The 5 MOST PROFITABLE Savings Accounts of 2019

What's the guys, it's Graham here. So I made this video about six months ago where I went over the most profitable savings accounts that you can get. Since then, in the last few months, I've received non-stop messages that the information is now outdated. Interest rates have gone up; thankfully, some banks have also gotten a lot better and should be on the list.

I thought to myself: you know what? They're right. I do desperately need to re-update all of this information and make a brand new video. This is really, really good news too, because the Fed raised interest rates back in January, which meant that savings accounts can now pay out a little bit more. So really, what we've been seeing over the last few months is all of these savings accounts just clamoring over one another to try to get your business. This basically just means that you now get paid out a little bit more money.

This is somewhat good news for us too, because even though the Fed has now been lowering interest rates, the interest rates paid on savings accounts have not been followed, and they have not been lowered. I have a feeling the reason for this is that they know if they lower the interest rate, you're just gonna go and move your money to another bank, and they don't want to risk that.

So, let's go for the five best high-interest rate savings accounts that are out there today to make you a little bit of extra money for doing absolutely nothing. Because everyone knows I like making money for doing nothing. For this list, since there are so many random banks out there, I've set up a very strict criteria that we must follow.

Number one: it must be a well-known bank. No banks that we've never heard of that are just available to people in Wyoming. No sketchy banks that just opened up last night and happen to rhyme with "Schmidt". It really must be a well-established bank that we have confidence in.

Now secondly, they must be verified. Unlike my Instagram account, which is not verified even though I've tried. People are now setting up fake accounts; just be warned for this. If someone sends you a weird message or adds you as a friend and then wants to be paid out in Bitcoin or cryptocurrency, that's not me. I don't do that sort of stuff. So if anyone ever asks you to pay in Bitcoin—that ain't me.

So when Instagram ever verifies my account, hopefully this, the scam artists won't be able to scam. But anyway, we need actual concrete proof that they offer the interest rate they say they do. None of these teaser rates that just give you an interest rate like this for a few months and then they downgrade it to something lower. For this, I looked at the reviews of the companies to determine their history of interest rates and to make sure that what they say is actually true.

Now third, it must be available to anybody in the United States. Like in my last video, I mentioned PNC Bank as offering a 2.35 percent interest rate, which I didn't realize. A lot of people were very quick to correct me that that rate is only available for states that do not have a physical PNC branch. And as we all know, on the internet, people are very quick to correct you.

Anytime you are wrong or leave out information by mistake or don't mention something, I'm making sure in this video everything I mention is available to anybody in the United States. Fourth, most importantly, as we all learned with Robinhood, it must be FDIC insured. This is a very big one, because the last thing we want is for a small company or a small bank to go insolvent and then find out they're not FDIC insured. Then you lose all your money, and then you have a bad time. I don't want anybody to have a bad time.

So safe to say all of these ones say that they're all FDIC insured. The last one, number five, is just to smash the like button if you haven't done that already. A like goes a very long way, so if you wouldn't mind just tapping that button, let's get into the video.

Now first, we have my longtime personal favorite that many of you guys have heard on the channel, and that would be Ally Bank. Not sponsored. I need to make it very clear that my videos when I talk about something like this are not sponsored, and these companies are not reaching out to me and be like "yo man, mention Ally Bank" or "what". They don't do that, okay? So none of this is sponsored. Let's make that very clear.

Now when it comes to me, I've used Ally Bank for years. It's been my go-to online bank. I use this myself to run all of my rental income through this because they allow me to have unlimited checking accounts, checks, and debit cards entirely for free. There's no minimums, there's no fees. And the best part about all of this is that they offer a 2.2 percent interest rate on their savings account, and they're FDIC insured.

Now even though they don't have any sort of physical bank that you can actually walk into, doing everything online and from the app has never been an issue. Anytime I ever need like actual physical cash—like for my ridiculous YouTube thumbnails—I just go to Bank of America, which I have an account with; I pull out some cash since they have branches everywhere, and that’s it.

However, I would have to say my one critique with Ally is that lately they have been lacking in the interest rate category. They are no longer as competitive as they once were. Like two years ago, about three and a half, four years ago is when I started banking with Ally, and back then their interest rate was pretty good at the time.

