After much anticipation, the chancellor delivered her second budget this week, unveiling a series of changes that could affect how you spend and save your money.

Here are some suggestions to consider what might lessen the impact on your finances.

1. Use your Isa allowance

The £20,000 annual limit on payments into the tax-efficient accounts remains but from 6 April 2027, the rules on where the money can be put will change for anyone aged under 65. Instead of being able to put all of the money into a cash Isa, that element will be capped at £12,000. Anything you pay in above that will have to go into a stocks and shares Isa. If you are over 65, all £20,000 can still be put into a cash Isa.

In the 16 months before the changes come in, you can exploit the existing allowances. There is no limit on what you can hold overall, and once money is in the Isa wrapper you will be able to move it around each year and earn interest without tax.

There are some good rates available at the moment if you have not used up this year’s allowance.

The cash Isa savings allowance has been capped at £12,000, from £20,000 a year. Photograph: Leonora Oates/Alamy

“If it makes sense to open a cash Isa, and you have the money and allowance available, it’s worth acting sooner rather than later, while there are still strong rates around,” says Sarah Coles of the investment firm Hargreaves Lansdown. This week, the online operator Trading 212 was offering a rate of 4.56% on an easy-access cash Isa, with Leeds building society and the Post Office offering 4.05%.

Interest earned outside an Isa is subject to tax once you go over your personal savings allowance. It’s £1,000 for basic rate taxpayers, £500 for higher-rate payers and up to £5,000 if you earn less than £17,570 a year. That means that if you’re earning 4% on your savings, you can hold up to £25,000 before facing tax as a basic-rate payer, or £12,500 as a higher-rate payer.

2. Switch shares to an Isa

One surprise in the budget was a rise in income tax on dividends, increasing the cost of owning income-producing shares. From April 2026, the ordinary rate will rise from 8.75% to 10.75%, while the upper rate goes from 33.75% to 35.75%. You will only pay this if you have used up your income tax personal allowance and the your annual dividend allowance (now at £500).

If you want to avoid the rise, you could switch your investments into an Isa as long as you have enough of your £20,000 allowance left to do so. The process, known as “Bed & Isa”, involves selling off the investments and then repurchasing them back within an Isa wrapper. If you have made big gains on them you may face capital gains tax (CGT) so it is worth taking advice. Any future growth and income from the investment will be protected from CGT and dividend tax.

Putting shares which boast the highest, most regular dividends inside a stocks and shares Isa makes financial sense, says experts. Photograph: Tommy (Louth)/Alamy

Coles says if the value of your shares is higher than the Isa allowance you have, you should prioritise those which generate the highest dividends. “This will leave more growth-oriented investments outside the tax wrappers. It may be subject to capital gains tax, but this can be deferred and managed through annual allowances,” she says.

Jason Hollands of the wealth management firm Evelyn Partners says married couples have the option of using two sets of dividend allowances and two Isas, by taking advantage of transfers between spouses.

“This involves shifting investments and cash to a spouse. It does not give rise to a taxable event which it would in the case of unmarried couples,” he says.

3. Review salary sacrifice

A well-flagged change in the budget was the weakened benefits for employees who pay part of their income into a pension via salary sacrifice. At present, workers and employers can avoid national insurance (NI) payments on sums sacrificed from gross pay. But from April 2029, payments above £2,000 a year will not benefit from an NI exemption.

If this affects you, there is almost three-and-a-half years to make any changes you need. A good place to start is with your employer – find out if the rules of your scheme are going to change after this budget.

Look at your contributions and see whether, in the short term, increasing the amount you are paying in is possible in order toexploit the current savings.

If you are keen to keep down your taxable earnings, it is also worth investigating what other salary sacrifice schemes your employer offer. This could be getting a bike through the Cycle to Work scheme or by leasing an electric vehicle.

There is almost three-and-a-half years until the chancellor’s salary sacrifice changes take effect. Photograph: Trevor Chriss/Alamy

But don’t panic. If your employer plans to still offer this as a way to pay into your pension, it remains a good option.

