!
Since you have the money, why not make much better deal with the creditor and settle the debt once and for all ... .

This is by far the best suggestion. Not necessarily on moral or ethical grounds, but for practical reasons and for peace of mind.

If you could choose between paying off a debt or splitting your money across Serbia/temporary non-CRS solutions, stablecoins, cash under the pillow, and Amazon gift cards, what would you choose? How much is your own time worth that you'd rather spend hours/days/weeks pursuing secrecy options vs just paying off the debt and living stress free?

 

[Golden Fleece]

1) For the love of god, if you have no experience with crypto then stay away from it.

2) Transfer all your money out of your home country and, preferably, out of the EU. Switzerland is a good choice.

3) As Backpacker stated, once your money is safely parked elsewhere, try to settle your debt for ten to twenty percent of full value. From the creditor's point of view, getting some is better than getting nothing. You must convince the creditor that you own nothing and that they will receive nothing, unless they settle with you.

4) You could just wait for the money judgment to expire. In the U.S., a money judgments automatically expires after seven to ten years (depending on the state), unless the judgment debtor bothers to renew it.

 

[Amsterdam123]

1) For the love of god, if you have no experience with crypto then stay away from it.

2) Transfer all your money out of your home country and, preferably, out of the EU. Switzerland is a good choice.

3) As Backpacker stated, once your money is safely parked elsewhere, try to settle your debt for ten to twenty percent of full value. From the creditor's point of view, getting some is better than getting nothing. You must convince the creditor that you own nothing and that they will receive nothing, unless they settle with you.

4) You could just wait for the money judgment to expire. In the U.S., a money judgments automatically expires after seven to ten years (depending on the state), unless the judgment debtor bothers to renew it.

You mean in Switzerland cash or account in online bank such as Dukascopy? I am trying to understand if safety deposit boxes in the UK or Germany are as safe as Swiss when it comes to privacy.

 

[Martin Everson]

Reach an agreement as soon as possible to pay off the debt. But do what you have to do to ensure you have enough money to survive, defend yourself legally etc.

Personally as your money has a source of funds I would just keep it in cash in safety deposit box outside the EU. I wouldn't put it into the banking system at all unless you need the money for your travels etc. Remember if you use a bank or EMI you will leave a digital trail that can and will be used against you at some point.

 

[Amsterdam123]

Reach an agreement as soon as possible to pay off the debt. But do what you have to do to ensure you have enough money to survive, defend yourself legally etc.

Personally as your money has a source of funds I would just keep it in cash in safety deposit box outside the EU. I wouldn't put it into the banking system at all unless you need the money for your travels etc. Remember if you use a bank or EMI you will leave a digital trail that can and will be used against you at some point.

Hello, I am still trying to understand the risks of using a safety deposit box in Germany or UK. I asked a German company offering deposit boxes outside the banking sector about their confendiality and they replied:
"To open a safe box we will need your passport in advance to write the contract..
The renting is minimum 1 year, nobody will know it that you have rented a safe by us. You will get an invoice and you can pay in cash. We need no bank account and we have not to inform any institution."
Their price is 135 euro per year while in Switzerland is around 500.
The UK is also outside the EU but they need proof of address and payment to be done by my own debit or credit card.
The only issue with Switzerland is the very high price and costs to travel to there.

 

[JackAlabama]

Just don't put it all into Tether (USDT)! You can also keep money (EUR) on an exchange, Kraken for example.

Tether so far has been proven resilient and the tether fud comes back periodically.

It is as safe as any bank (which means maybe not too much but also no cause for immediate concern). Banks/exchanges come with the added risk of not being only a blackbox but also posing custody risk with some made up kyc/aml bs wasting days in playing the compliance ping pong and pulling out documents and source of funds from years ago just to prove some meager balance.
So best is diversify between tether and banks and exchanges.

 

[Jerry1911]

USDT has indeed worked fine so far but it's unregulated and there is that proverb, past performance does not guarantee future results.

I do agree that banks are a pain to work with however source of funds is ok in this case and banks come with deposit insurance after all.

However a simple safety deposit box might be a better alternative, like Martin said.

 

[JackAlabama]

USDT has indeed worked fine so far but it's unregulated and there is that proverb, past performance does not guarantee future results.

I do agree that banks are a pain to work with however source of funds is ok in this case and banks come with deposit insurance after all.

However a simple safety deposit box might be a better alternative, like Martin said.

There is also the proverb *the more things change, the more they stay the same* and *but this time it is different* when it is not.

Tether has been proven outstandingly resilient if you ask me and they could redeem a few b$ in a few days without a blink.
Unregulated or nah is also not the key point in life. The key point to observe is if what you do is useful to someone with big sticks or nah.
But that is off topic.

That being said.
You always face the problem of cash cancelling which regarding Euro22 version is not a non-zero risk. Do not forget who owns the cash (it is not you, it is the ecb). Best to deposit usd cash bills, those have never been cancelled in their entire history.
Cash in europe is already largely immobile on top of that and clearly on its way out.

OP is also traveling and the next small crisis could make travel impossible, cumbersome or very costly whereas a safe deposit box would be hard to reach.

If not, OP should just stuff it all under his mattress (easiest and cheapest solution, if the bed is chosen correctly).

 

[Amsterdam123]

Well, unfortunately I don't have a mattress or a bed. I am long term traveller so I sleep every night in a hotel, hostel, guesthouse or Airbnb. I don't own house and I don't rent house. Even when I visit my own country, I stay in hotel. If I had my own or rented room or property somewhere in the world, I would have definitely left my cash there. I have some family and some friends and I do have a lot of cash at the moment at their house and also their bank account but I don't see that as a long term solution.

 

[Golden Fleece]

You mean in Switzerland cash or account in online bank such as Dukascopy? I am trying to understand if safety deposit boxes in the UK or Germany are as safe as Swiss when it comes to privacy.

Any decent bank outside of the EU, preferably in a country such as Switzerland or Singapore. As others have noted, there are far too many logistical problems with keeping cash in a safe deposit box, unless you plan to live in just one country. And then how do you get the cash back into the system, at some point in the future, without proof of source?

From a U.S. perspective (and the U.S. is the most litigious nation in the world), there is an almost zero chance that anyone would try to collect funds located outside the U.S., unless the judgment is in the seven figure range.

Even then, the creditor would need to bring a judgment debtor into a deposition just to discover in which country the bank account and funds are located. If you are living outside your home country, then that will never happen. And even if the creditor had that information, they would still need to hire a debt collection lawyer in the offshore country -- and then go through all the due process hoops and then obtain a collection order (or even obtain a new judgment) from a court in the offshore country.

Even in the U.S., a judgment creditor must seek what is called a "sister state judgment" just to collect a judgment in another state. Depending on the sister state, this can be an onerous task. To collect a judgment outside the U.S. is 100 times more difficult -- and almost never worth the effort.

The process likely works somewhat differently in the EU, but my guess is that having both yourself and your cash outside the EU makes you practically judgment proof. But it is still wise to place your funds in two or three bank accounts in countries outside the EU.

In fact, you could even place less than a thousand Euros in a EU bank (not in your home country) as a "trip wire" to alert you regarding any collection efforts. This allows you more time to react and to move your other funds, if necessary.