I FOUND THE 5 WORST BANK ACCOUNTS EVER

[Music] What's up you guys? It's Graham here. So, get ready! We're in for quite the video today because so far on this channel, I have only covered the best bank accounts out there. I'm talking about the banks without any fees, offering you nothing but free services, giving you signup bonuses, and even doing that while paying you a 2% interest rate.

However, I think we've gotten a little spoiled lately because sometimes you don't realize how good we have it until we go into the depths of the underworld to get a slight glimpse into the bad. That's right! I've scoured through dozens and dozens of banks, read pages upon pages of fine print, and almost threw up a few times from all of the excessive fees. But I have found what I believe to be the five worst bank accounts in existence that should be avoided at all costs.

Now, I don't want to warn everyone that this video might be slightly upsetting to some of our more sensitive viewers who don't like excessive fees and don't like losing money because that's exactly what we're gonna be exposing today. Not to mention all of the hidden fees that took me way too long to find because they love to bury that stuff at the bottom of the page and the fine print, and nobody reads that except for me.

All I ask in return if you appreciate all of the grueling hours of research and 20 cent iced coffee that went into making a video like this is just a gentle tap of the like button from the YouTube algorithm and also a subscribe if you haven't done that already. I post three videos a week, and in each of those videos, I ask you to hit the like button. So anyway, with that said, let's begin the video.

So, we're gonna start with the first bank that I really wish was not on this list, but I cannot give any bank special treatment just because they like some of their products and that would be Chase Bank. So here's why this really pains me to mention, and that's because the Chase Sapphire Reserved is one of my favorite credit cards of all time. Not to mention that Chase has some of the best credit cards currently on the market with some really good rewards. I also have two mortgages with Chase Bank, and they gave me a really good interest rate at the time I applied. Not to mention that Chase Private Client is a phenomenal service with a lot of free perks when you have more than two hundred and fifty thousand dollars with them.

However, I gotta say it and I got to call them out for this because to me, their actual bank account is just bad. I don't even know where to begin, so let's just start here. If you go and open up a checking account with them, they're gonna be giving you the gift that just keeps on giving, and that would be a twelve dollar monthly maintenance fee. Of course, like most banks, this monthly maintenance fee is waived if you enable direct deposit, keep a daily balance of about $1,500, or keep an average balance of $5,000 between this and other linked accounts.

Although what really gets me is that every now and then, I'll forget to transfer a little bit of extra money into that Chase Bank checking account to pay my mortgage, and it might temporarily drop just below the $1,500 requirement. Well, guess what? The next day, I am hit with a lovely $12 monthly maintenance fee! It's almost like Chase Bank just sits there and waits, salivating for the moment my account temporarily and accidentally drops below $1,500 just so that they can swiftly extract $12 more from my account.

But no, it doesn't stop there. If you scroll down just a little bit more, you'll read that other miscellaneous fees apply. Click on that, and you'll see that that includes a two dollar and fifty cent ATM fee within the U.S. for any non-Chase ATMs, a $34 overdraft fee, a $35 wire transfer fee if you want to send money out, a $15.00 wire transfer fee from money coming in, a $30 stop payment request on checks, $8 per cashier's check, and $2.00 per page if you want additional checks printed at the branch. But no, that's not even the worst part. It's the interest, or lack thereof.

Here's how bad it is. Let's start with your checking account. In addition to the monthly maintenance fee of $12, you will be enjoying the interest rate of... wait a second, I can't seem to find it shown anywhere on their main page. I wonder why? Wait a second! That's because on their basic checking account, they don't even give you interest! Okay, got it. In order to get any interest at all, you need to join their Premier Plus Checking. Oh, so fancy! Now, in order to upgrade yourself to this elite level, you're either going to need to pay a $25 monthly maintenance fee or keep $15,000 or more in your accounts or have a link to a Chase mortgage enrolled in automatic payments from your Chase account.

Oh, and you're also going to be able to earn actual interest. So, let's see how great this is. If you... moments later... okay, so you can earn 0.01% regardless of how much money you have. Now, just to put that into perspective, if you have $10,000 sitting in the account, you're going to be earning 83 cents per month in interest. Honestly, I think you're better off just walking around the streets picking up loose change at that point.

