10% APY Savings account for kids. $500 limit. ***UPDATE 5/6/5*** - $75 DD bonus

Affinity Bank offers The Kids Only Savings Account - a 10.00% APY* on all balances up to and including $500.

Kids Only account opened for children up to 16 years of age. Custodians must have or open an account with Affinity Bank.

This bank often has $75-100 Direct deposit promotions to their Free Checking. I think that I saw somewhere current $75 promo - you can call 800-489-1562 and check

Update 5/6/2005 - I sent an e-mail to Affinity bank to check if they have the current Direct Deposit bonus. Answer is "Yes"

Thank you for your inquiry.
To receive this offer you must open and fund a new Affinity Bank checking account with a minimum deposit of $100 and establish a recurring direct deposit from your employer. (Retirees, ask about Social Security or pension direct deposit)

$75 will be credited to your account within 90 days of funding your account if you meet the conditions set forth. All accounts are subject to approval. One offer per customer.

Offer not available to current Affinity Bank checking account holders.
Offer is made to U.S. residents 18 years of age and older only. Offer may be modified or withdrawn at any time without notice.
You can apply online at our website: www.affinitybank.com, print the application and mail it in with your check, go to any of our branches, or we can mail you the enrollment form if you provide us with your address.
If you have any further question, please feel free to contact us.

Sincerely,

Cheri Gibson
Call Center
1-800-489-2194

sweet OP. This is what makes FW Finance great.

The parents account can be their free checking ($100 min balance) or savings ($500 min balance)

dont forget the free piggy bank too. Its never too early to teach your kids about responsible finance if you want them to succeed.

"Balances over $500 will be paid at the Gold Savings rates."

Does this mean that if you have $501 in the account they only give you the Gold Savings Rate? Or just everything after the $500 mark gets that?

... how hard is it to figure out it's $50 in interest a year and it's not compounded b/c it's only allowed up to $500 limit

$50 * 20 = $1000

This isn't that great, but to a 10 year old, $50 a year in earned interest is a lot of money

fatcool said: after 20 years how much will that 500$ grow?as big as a Mississippi dragonfly...

slimcustomer said: xpguy said
For politeness sake, can someone come up with a better term for "hard pull"? I feel dirty everytime I see it.
"hard inquiry" and "soft inquiry"

forceful pull and gentle pull

supertle said: ... how hard is it to figure out it's $50 in interest a year and it's not compounded b/c it's only allowed up to $500 limit

$50 * 20 = $1000

This isn't that great, but to a 10 year old, $50 a year in earned interest is a lot of money

but the other money will still earn intrest just not at the 10% promo rate. While i haven't looked up the normal rate, im assuming it not 0

I think that it may cap out at $800 because the account is for minors until they reach 16 years of age, so potential 50 x 16 = 800 at the 10% apy.

supertle said: ... how hard is it to figure out it's $50 in interest a year and it's not compounded b/c it's only allowed up to $500 limit

$50 * 20 = $1000

This isn't that great, but to a 10 year old, $50 a year in earned interest is a lot of money

slimcustomer said:

For politeness sake, can someone come up with a better term for "hard pull"? I feel dirty everytime I see it.


so just never ask anyone to pull!

midget pull

Thanks turrdog for the update.

And the answer is ... hard inquiry. (midget pull a close second due to graphic)

If the 10% interest rate is not guaranteed (before the child turns 18), can someone please tell me why this is a hot deal? Considering you have to open 2 accounts and a hard pull, Oops, I mean hard inquery. For most people, you won't have a local branch to deal with.

Truefan said: supertle said: ... how hard is it to figure out it's $50 in interest a year and it's not compounded b/c it's only allowed up to $500 limit

$50 * 20 = $1000

This isn't that great, but to a 10 year old, $50 a year in earned interest is a lot of money

We should not get too excited about a long term investment with Affinity Bank: "* APY (Annual Percentage Yield) information is accurate as of May 2, 2005 and is SUBJECT TO CHANGE".

simonyu1 said: If the 10% interest rate is not guaranteed (before the child turns 18), can someone please tell me why this is a hot deal?
Do you know any bank, which guarantees rate for 18 years?
BTW, it is not a promotion and it's been a while already. They are willing to give away $50/year to keep you in the bank

Edit - I think they believe having a child assumes people are serious and bank in one place only

I went ahead and e-mailed them... but it doesn't look like this sort of account has an "on-line" option... any idea if you can do this even though you don't have a branch near you?

