Chase Direct Deposit Requirements Changing February 8th

For those of you with a free Chase Checking account, be sure to make a note of the changes coming up on February 8th. Previously to avoid the $6 monthly fee on the account, you only needed to have 1 direct deposit post to your account for any amount each month. Unfortunately as of February 8th, that is changing.

The current posily states that you must have at least one direct deposit per month of at least $500 post to your account. They also go on to say that two or more smaller deposits that add up to $500 or more do not qualify. As always the direct deposit may include a payroll, pension or government benefit payment, such as Social Security.

A lot of people that opened a free chase account for their popular $100-$150 bonuses may want to decide if they want to keep them open. If this is your primary checking account then this is no big issue, but for those of you that use it as a secondary really need to decide if they want to increase that direct deposit to $500 per month to avoid fees.

I am seeing more and more articles that say other banks are soon to follow Chase’s lead. With the new banking regulation passed last year, banks are looking for other ways to generate revenue and upping the requirements of free accounts seems to be a popular way to do so.

Expiring: $50 Tradeking Promo

The January 2011 Tradeking promotion is expiring on Monday January 31st 2011. If you are interested in opening an account and would also like getting a $50 bonus when doing so, then now is the time to open an account with them.

Don’t forget that all you need to do is open an account with $2500 and execute one trade. Once that is complete you will get a $50 bonus that you can use for future investments.

For more details checkout the Tradeking Bonus page.

$20 Amazon.com Gift Card for $10

Ok, this is a simple one. Living Social, a group discount retailer similiar to Groupon, is offering a $20 Amazon gift card for $10. All you have to do is buy it with no hoops to jump through. Free money doesn’t get any more free than this, unless of course it was just given to you!!!

Another perk is that if you get 3 friends to buy, the the card then becomes free for you.

I am sure this deal won’t last long, so get in while you still can!

Stay Away from Make Money Online Scams

Ok, after getting numerous emails about opportunities to make money online, here is my response: AVOID THEM ALL. You can’t go anywhere online these days without seeing an add to work from home or make thousands of dollars by using your PC. The truth is that most of these programs are just teaching you to sell what you just bought and make a commission off of it.

Take for example all of the books that claim to help you win the lottery. Don’t you think the people writing the books should just use their tactics and win the lottery? Then they wouldn’t have to sell books! All those late night infomercials to sell real estate and retire early? Come on! If that is the case then why aren’t all realtors rich and retired?

Sure there are legitimate ways to make money on the Internet, but like any other job it takes time, patience and money to get going. For example, this blog. It took me over a year before I even saw any money coming in and over a year and a half before the money coming in paid for the costs to keep it going. Now it is doing very well, but had I been impatient back in the beginning and quit, I would have never come this far.

A lot of people drop their hard earned cash to try to get rich quick. Trust me, I am one of them. I tried the whole Clickbank marketplace, selling eBooks, eBay stores, etc. All of these were started by purchasing something from a person that said I could make thousands of dollars a day, well guess what, it was more like losing hundreds a month.

If you are determined to try an online business, my advice to you is to start a blog and write about what interests you. Don’t get all caught up in the ads and how to monetize it. Once you are established and start getting people coming to your site, you will be amazed at how easy it will be to make some extra money from it.

But I couldn’t end this post if I didn’t ask, if you have found a get rich quick scheme that actually works, let me know!!!

Tradeking Releases iPhone and BlackBerry Apps for Mobile Trading

With all the discount brokers out there, other than commissions which are all relatively close to each other, they need to distinguish themselves through their feature sets. Well Tradeking has done just that. They have  just released their new iPhone app. This application allows you to do the following within your account:

• Trade Stocks and Options
• Check Account Activity
• Get up to date quotes and charts
• Follow the latest news

The Blackberry App which was released earlier also offers the same features. There is an Android Tradeking App, as well as an iPad Tradeking app on the way. Now there is no excuse for you to not be able to sell that falling stock. You have to admit it is great to have such real time access to your portfolio. Remember those days where by the time you called your broker and your stock trade was actually executed, you missed out on making a fortune?

Don’t forget that there is currently a $50 Tradeking Promo going on if you are interested in opening an account and get a little bonuis.

January 2011 Hot Brokerage Promos

Since the market has turned around a bit many of the online brokerage sites are offering promos to get you to open an account. Now is not a bad time to start investing since the market is still of its highs from last year but seems to be rebounding a bit. Sure we still may be in for a rocky ride, but if you are investing in the long term, now is the perfect time to get going. If you have some extra money to invest I suggest you look at one of these promos prior to signing up with anyone.

Here are a few of the current ones going on:

• Tradeking Promo – Get $50 when opening a new Tradeking account (see post for more details)
• ETrade IRA Promo – Open an ETrade IRA and get 100 free trades. (See post for more details)
• Zecco Promo – Zecco brokerage gives you Get 10 free stock trades every month if you $25,000 balance or make 25 paid trades each month. Otherwise the commission is only $4.50 / trade which is one of the lowest out there. (See more details here
• OptionsXpress Promo – OptionsXpress is giving away $100 when you open a new account with them. (See post for more details)
• Firstrade Promo – Firstrade is giving away 5 free trade when you open a new account. (See post for more details)

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