“It’s easy to assume that continuing to increase your pension contributions is no longer valuable, but this is not necessarily true,” says Chris Britton of the human resources tech firm Reward Gateway/Edenred.

“Yes, your employer will be liable for increased NI for any contributions you make that exceed £2,000 a year, but bear in mind that all contributions to your pension, even above the £2,000 threshold, are exempt from income tax, and you’re still avoiding paying NI on any contributions up to £2,000.”

4. Give gifts while you can

There were some tweaks to inheritance tax (IHT) that will bring more people into the net; so for those who might be affected, the advice is simple: think about spending and giving away more money.

IHT is a tax paid on someone’s assets after they die if they leave enough to go above a certain threshold. The thresholds at which IHT is payable were already frozen, and in her budget the chancellor extended the freeze for another year, until April 2031.

The standard IHT rate is 40%, and it is charged only on the part of the estate that is above the tax-free threshold, which is £325,000. (There is a separate threshold for homes.)

The exemption for spouses or civil partners will continue to apply, so everything can be left to them without an IHT bill.

Gifting sums is a good way to cut or avoid inheritance tax. There is even an allowance that lets you hand tax-free gifts to people getting married. Photograph: Adrian Sherratt/Alamy

The extension of the current thresholds makes it all the more important to consider the value of your estate – especially as April 2027 will bring unspent pensions into the IHT net.

One way to reduce the bill is to make financial gifts while you are still alive, althoughthe financial adviser RBC Brewin Dolphin says its recent survey found that 73% of well-off individuals had never done so. “Our advice … is to start the process of gifting as soon as possible,” it says.

There are various allowances you can use to give tax-free gifts. For example, you can give away assets or cash worth up to £3,000 in a tax year without them being added to the value of your estate. And the small gift allowance lets you give as many gifts of up to £250 a person as you want each tax year (as long as you haven’t used another allowance on the same person). There is also an allowance that lets you give tax-free gifts to people getting married.

Meanwhile, the “potentially exempt transfer” rules allow you to give money or gifts of any amount or value to anyone, which will become exempt from IHT as long as you live for seven years after giving them.

5. Weigh up mansion tax

The new high-value council tax surcharge – the “mansion tax” – will hit owners of properties in England worth more than £2m. This charge will start at £2,500 a year, rising to £7,500 a year for homes worth more than £5m.

The new tax (which will sit alongside council tax) will be based on property values in 2026 rather than now, and won’t take effect until 2028. The Treasury says fewer than 1% of properties in England are expected to be above the £2m threshold.

The fact the new tax doesn’t come in until April 2028 has negatives and positives. On the downside, that is two-and-a-half years of uncertainty for owners of, and prospective buyers of, higher-value homes.

The new ‘mansion tax’ will start at £2,500 a year for homes worth £2m+, rising to £7,500 a year for homes worth more than £5m. Photograph: Jeff Gilbert/Alamy

Analysts at Morningstar say they are expecting a 5% to 10% “correction” (fall) in the prices of high-value properties, and some impact on homes a little below the £2m mark – which might at least alleviate the worries of some owners who are keen to stay put.

On the plus side, those who might be affected have a lot of time to consider their options.

Some owners will decide to ride it out and set some money aside to pay the tax, but the most obvious way to avoid it is to bring forward any plans to downsize. Moving home attracts lots of costs – not least stamp duty – so if avoiding the mansion tax is your only motive, you need to do your sums first.

It might not be as easy to move as you hope – the new tax means “you have to question who’s going to want to try to buy these properties”, says Chris Ball at the wealth management firm Hoxton Wealth.

If you are approaching the £2m threshold you may want to keep a lid on the value of your property. The HomeOwners Alliance suggests many owners of £1m-plus homes will hold back on making improvements to avoid being pushed over the threshold in future years. So perhaps this will swing the balance against “non-essential” work such as getting the loft converted or a conservatory added.