You don't need to live near a branch. There is an online application, and the CSR said he will send me one through regular mail.

Just for reference, I called them and talked to them since they didn't respond to my e-mail. Here are a couple of other things to consider for those of you that aren't local.

1) The only way you can withdrawl money is to call in and have them manually process a check where they will mail it to you.
2) You are limited to 3 withdrawls a quarter anymore and they will CLOSE, repeat CLOSE, out the account.
3) The 10% APY has been that way for over 4 years.
4) There is no requirement for the "custodian" of the account to have their own account at Affinity bank.
--
Just got an e-mail from them confirming 3 and 4.

The direct quote from the person that e-mailed me was: "You would not have to open another account however you might want to look at our rates online. We have some good rates available"
--
Perhaps the custodian account qualifies as an account at Affinity bank? I also did confirm that they do pull a credit report on the "custodian".

If I'm not mistaking it wouldn't be 1000 in one year, but correct me if I'm wrong.

Year 1) ((500 X .10%)/365) X 31 = 4.25/month interest X 12 = Approx. $51

Year 2) 500+50=550 redo the calculation for that year. ((551 x .10%)/365 X 31
= 4.67/month interest X 12 = $56.1 + 551 = 607

So in 2 years that's a gain of 107 not 100 flat.

LOL and I'm in no mood to do all 20 years but I'm sure you get the point. I only point it out because I made a stupid mistake of simply taking 50 and multiplying it 20 times for the amount of years. But see that's not true because we forget the main factor that each year money is accumulated!

Year 3)But to do one last run let's now take that $607 + 61.86 = (equation) =
$668.86

168.86 gain compare to 150. Not bad actually.

Now take 20 years to that. With compounding yearly on what you earned last year. By year 5 you'll see that the end result would not be 700 dollars but instead 812 dollars. In five years when that kids 15 he'll be 312 dollars richer as opposed to miscalculating all his life and only being 200 dollars richer. Friggin' interest rate. THAT'S 10% WOW! If only you could invest in the thousands or even in the 100 thousands! With a 2000 investment in 10 years you could have such a good gain only from interest. Sad thing is that we don't know how inflation and all play a roll in the interests. I'm still learning and hoping CDs and MMAs will jump to higher interest rates for us older kids.

Anyway, I just felt the need to give my 2 cents because little information like that helps a lot. Kick me in the ace for exposing my arrogance or love me for enlightening you. Either way I'm happy that I shared my thoughts. Best of luck guys.

1-2% is better then ANY of my local banks give for a savings account

TZafar said: If I'm not mistaking it wouldn't be 1000 in one year, but correct me if I'm wrong.

Year 1) ((500 X .10%)/365) X 31 = 4.25/month interest X 12 = Approx. $51

Year 2) 500+50=550 redo the calculation for that year. ((551 x .10%)/365 X 31
= 4.67/month interest X 12 = $56.1 + 551 = 607

So in 2 years that's a gain of 107 not 100 flat.

LOL and I'm in no mood to do all 20 years but I'm sure you get the point. I only point it out because I made a stupid mistake of simply taking 50 and multiplying it 20 times for the amount of years. But see that's not true because we forget the main factor that each year money is accumulated!

Year 3)But to do one last run let's now take that $607 + 61.86 = (equation) =
$668.86

168.86 gain compare to 150. Not bad actually.

Now take 20 years to that. With compounding yearly on what you earned last year. By year 5 you'll see that the end result would not be 700 dollars but instead 812 dollars. In five years when that kids 15 he'll be 312 dollars richer as opposed to miscalculating all his life and only being 200 dollars richer. Friggin' interest rate. THAT'S 10% WOW! If only you could invest in the thousands or even in the 100 thousands! With a 2000 investment in 10 years you could have such a good gain only from interest. Sad thing is that we don't know how inflation and all play a roll in the interests. I'm still learning and hoping CDs and MMAs will jump to higher interest rates for us older kids.

Anyway, I just felt the need to give my 2 cents because little information like that helps a lot. Kick me in the ace for exposing my arrogance or love me for enlightening you. Either way I'm happy that I shared my thoughts. Best of luck guys.

I just caught myself falling into this mistake (compounding at 10%). The catch here is that it's the first $500 that gets 10%. Anything above gets the "gold rate" (or whatever the name was), which in a previous post was shown as something like 0.4% until $5,000. So, the $50 a year is a pretty good estimate, with such a low rate for the earnings to compound at.