Best Savings Account

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Last Updated: Sunday, 21 November 2021 03:58
Published: Tuesday, 01 September 2020 23:08
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Savings Accounts:

As of Sept, 2020, best savings rate is 1.1%. Best savings rate is 2.20% (as of Nov, 2019):

Usually I do not plan to keep more than $50K in savings account as then it's better to put it in 6-12 month CD which offers 0.5% more than this (you would make $200 more per year after taxes in CD account compared to savings account with a 0.5% interest difference on balance of $50K). Savings bank rates have been dropping since Jan, 2019, so better to put money in CD or rewards checking accounts.

Update: Sept, 2020: CD rates have all gone below 1%, so the only option right now to park any money is in Kasasa Accounts (explained later below)

This is the most up to date link for best savings account: https://www.doctorofcredit.com/high-interest-savings-to-get/

You can find the list of best rates nationwide as well as for your region in link above.

 

2021:

  • UPDATE (Nov, 2021): Affiliated Bank: The bank listed below, recently lowered their savings rate to 0.75% from 1%, so no reason to keep any money in their savings account, as T-mobile checking gives 1% on all of your balance.

 

2020:

UPDATE (July, 2020): With FED dropping interest rates to 0%, and as explained in Checking accounts section, there is no hope to get any return in any kind of bank accounts. Savings rate have declined to below 1% even at the best banks. Most banks have dropped it to under 0.5% (including banks which had a long history of never dropping the rates below 1%).

As per doctor of credit link above, there are only 2 banks which are offering over 1% savings rate nationwide - National Cooperative and Customers bank (both have 1.1% interest rate as of Sept, 2020). You can look up them on their website - they keep changing constantly, so i won't count on these banks to be maintaining their high interest rates once they have amassed enough deposit money.

I'm listing 3 other regional banks below. I'll mostly be listing Kasasa Saving accounts below, as it's impossible to find Non-Kasasa Checking or savings account that can offer you these high rates.

  • SSB Bank: https://www.ssbpgh.com/saver
    • As mentioned in "Checking accounts section", SSB also has "Kasasa Savers" account which gives you 1.5% interest on up to $100K as long as you meet their Kasasa Checking account requirements. i.e there is no separate requirement for Kasasa Savings account.

 

  • First Security Bank: https://www.1stsecuritybank.com/personal/savings/kasasa_saver/
    • As mentioned in "Checking accounts section", First Security also has "Kasasa Savers" account which gives you 1.31% interest on up to $50K as long as you meet their Kasasa Checking account requirements. i.e there is no separate requirement for Kasasa Savings account.

 

  • Keesler Federal Credit Union: https://www.kfcu.org/rates/
    • As mentioned in "Checking accounts section", Keesler also has "Kasasa Saver Qualified" account which gives you 1% interest on up to $150K as long as you meet their Kasasa Checking account requirements. i.e there is no separate requirement for Kasasa Savings account.
    • Other account that may be worth opening is High Interest Money Market (HIMMA) Plus account. It pays 1.45% interest on $100K+. However, this higher interest is only for 6 months from date of account opening. Then it reverts back to their standard rates which is lot lower. So, you would open it for just 6 months, keep your money there and then close it at end of 6 months. May not be worth it, unless it's for a year.

 

  •  Affiliated Bank: https://www.affiliatedbank.com/personal/accounts/checking/kasasa-cash/
    • As mentioned in "Checking accounts section", they are offering Kasasa Cash savings account also in which they offer 1% for upto $200K, as long as you meet their Kasasa Checking account requirements. i.e there is no separate requirement for Kasasa Savings account.
    • Again, based on their history of lowering rates significantly, they may not be reliable long term.

2019

  • United Bank = 2.5% - The only Bank I found so far which gives you free checks + ATM card (not a debit card, so not that great for taking cash out at shops) is united bank with highest interest rate of 2.2% (upped to 2.5% in Fe, downgraded to 2.2% as of July,2019) on money market account. You have to call them to get this rate, telling them that you saw this rate online in an advertisement. It appears on their website using this link, but not directly: https://www.bankatunited.com/Landing/Advantage-Money-Market .
  • EBSB Direct: 2.5% - They had this offer for some time, but pulled it back a couple of days ago. Offer keeps on coming and going. No checks or debit cards, online setup is difficult, but eventually worked (was told by a rep to use EBSB  - and NOT EBSB direct - website for logging in, even though you do initial setup and everything on EBSB Direct website).
  • Some investment firms are offering high savings rate, but it's tied to Fed rate, so, when fed drops rate, their rates drop as well. Ex: wealthfront, betterment, etc. However, these a/c do require you to jump hoops, to get your money withdrawn. Since log term direction of fed rates is to keep going lower, I do not see any value in these.
  • Misc banks: Many offer good rates, but they have withdrawal limits per day and per month, do not give you checks or ATM card, so only way to get your money back is bank to bank transfer. This account becomes more like CD since once you put money in, with all the limits and no debit card or checks, it will take you couple of months to get all your money out. One such example is: Customers Bank. Some banks do a hard credit pull (which affects your credit score, and also each credit pull should earn you $300 or more, or else you can open a credit card and get that $300 for each credit pull. So, definitely not worth at all to open accounts at banks, that do hard pull). One such example is: Northfield Bank.