Lately, other banks have just gotten better. I've stuck with Ally just because I've been with them for so long; I'm used to it, I trust them, I like them, and it's not worth switching for just a little bit more money. Until recently, I found another bank that I'm actually moving some money over to, which I'll tell you about in this video if you just keep watching.

Now the second option out there is a really popular online bank that a lot of people have commented on and have been really happy with so far that pays just a little bit more than Ally, and that is Marcus by Goldman Sachs. They offer a 2.25 percent interest rate, and with that they have no monthly fees, no minimums, no hidden fees, no crazy stupid fees, and of course, they're FDIC insured up to $250,000.

However, even though they pay slightly more on their savings account, it doesn't appear as though you can mobile deposit checks directly into that account, which is definitely a big inconvenience. I don't really like doing ACH transfers; I don't like doing wire transfers; I don't like having to ever mail a check in somewhere and wait for it.

It's 2009; everyone should have a mobile app for the bank account, and you should be able to mobile deposit checks. This ain't 1999 no more. That's the one thing that I don't like with Marcus by Goldman Sachs. If they just stepped it up a little bit, just a little bit, and got with the times, then I could give my full recommendation on it. But overall, it seems just kind of a hassle considering that there are other better banks out there.

Now third, if we're gonna take it up a notch and turn up the heat, we have another really good one and that would be CIT Bank, which is now offering a 2.4 percent interest rate. Not to be confused with Citibank, this is CIT Bank. Now the thing is, in order to get that 2.4 percent interest rate, you have to do one of two things. The first one is to keep an average balance of $25,000 in the account, or deposit at least $100 per month.

Assuming you could do one of those or even just deposit $100 a month into the account, there's no maintenance fees, there's no hidden fees, they're FDIC insured, and it's available to anybody in the United States. The best part about all of this, unlike Marcus by Goldman Sachs, is that they have a mobile app that you can deposit checks to.

Overall, I would actually be pretty happy with this bank, and the only reason I have not switched over so far is because I've been with Ally for such a long time. It's not worth it to go and get a brand-new bank for like 0.2% extra interest before taxes annually, and it's just not right now worth the hassle to me. Like I said, we're slowly getting better, and some of these offers are getting pretty unbelievable.

Now fourth, speaking of kind of unbelievable—this is one that is believable; it's real—but I didn't believe it at first. I thought it was a joke until I looked into it, and so many people commented on this. They looked into it, and I'm like, wait a second, this is actually pretty good. That would be Redneck Bank. Yeah, no, I'm not kidding; Redneck Bank—that's the actual name. Don't ask me how they came up with that name; it makes no sense to me, but it is what it is.

They even have a very realistic fly on their website that you could chase around with your mouse, and you can have a lot of fun with that, which makes this website just a hidden gem. Now Redneck Bank is offering a 2.5 percent interest rate on their savings account, and even better, they're offering a 3 percent interest rate on their checking account, which is absolutely incredible.

Here's how this works: on their checking account, you're gonna be getting 3 percent interest up to the first $10,000, and then they'll give you a 2.5 percent interest rate in their savings account up to $50,000. Honestly, for me, if it weren't for the limit of $10,000 and $50,000, I would move my money in here in a heartbeat. Judging by how many people have been super happy with them, reading their reviews online, they seem like an all-around just really good bank, and honestly, I'm really impressed with this one.

I would recommend, if you're looking for a high-interest savings account, to look into this one and do some more research just to make sure you're comfortable with it. But otherwise, this one looks like a really, really, really good option. But wait, there's more! I can one-up that one, and this one I think is going to take a gold medal.

This is the one I actually just opened up an account with myself, so I can move some money from Ally into this account. Sorry, Ally; I know we've been together for years, but you're just not giving me the interest that I really want because this bank is giving me the interest. That is Wealthfront—they're offering 2.51% interest on their cash account, with FDIC insurance up to $1,000,000.

But let's take a quick pause here right now, because this is very important. I'm sure you're thinking to yourself, "Wait a second, how can they offer $1,000,000 FDIC insurance when the limit is $250,000 per bank? What's going on here? This seems a little sketchy." That's honestly a very good question; when I saw that, I'm like, how is this possible?

I did some good old-fashioned research, and this is what I came up with. When you look on their website, you gotta read the fine print, and this is what it says: FDIC insurance coverage is limited to $250,000 per qualified customer account per banking institution. Wealthfront brokerage uses more than one program bank to insure FDIC coverage of up to $1 million for your cash deposits.

