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By the NRIWallah team · Updated August 2026
Guides and calculators for moving, holding, and growing money across borders.
The decisions that compound
The corpus you need, earned abroad and spent in rupees
What your household spends, restated city to city
What a job offer abroad is really worth at home
Rupee SIP against investing where you live
UK, US and Indian retirement pots side by side
Funding a child's degree, India vs UK vs US
Rates, deposits and transfers
Compare remittance rates and fees before sending
NRE / NRO / FCNR across major Indian banks
Where your deposit actually earns more
Borrow-to-deposit spread after tax
Which Indian mutual funds accept you
Compare Indian stock brokers for NRIs
Remittance is the most complete Paisa topic right now, and it works best as a tool plus guide rather than a standalone subcategory.
Use the Remittance Calculator when you want to compare fees, exchange rate visibility, and recipient payout before sending money.
The goal is simple: compare first, then send.
Under the Indian Income Tax Act, gifts received from specified relatives are exempt from tax, regardless of the amount. These relatives include:
Gifts from these specified relatives are not subject to tax, regardless of the amount. However, gifts from non-relatives are taxable if the total value exceeds ₹50,000 in a financial year. It’s important to maintain proper documentation of such gifts to substantiate the relationship and the tax-exempt status if required by tax authorities.
Repatriating funds from NRO and NRE accounts involves different rules and limits, and understanding these can help NRIs manage their finances effectively.
NRE Account Repatriation:
NRO Account Repatriation:
Understanding these rules helps NRIs plan their financial activities and ensure compliance with Indian regulations when transferring funds to their country of residence. It’s advisable to consult with your bank or a financial advisor to navigate the repatriation process smoothly.
A Portfolio Investment Scheme (PIS) account is a special type of account that allows Non-Resident Indians (NRIs) to invest in Indian stock markets. This scheme is regulated by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and enables NRIs to purchase and sell shares and convertible debentures of Indian companies on a recognized stock exchange.
Benefits of a PIS Account:
To open a PIS account, NRIs typically need to apply through a designated bank that offers PIS services. The bank will handle the necessary approvals and compliance with RBI guidelines. This account is particularly beneficial for NRIs looking to diversify their investment portfolio by including Indian equities.
Every NRI runs two balance sheets whether they mean to or not. There is the money where you live — a salary, a pension pot, an ISA or a 401(k), all denominated in a currency that buys imported goods cheaply and Indian services expensively. And there is the money in India — an NRE deposit, a flat in Pune, mutual funds bought before you left, all denominated in a currency that has slipped against yours for as long as anyone has been keeping score.
Almost every financial question an NRI has is really a question about the join between those two sheets. Should the next ₹50,000 go into an Indian fund or an index tracker where you live? Is an Indian fixed deposit at 7% actually better than a foreign one at 4%, once the rupee has done what it does? What is a job offer in Bangalore worth against one in Manchester? None of these have obvious answers, and none of them are answered by a calculator built for someone who only ever deals in one currency.
The tools above are grouped by the question rather than the instrument, because that is how the decisions actually arrive.
Long-horizon decisions come first because they compound the hardest. Retiring in India is the largest of them: you accumulate in one currency for twenty years and spend in another for thirty more, with Indian inflation running above the inflation you are used to and medical costs compounding faster still. Funding a degree competes for the same savings on a shorter clock. And if the underlying question is whether to move at all, salary comparison and cost of living answer the earning and spending halves of it — the first through each country’s tax system, the second from what your household already spends.
Then the mechanics. Where to hold cash, which deposits are worth the paperwork, which fund houses will even accept your application, and what a transfer really costs once the exchange-rate spread is counted rather than just the advertised fee.
We do not convert at the exchange rate and call it a comparison. A pound buys roughly three times more in India than the market rate implies, and any tool that ignores that will mislead you in both directions — making an Indian salary look derisory and a British one look transformative.
We also publish ranges where the underlying data deserves one. Rent series for London come from the ONS and are solid; rent series for Dubai neighbourhoods are portal listings on inconsistent bed-counts. Presenting both to two decimal places would be false precision, so each figure carries a confidence tier and the answers widen accordingly.
For the tax side of these decisions, see the tax section ; for property specifically, housing . Everything is free, nothing is gated behind an email address, and we are open about how we make money .
