Online only banks

M

Muskrat

Senior Member
Location
Mainly arizona
Anyone use banks that have no “brick and Mortar” presence? I just made myself open an account at Discover bank as their high yield savings interest rate is over 3 percent. Do not know how I feel about this yet
 

MY estranged husband uses one, and he's very happy with the yield.. I'm still not fully trusting of them yet.

That said, so many of our Bricks and mortar banks are closing very fast, that soon we'll have no choice ...
 

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Discover sounds good to me...have had a card for many years. Don't know about the other ones. A lot of them could probably be pump and dump banks...lol. Guess as long as they pay you the interest its ok.
 
Liberty said:
Does anyone here use "only" an online bank in place of a local bricks & mortar bank? If so, how do you like it?
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Yes, I do. It seems better than the regular kind in some ways.

Some people might still need a physical place, e.g., for safety deposit box or night deposit. But many don't.

I still have accounts with the old brick and mortar bank, because I haven't had a reason to close them. But the nearest branch is hundreds of kilometers away, so it might as well be a virtual bank.
 
i have used Chime for about the past six months now just so I had another account linked up with my Paypal account and I have no issues.
 
I use three banks. One for business accounts (branch was located close to our warehouse), one for personal checking (branch very close to our house), and an exclusively online bank for savings and CDs because it offers very good rates and my money is FDIC insured, same as brick and mortar bank accounts.

As necessary, I transfer money to and from the online bank to my personal checking account. Funds are available in my local bank within 2-3 business days of my initiating the transfer.
 
Hubby and I have had a savings account with Ally for many years. We get great service when we need to take money out and no fees. It only take a day or 2 to transfer the money into our checking account at our local bank. Right now our savings is earning almost 4%. We also have a local bank for our retirement money to be deposited into each month.
 
We prefer a physical presence or at least a dedicated bank ATM.
Since Covid, only used a physical local bank for a rental property sale.

Chase Bank: regular daily banking. Wife's account.
I use nearly CU and Savings bank. Walkable distances and they have local branches, ATMs.
otherwise, not a high priority.

Investigating CD's
BECU: 3.55% -12mo.
PennFed (banner ad this thread) 4.6%-12mo, 4.1%-36mo.
Luther Burbank Fed Saving @4%, CD (local office)
CapitalOne @5%, CD. We have a CapOne "cafe" nearby-I need to investigate this.
Wealthfront @4%, Passbook/checking. Son put some of our excess cash into this. (online only)
FirstTech Fed CU @4% checking up to $15k; @4.5% share certificate, 13mo, bump up. Even closer to me, walk distance. Had an account with them 40 years ago. (local office)
 
Here in Toronto I have 2 accounts with the Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce. One is a checking account, the other is a Investor Edge stock trading account. I have not been inside of my "home branch " for at least 5 years. Everything is done on line, including my TSX trading on a daily basis. I can transfer funds from one account to the other in about 30 seconds, 24/7. In Canada there are a couple of "On line only banks " one of which is Tangerine. I have not used ant of them. In order to be called a "Charted Bank in Canada, they need to have branches in all parts of our country. The CBIC for example has more than 1,100 branches across Canada, and a further 11,780 ATM"s. JimB.
 
I never want to go to the physical bank so virtual ones suit me just fine!

A few months ago, I moved from one virtual bank (Credit Karma) to another (Sagewell Financial) because Sagewell is retirement-focused. They charge a small monthly fee but they give like a 4.4-ish% interest rate on deposits and a retirement expert and discounts at a large list of stores just by using their debit card. They say they can also negotiate your monthly bills to a lower rate but I have not tried that yet. So far so good, I am going to have them round up and consolidate my various retirement accounts soon and the expert has been really helpful so far.

I was thinking about posting about it, but I wasn't sure if that is allowed?
 
Muskrat said:
Anyone use banks that have no “brick and Mortar” presence? I just made myself open an account at Discover bank as their high yield savings interest rate is over 3 percent. Do not know how I feel about this yet
Click to expand...
Yes, we have and had no problems so far with them. Like you say, interest rates can be better at those banks. We also have a brick and mortar band and credit union we use locally.
 
Hub can't see having the local bank and then an online one too. We use the brokerage for whatever we don't get at the local bank. Schwab is a bank, too.
 
Liberty said:
Does anyone here use "only" an online bank in place of a local bricks & mortar bank? If so, how do you like it?
Click to expand...
i dont have a bank local to me , so all online , but if i need to pay a check in, or draw a large amount of cash out my local post office will do it .......
 
My 'online' financials are managed by a 75 YO investment conglomerate. Everything under one umbrella headquartered in New England. Pension/SS/debit-credit-ATM/investments,,,etc, every conceivable financial program offered by anyone & I've never set foot in their building & never paid one dime in fees or charges.
 
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Liberty said:
Does anyone here use "only" an online bank in place of a local bricks & mortar bank? If so, how do you like it?
Click to expand...
Yes. I've used Ally Bank for 3 years. Never a problem. My mother used it, too.

Synchrony Bank, which my mother also used, had terrible customer service. I will never use them.
 
@WheatenLover, have not seen you in a while. How are things going there. Did your son get moved? Have you got all the dogs under control? How are you feeling and your cousin, is he doing okay?
 

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