Where to stash your cash? ~ Champagne Living

Monday, May 25, 2009

Where to stash your cash?

This morning I turned on my computer to check out how my money was doing in this very iffy economy. I try to keep very close tabs on who is going to give me the best interest rates and I move accounts accordingly. If I'm truly going to live the good life for less, then I need to maximize whatever money I have.

I generally use a few online money portals just to compare CD rates and High Yield Savings and Checking accounts. While we were away I read an interesting article that came in a mailer that I had received about shopping for a bank online. Included in the article was a website that I hadn't heard of before called Money Aisle.

I figured I'd give it a whirl and see what it came up with. Because I don't just want to LIVE RICH, I want to BE RICH as well.

Money Aisle is set up in an auction format that allows banks to BID on your business, whether you're looking for a great CD rate or a High-Yield Savings account. It's a very simple process.

Pick Your Product

Select your financial product (CD or High-Yield Savings), the amount of money you wish to invest and, if you're investing in a CD, the maturity duration.
Once the information is entered, click the "Start Auction!" button.

Banks Bid Live

Within seconds, MoneyAisle generates a live auction among the participating banks for your business.
MoneyAisle captures the highest rate offered by these banks and then repeats the process to see if any other participating banks will beat it. Each auction round pushes the rate higher.
This process is repeated as many times as necessary until one bank is left. If two or more banks tie for the winning bid, MoneyAisle will break the tie on a random basis. The winning bank's rate is the highest rate offered during your auction. The entire live process typically takes only a couple of minutes.
You watch the auction live and see the number of rounds, the number of bids and the increasingly higher rate appear in real-time.

Get A Great Rate!

You get the highest rate available on our platform at that moment for your CD or High-Yield Savings account.
If you are satisfied with the rate and wish to complete the transaction, provide your contact information and accept the rate. If you received the rate by running a Test-Drive auction, you can register for an account to accept the rate.
Once you've entered your contact information, a representative from the winning bank will contact you about opening your CD or High-Yield Savings account. If the bank supports online account opening, we will give you the option to go directly to their online platform.

All CDs are FDIC insured and when I plugged my information in, there were a total of 97 banks competing for my business. You can WATCH as the banks bid in real time! Money Aisle has had some GREAT PRESS lately - including The NY Times, The Wall Street Journal, and USA Today. They are endorsed by quite a few State Banking Associations as well.

I'm not expecting to be able to grab those rates of 10% that we had during the 80's & 90's, but I still want to to get the MOST for my money in order to enjoy the good life. That way I'll have a little extra to do some traveling, shopping and pampering!