ETrade Complete Savings Up To 3.30%

ETrader raised their interest rates on their complete savings account from 3.15% to 3.30% yesterday. This isn’t a huge increase, but it is good to see an upward trend in interest rates on high yield savings and checking accounts

I currently use this account for my emergency fund. I recommend it to those of you that need a place to store some cash at a good interest rate. The account links to your checking accounts via ACH and it is very easy to move money back and forth.

You can still get a $25 bonus for openening the account with one dollar. See my bonus post for details.

Xbox 360 Price Cut

If you are like me and are waiting for the Xbox 360 to approach a more reasonable price before you buy, July 6th might be a good day for you.

According to this photo that was released, K-Mart already is starting to advertise the price drop. The photo, of a K-Mart newspaper circular, shows the Xbox 360 20GB console with a $299.99 price. That is a $50 drop of the current price of $349.99 for that console.

The thought is that they will be dropping the price of the Arcade and Elite consoles, but nothing has been seen in the wild yet.

Is $50 enought to get me to buy? Not sure yet, but after hearing about the new Deadliest Catch Xbox 360 Game, I may have to do it!

IRS Mileage Rates Going Up

With the freakish increase in gas prices, it only makes sense that the IRS gets moving and ups irs mileage allowance

They are increasing the irs mileage rate from 50.5 cents per mile to 58.5 cents per mile. The increased irs mileage rates covers miles driven from July 1, 2008, through Dec. 31, 2008. That looks to be a 16% increase. And gas prices have increased over 50%, what a great deal! Yes that is sarcasm you are reading. This just looks to be one more way that we have to carry cost increases on our shoulder while the government provides little help.

Obviously the Mileage Reimbursement is only for people that drive for work or use their vehicle for things other than personal driving, but please make a note of it since you can be losing out on a couple of bucks if you are still expenseing at the 50.5 cents rate.

And due to the great idea to have a .005 on milage, make sure you always drive an even number of miles to get that extra .005 back! These days, you should take everything you can get!

High Yield Checking Accounts

In hopes of getting people to add more money in their accounts, you are seeing an increasing trend of local banks creating High Yield Checking Accounts, also referred to as Reward Checking Accounts.

A High Yield Checking Account is pretty much the same as a regular checking account, but it tends to offer a very high interest rate if you meet certain criteria each month.

For example, I currently have a High Yield Checking Account with my local bank. I am earning 5% interest on my balance (up to $100,000) if I do the following every month:

• Use my debit card for 10 purchases (not ATM withdrawals)
• Have at least 1 direct deposit
• Receive my statement electronically

If I don’t meet those requirements the APY becomes .05%. So you can see that it is important that each month I don’t miss out on the 5%.

Since I have direct deposit of my paycheck and get my statement via their online banking interface. The only real challenge for me to meet the requirements is the 10 debit card purchases a month. There are many ways to do this easily, such as pay your cell phone bill online 10 times for small amounts. By 10 $.99 MP3’s from Itunes or Amazon.com

The thought behind all of this is that it is cheaper for the banks if you use your debit card rather then checks. You can still use checks but I think they think they you will tend to use the debit card more once you get used to it. It also saves the banks quite a bit by not having to mail out statements to everyone as well.

Since I opened this account, I don’t even use my savings account anymore since 5% APY is higher than any savings account that I can find. Most large banks like Chase, Bank of America, etc do not offer these. They still trap you in with the $50 bonuses then just give you < 1% on your money. If you are interested, check with the small local banks in your area, these accounts are popping up all over and you are bound to find one.

Here is a good resource for a list of banks that offer High Yield Checking Accounts. It is a little out of date so you may need to call the bank to get the full details.

Amex Blue Cash Gas Discount

I have been receiving many questions about the Gas Discount that you receive with the American Express Blue Cash card. I wanted to take some time to explain how it works since there are some things you need to think about.

This card gives you a cash rebate on everything that you buy. There are different cash back rates depending on where you shop. There is also a tiered rate depending on how much you spend.

Here is how it works. When your total spending with the card for the year is less than $6500 you get the following cash back rates:

Purchases at supermarkets, gas stations, and drug stores: 1%
All other purchases: 0.5%

Once you pass $6500 in spending the rates increase:

Purchases at supermarkets, gas stations, and drug stores: 5%
All other purchases: 1.5%

The question you need to ask yourself is do you think you will hit that $6500 spending early enough in the year so that you will start getting the 5% back on supermarkets, gas stations, and drug stores. The spending requirement is annual based on your anniversary date. So if you signed up for the card in May, you have until May 2009 to hit that $6500 to bump yourself up to the next rebate tier. In May 2009 your rebate is paid out and the spending requirement resets it self.

Once you get there it is pretty powerfull since if you use this when buying gas that is $4 / gallon you are only paying $3.80 / gallon. The rebate is added to your account and is paid out as a credit to your bill on your anniversary date.

I hope that this clears up some confusion as to how the rebate works. My wife and I use the Blue Cash card for all purchases that will take a credit card and even pay bills such as cell phone, cable, etc. This allows us to hit the $6500 spending threshold quickly and then we enjoy the 5% discount on gas, groceries and drug store purchases for the rest of the year.

If you are a big spender you might think about getting the Blue Cash card. Every little bit helps, especially since gas prices are out of control so a 5% Gas Discount is worth it.

HSBC Savings at 3.5% APY

HSBC has raised the interest rate on it’s Online Savings Account to 3.5%. This rate is good through August 15th 2008.

There is no minimum balance requirement and you need to open the account with at least $1. You also get a free ATM card and free ATM withdrawls at and HSBC ATM. Just make sure to look at ATM fees on the machine you are using if you are using a non HSBC ATM. HSBC also has an ACH feature where you can push and pull money from your Online Savings account to other bank accounts that you may have. You can also set up scheduled transfers if you want to save money over time without having to log in and make the transfer each time.

I currently have most of my cash in this account and am very happy with it. If you have some cash sitting at low interst rates, this is great rate compared to everyone else.

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