Though surely their savings accounts are gonna be a lot better than this, right? No, wrong. Now, to start, for the monthly maintenance, we have five dollars per month on their savings accounts. You actually get the privilege of earning interest. Now, obviously, there are some simple ways to get around that five dollars a month. Let's see just how much money Chase Bank is gonna be paying you for a savings account. Oh, so it's the exact same as the checking account! Got it.

So now let's step it up a little bit and say that you want to be a big baller and either spend twenty-five dollars a month as a maintenance fee or keep fifteen thousand dollars in combined account balances. You can enjoy the relationship rates! Nice! Although I gotta admit that's a pretty bad relationship. To me, this is the type of relationship you want to leave immediately because there are so many red flags, like getting 0.09 percent in interest if you have more than two hundred and fifty thousand dollars. Come on! For a quarter million dollars, you should be calling me up every morning wishing me a great day at the office, not slapping me in the face with 0.09 percent interest.

Anyway, I think it's safe to say that for me, Chase Bank is pretty disappointing, and I wish I didn't have to say that because they do have some really great services and features out there with their credit cards and their mortgages. It's just I feel like their bank account itself to me is lacking, and unfortunately, it does get worse than this.

Now this is yet another one I wish I didn't have to include in this video, but I gotta give you my honest opinion. I can't play favorites here, and that would be Bank of America. Now, in their defense, they do have a very great credit card for people just starting out and building their credit, and that would be the Bank of America Cash Rewards Card. They also have really great mortgage rates. I financed one of my properties through them, and they were nothing but spectacular.

And one more thing I want to mention before I absolutely roast them is that their mobile app is really easy to use and their online website has just a phenomenal user interface that is very easy to use. But for me, the friendship ends there, and this is where I draw the line. Now, just like Chase Bank, it's really difficult to find all of the fees until you start digging below the surface because they love to wow you with colorful images of happy people, people sitting in really uncomfortable positions with a dude drinking a can that's obviously Diet Coke but they photoshopped the logo out, and they maybe hope that that will potentially distract you from noticing the $12 monthly maintenance fee.

Now of course, this is waived if you're a qualifying student under the age of 24, enable direct deposit, maintain the minimum $1,500 daily balance, or if you enroll in Preferred Rewards, which I will get into momentarily. But let's talk about the fees, which I think what you find will haunt you in your dreams forever. You'll find a $35 overdraft fee, a $30 wire transfer fee, a $15.00 incoming wire transfer fee, and a $15.00 cashier's check fee unless you are a Preferred Rewards customer or higher.

And even though they have a whole bunch of random fees on top of other random fees, at least those are waived if you become a Preferred Rewards customer, so that makes it just slightly better until you see the interest rates. Let's start here. Your normal checking account, the one you're going to be using all the time, pays no interest. Sorry to be the bearer of bad news, but if you want to earn some of that sweet, sweet interest, you'll need to sign up for their Bank of America interest checking account. But alas, something as glamorous as that does not come without a price, and that price is either $25 a month or a combined balance of $10,000 or more.

However, I couldn't find anything on their website about how much they actually pay in interest besides this business checking account that pays 0.01% on all balances. So let's move on to the savings accounts because this is where things get interesting. The regular savings account pays you a whopping 0.03 percent interest, but then let's say you got $20,000 to throw around, then you can join their Preferred Rewards. Ooh! And that means you could be a gold tier member that will give you 0.04 percent interest up to $50,000.

And if you have more than $50,000, you could join their platinum tier, which gets you 0.05 percent in interest. And then if you have more than $100,000, you could join their platinum honors tier and get 0.06 percent in interest. Needless to say, Bank of America is really great if you're a student, use their credit card, have a neat and easy to navigate website and app, and also want to scream every single night because of all of those excessive fees. But in terms of the actual bank account, to me, it's an absolute disaster.

But it still gets worse than this because that brings us to Wells Fargo, and there's certainly no stranger to controversy over the last few years. Now, full transparency here—not that I'm bitter or anything like that—but Wells Fargo has been one of the only bank accounts I have ever gone out of my way to go and cancel. So, typically, it's easy for me to keep $1,500 in an account just to keep it open and maintain that relationship with the bank in the event I ever want to get a mortgage with them. But nope, this one was just so bad that I could not keep it open.

