CD Rates

[rpow53]

I have mine and DW roths in cd's with fidelity and they are maturing at the end of this month. where is the best place to have cd's at this time. I don't want to put them into mutual funds at this time. we have enough in funds for the time being.

 

[wildcat]

Hmm, why not roll into more CDs if you don't intend to invest the money? As for me, I never seem to have enough funds.

Edit - Ok, I thought you were asking where else to put the money in terms of asset classes. Yeah FWF, Bank blogspot, Emoneycentral and Bankrate are all pretty good.

 

[twaddle]

I believe Countrywide is offering pretty good rates. Are you feeling lucky?

Here's a continuously updated thread at FatWallet:

CD Thread, Post The Best Rates You Can Find Here!

 

[Leonidas]

I have mine and DW roths in cd's with fidelity and they are maturing at the end of this month. where is the best place to have cd's at this time. I don't want to put them into mutual funds at this time. we have enough in funds for the time being.

I think that the general agreement here is that Bankrate.com (Compare mortgage rates, home loans, CD rates, auto loans, credit cards, mortgages and more) is good source for rate info. You may also want to check around locally, or with your credit union. My CU has never shown up in a rate search at bankrate.com. but its rates often meet the best/better rates I've found on the bankrate website.

 

[LOL!]

I wish to second the idea of looking locally as well. I'll give an example. You never would think that WellsFargo would have a decent CD rate, but I noticed a new branch office going in outside of town in a growing area. In order to attract depositors, they advertised an excellent rate for a 5-month CD with a big sign. The rate would have put them on that fatwallet list.

I cannot imagine that a Fidelity broker-sold CD would be monetarily worse than what you could get elsewhere. My spouse buys CD in her IRA at TDAmeritrade. Rates are not as good as at Vanguard, but the difference at the end of the year is probably less than $20.

 

[Nords]

My CU has never shown up in a rate search at bankrate.com. but its rates often meet the best/better rates I've found on the bankrate website.

If you can meet Navy Federal Credit Union's eligibility requirements, they've just ended a 10-month 5.83% $10K CD (6% APY) and they may bring something back later in the year. It's worth checking their website every few weeks.

Navy Federal: Rates

Pentagon Federal Credit Union (which anyone can join with a one-time donation to a military family support organization) is also offering three-year CDs at 5%.

https://www.penfed.org/productsAndRates/checkingAndSavings/moneyMarketCertificates.asp

 

[calmloki]

6% of any interest? Local credit union with a gooood rate for a little while yet. 'Course you need to be the right kind of Oregonian.
https://www.onpointcu.com/welcome.html

 

[VoyT]

I'd third the idea of banking locally ... we've gotten to know our branch manager, and she's been willing to match rates with competing banks. Never hurts to ask...

 

[DallasGuy]

Another web site with CD rates

Here's another web site that I've gotten some good CD rates from:

Highest rates and yields on bank certificates of deposit (CDs) updated daily by money-rates.com.

The bankrate.com one mentioned above is also a good one.

 

[Leonidas]

That 6% APY special looks attractive. Unfortunately I think I’m outside the zone on membership. I never joined the NFCU while I was on active duty – mostly because I believed that a Corporal’s pay should just be deposited directly into his account at the NCO club or the civilian bar of his choice. While I was in the reserves they tried to get us to join, but by then I was a member of the police credit union and in those days before ATM cards it just made a lot more sense to have a nearby physical place I could go get cash from 5 days a week.

I don’t recall my credit union ever offering specials on CDs. They do auto loan specials all the time, but never anything on savings products. So, I decided to check out NFCU and PennFed to see what their regular rates were like. I was very surprised to see that my itty bitty local credit union has better rates.

1 year CD Rates (APY)
PennFed – 4.34% ($1,000 min)
NFCU – 5.05% ($1,000 min)
My CU – 5.44% ($1,000 min)

Regular Savings Rates (APY)
PennFed – 1.2% $5 min
NFCU – 1.41% $5 min
My CU – 1.51% $5 min (with 2.02% on balances of $2,500 or greater)

*NFCU had a ton of “member specials” that were too many to go through, but some of them (like that 6% APY) looked pretty good. If you keep you eye on their site I think you could pick up some nice rates every now and then.

My first thought was that the really big credit unions should have had better deals. I guess I was thinking of something along the lines of economies of scale. And PennFed and NFCU are huge compared to my CU:

PennFed – 775,000 members / $9,000,000,000+ assets
NFCU – 2,911,395 members / $30,016,926,000 assets
My CU - 25,025 members / $286,700,000 assets

Size, apparently, does not give an advantage.

Is it a question of overhead? Both PennFed and NFCU have many more locations (spread out across the world) as opposed to a main office and two branches located inside one city.

Or is it a question of the business model. Do their memberships have a higher default rate on loan products?

Is it exclusivity of membership? PennFed has a lot fewer members than NFCU, but the rates at NFCU are better. The membership at PennFed seems a lot less exclusive than NFCU, and my CU is even more so. There are a lot of so-called "community credit unions" that have huge memberships and their rates stink. Some of the smaller, more exclusive community credit unions have better rates - but the best rates seem to belong to those CUs that have membership based solely on a single employer and immediate family members of those employees. None of this is the product of exhaustive research, just some cruising around of different websites.

 

[OAG]

Check out National Credit Union Administration -Downloadable Data, Graphics, and Software for a lot of data on all Credit Unions.

 

[twaddle]

I'm surprised nobody has commented on the 10% CD from the FatWallet thread I posted.

BRIDGEVIEW BANK | 90/10 CD

Short-term CDs don't excite me, but if you're looking for a "bonus"....

 

[OAG]

BRIDGEVIEW BANK: I went there but I could not find anything about FDIC insurance. Also you must open a Checking Account with a direct deposit. Got a few strings attached. When I googled them I read some stuff, while some looked a bit outdated, makes me a bit cautious.

 

[KB]

At the very bottom of their website, it has 'Member FDIC'. The name in the same section is Bridgeview Bank Group.

 

[OAG]

At the very bottom of their website, it has 'Member FDIC'. The name in the same section is Bridgeview Bank Group.

Now I see it -- must be going blind in my old age.