I am a foreign college student from Asia, who was fortunate enough to live in the US these last years and attend college here. To do this I had knit together a patchwork of foreign grants, sponsorships and awards. I've studied hard, lived frugally, and will graduate this year from my US alma mater without any of the usual student debt that cripples my US classmates. Once I graduate, my student visa will end and I will be asked to leave the country. I do not intend to transfer visas to stay in the US (at least for the time being) but I'd like to keep that option open for the future.
However all this now created for me the opposite issue of student debt: I have about 15k of sponsorship money left in my US student account that I'm not sure what to do with. The money was originally intended to cover living expenses and is mine to manage. What do I do with it?
As I see it, these are my options: - Stock investing, but as a non-resident who is about to leave the country, that seems very hard to actually arrange (partially because of all the extra legalese generated since the Patriot act). I've looked into options like the Schwab foreign investor account, but that particular one requires a minimum 25k to open. - I could transfer it to an asian bank account, but then I'd take a serious hit from bank fees and the currency exchange. I do not really need this money at home, since I still have my home accounts (incl. emergency fund and other provisions) and I'd prefer to keep those US funds around in dollars, just in case. - I could do nothing and leave it sitting in my US savings account for now. (Maybe transfer more money into it, pay the currency fees, up to 25k and then apply for an investor account?)
Thanks in advance for all your advice!
Submitted March 25, 2017 at 06:56AM by cephidorus http://ift.tt/2o3fR2d