Let's begin with the checking accounts, and I love on their website that they advertise you can open up an account with $25. Seems easy, right? After all, that is their most popular option! Except when you see that it comes with the $10 monthly maintenance fee unless you make 10 or more debit transactions, have qualified direct deposits totaling $500, or keep $1,500 minimum in the account. Which means if you don't read the fine print and only deposit $225, that is going to be gone in two and a half months just from the fees.

And then afterwards, if you forget about it and forget to deposit more money in the account, you're gonna be hit with a $35 overdraft fee, meaning your $25 initial deposit has now turned into a negative $30 balance by month three. But on the bright side, I do have to hand it to Wells Fargo. They did make these fees very apparent right on the front page instead of making me scroll through the entire website trying to find it. So for that, Wells Fargo, you get a thumbs up for the YouTube algorithm!

Besides that, though, while we're on this fine print page, you'll enjoy a lovely $15 wire transfer fee for incoming money, a $30 wire transfer fee for outgoing wires, a $10 fee for cashier's checks, and yeah, a lot of other fees—all without paying any interest. But now let's say you're too good for the regular checking account and you have $10,000 and you want to join the Preferred Checking account. That means you can enjoy no fees on cashier's checks, a $10 discount on personal style checks, and 0.01 percent interest on all balances above $500. Yikes!

But now, of course, I'm sure you're asking yourself, "But Graham, I don't have $10,000 to join the Preferred Checking. How can I still do this if I don't have $10,000?" Well, I had some good news because you're in luck! That is only going to be costing you $15 a month. You'll even get a platinum debit card with chip technology. Wow! Even though that comes standard on pretty much every single debit card ever these days. That's amazing that they include that for $15 a month or $10,000.

But now we're going to be discussing the top tier of Wells Fargo: the best of the best, as good as it gets—the Portfolio Checking account. Oh, sure, there's a $30 monthly maintenance fee or you need to keep $25,000 or more in your accounts. But of course, like they say, they do give you back favorable interest rates, which I guess is open to interpretation because their idea of favorable interest rates is paying 0.05% on balances above $5,000.

And of course, they reserve their best features for those who keep $250,000 or more in qualifying balances, and that includes no overdraft protection transfer fees. Except I'm reading that, and the first thing I could think of is: does someone actually need overdraft protection if they have $250,000 sitting in their bank account? Like, you're not overdrafting on anything if you got a quarter million dollars sitting in your bank account! Unless, of course, your custom Ferrari had too many options and it came to $251,000. Oops, stuff like that happens. So maybe actually this is a pretty useful feature.

Anyway, this bank to me takes the number three spot because the way I see it, their interest rates are just absolutely horrendous. But also, you get a bank that's settled five hundred and seventy million dollars for creating fake accounts, but that's none of my business. Then we have another one that just gets a little bit more absurd, and that would be US Bank. Not to mention, it looks like their website hasn't really been updated for at least a decade or two.

Now, to start, you have a few options if you want to bank with US Bank, and that begins with this Easy Checking account for $6.95 a month. But if you want to waive that, you'll need direct deposits totaling $1,000 or more or the usual $1,500 minimum account balance. And then they love to hit you with that additional $2 a month paper statement fee, which I have a feeling a lot of people might just forget to enroll in statements, which would waive that fee, and then just never get around to noticing that $2 monthly charge. Doesn't really sound all that easy to me, does it?

Now, in addition to that, you'll also have a $36 overdraft fee, which is higher than anything else that I mentioned in this video. They've also got a $20 wire transfer fee for incoming wires and a $30 wire fee for outgoing wires. Now, in terms of the interest you're gonna get for all of these fees, what interest? No, seriously though, their checking account pays nothing, and their standard savings account pays you 0.01% interest on all balances. But the good news is that for $14.95 a month, or if you open up a U.S. Bank personal loan or credit card, you can enjoy a savings account that pays you a whopping 0.04% all the way up to 0.07% if you have more than $500,000.