So basically, what they're doing is that you have an account with Wealthfront, but on the back end, they're taking that money and splitting it up between affiliate institutions so that way you get four times the coverage within one account. It seems to me that this might be just a little bit sketchy. On the sketch scale, if there is such a thing—like 10 being super sketchy and 1 being not sketchy at all—this is probably like a 3 sketchy.

The only reason I say this, and it's only just my assumptions here, is that I would love some FDIC verification that they would actually qualify that up to a million dollars because you are holding your money in one account. Even though technically your cash is spread across other accounts, I just want them to confirm themselves—that they give the stamp of approval.

We had this issue with Robinhood as well, where they were like "wait a second, we don't do this; I don't know why you're claiming this; we're not going to cover you," and then they had big issues with Robinhood. So I have no doubt that I think $250,000 would be a pretty safe example, but going up to a million dollars? I don't know if I'd—

But that's just me. With Wealthfront, there's no minimums, there's no hidden fees—a straight-up cash account that offers 2.51% in interest. I've been doing a lot of research on this and reading a lot of their reviews from people who have banked with them before, and it seems pretty decent. So I'm giving it a shot. I opened up an account with them; I'm gonna move some money in Wealthfront, and I'm just gonna split my money between Wealthfront and Ally just so I can have some sort of diversification there, just in case something happens. That way I don't put all my eggs in one basket.

So far, from what I could see, Wealthfront is a very good option that I'm gonna give it a shot. The reason that they're offering such a high interest rate is because they want people to get into the Wealthfront ecosystem, and once they're there, they're hoping that they're gonna be using the investing platform as well—which is really where I think they're gonna be making most of their money.

Very much, this account could be like a loss leader for the company; even though they lose money on the savings account, they might make it up on the back end, which is perfectly fine with me as long as I can get my 2.51% interest rate.

Finally, I just want to mention one last honorary mention that pays beyond everyone else, and I have to mention this just because everyone has commented this on my previous few videos or just asked me to make a video on this. But it's not that interesting to make its own dedicated video in this, so here it is: the T-Mobile checking account that pays 4% in interest.

But wait, of course you don't get a 4% interest rate without a catch. There's always gotta be a catch. So here's the catch: it's limited to the first $3,000 only, and you also must deposit $200 a month to get the 4% interest rate. The way I see it, to me, it's just not worth the hassle considering that you can get 2.51% in Wealthfront and put way more money in it without having to worry about depositing $200 a month to get that rate. But of course, I do want to mention it because if you're sitting there right now with $3,000 just wanting to make the highest interest rate possible within a bank, T-Mobile is it—as long as you are just okay with depositing $200 a month.

Now before I end the video, I just want to say this and make this very clear just so there's no confusion. Using these accounts is not supposed to be a substitute for investing, and it's not about trying to make the most money possible—even though that's actually kind of the point by getting a slightly higher interest rate.

But let me explain: with a lot of these savings accounts, you're not making a lot of money. If anything, when you account for inflation—like if inflation is 2% per year and your money is sitting there in a bank account making 2.5%, you're really only making half a percent in a year. No one is ever getting rich off half a percent a year.

However, the entire point of this is to keep your money's value or grow it by just a little bit until you have time to go and reinvest it elsewhere. For example, I would keep my emergency fund in a high-interest savings account so it earns a little bit of money and doesn't lose any value. Then I have the money sitting there for obviously emergencies or if I'm saving up for another property, and I know my money is just going to be sitting there for six to twenty-four months until I find the right deal.

Of course, I keep that money in a high-interest savings account so it's always ready to deploy whenever the right deal comes up, and it doesn't lose any value. So again, this is not supposed to be a substitute for investing. This is not to say that getting 2.5% is a very good return because really, it's not. It's just about holding the value you have right now, maybe making a little bit until you go and reinvest that money in higher yielding returns.

So with that said, you guys, thank you so much for watching; I really appreciate it. If you guys enjoy videos like this and you have not already smashed the like button, make sure to always smash the like button. Make sure to always subscribe; it's totally free to subscribe. In fact, the subscription button pays 3% in interest by subscribing, so make sure to subscribe. 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 be a part there.

Then shameless plug to my second channel, the Graham Stephan Show—I'm gonna be posting there pretty much daily, so if you want other content there, if you want more of me, it's on the second channel. Anyway, with that said, thank you so much for watching, and until I see you next time!