Okay, now that's kind of high, but if you have the Platinum Checking account, meaning you have more than $25,000 available or pay $24.95 per month, you'll get a whopping—wait a second—it's still only a 0.01% in interest. Okay, fine, but at least you can open up a retirement money market savings where you can earn all the way up to 0.6%. I think it's pretty safe to assume you're never going to be retiring off of 0.6%. Though I don't get why anyone would go and do this.

But it still gets worse than this, if you could believe it, and that brings us to this next one. This is the only other bank that I have gone out of my way to cancel because it was so awful, and that would be, to me, Citibank. Now, this is another one I wish I did not have to mention because I'm really a fan of the Citi double cash rewards credit card, but besides that, in terms of the actual bank itself... wow!

Now, let me just say this one upfront. One of the many reasons why I cancelled and why I think this one is so bad is because the mobile deposit limit is $1,000 a day. Now, you might think to yourself, "Graham, $1,000 is a lot of money! You're out of touch with reality." Well, yeah, I guess maybe a little bit, but this is an issue when you use this bank to deposit rent checks into, or any single check that is above $1,000, including a paycheck. You just can't do it. You literally have to walk into a physical Citibank branch location to deposit any check over $1,000, regardless of what or when it is. Even if you deposit only one check a month for $1,001, you can't do it from your phone. So with that, I was out!

But it also did not stop there because if you go and open the regular checking account, you'll enjoy the typical twelve dollar monthly maintenance fee, that's waived when you keep more than $1,500 in your account. You'll also have the typical fifteen dollar incoming wire fee, a thirty-five dollar outgoing wire fee, and standard fees for a bank that's featured in this video. But here's where Citibank takes a turn for the worst, and this is with their interest rate.

With their normal checking account, you'll get an interest rate of 0.01%, and with the regular savings account, you'll enjoy an interest rate of up to 0.13% in interest when you deposit more than $500,000. But then if you have priority savings— which means you have $50,000 or more between all eligible accounts—you'll get to earn 0.03 percent interest in your checking account and 0.15 percent in interest when you have more than $500,000 in their savings account. But things do get better because if you're a Citi Gold client—which means you have more than $200,000 across your bank and investment accounts—you'll get the same 0.03 percent interest in your checking account and up to the same 0.15 percent interest for $500,000 or more.

But on the bright side, at least you'll get financial guidance from a wealth adviser, and you'll get $2.95 equity trades. Yes! I think someone should really bring them up to speed to today and tell them that free stock trading is a thing. Just look at Robinhood, or Webull, or even Charles Schwab! Like, there's no need anymore to pay $2.95.

But anyway, if you're that good with money that you've saved up two hundred thousand dollars, I personally don't really think you need financial guidance. All you really need to do instead is smash the like button for the YouTube algorithm because this video took me forever to plan out and film. So anyway, there you have it! I hate to be the bearer of bad news; it just gets me so upset to see all of these fees, and why people are still using these banks right now is just beyond my comprehension.

Oh sure, some of these banks are convenient! Like, I get it for people who like walking into a physical branch, and Bank of America and Chase banks are pretty much on every street corner. But in terms of actually being a financially responsible adult, there are way better options out there, in my opinion—not financial advice.

Like I can make another video in the future covering the top 5 best bank accounts out there, and these are just a few to name some off. You got Ally Bank; no fees, no minimums, 1.7 percent interest. Marcus by Goldman Sachs; no fees, no minimums, also 1.7 percent interest. CIT Bank; no fees, $1,000 minimum, but pays 1.8 percent interest. And you get the idea; I'm going to be covering some of these other ones in the future.

So anyway, with that said, you guys, thank you so much for watching! I really appreciate it. As always, if you have not already subscribed, make sure to demolish the subscribe button and the notification bell so YouTube notifies you anytime I post a video. Also feel free to add me on Instagram; I post there pretty much daily. So, if you want to be a part of it there, feel free to add me there, also on my second channel, The Graham Stefan Show. I post there every single day I'm not posting here, so if you want to see a brand new video from me every single day, just go and add yourself to that.

And finally, if you guys want two free stocks, Webull is holding a promotion; they will give you two free stocks when you deposit $100 on their platform. One of those stocks is going to be valued up to $1,400! So if you want to have a chance to get a stock valued up to that amount, make sure to use the link down below in the description, sign up, and enjoy your two free stocks. Thank you so much for watching, and until next time!