CD Discussion Thread

He explained previously:

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For one thing, you don’t have to allow javascript from 50 domains in order to navigate most of their website. I can’t speak to the logged in side of their site as I am not yet a member.

Thank you for re-posting that from six months ago. Appreciate it. Guess I am consistent on Blue.

It’s like it is for me with Keesler. I did not join in time to get that 5% deal they had. Stupid of me. But I did join eventually because Keesler, like Blue, is just one of those “gotta join” credit unions. Since joining Keesler they have done nothing but constantly send me money. And I don’t even have a CD there! It’s just a great CU.

I feel the same about Blue. I need to drop one of my existing inactive CU memberships and sign up with Blue instead. I’d be better off.

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Shucks!
I do have a CD with Keesler. What’s this “send me money” deal? I do draw my interest but, nothing extra. :thinking:

Guess I should join Blue.

I went to their website and nothing really stood out to me.

Couple of comments here regarding Freedom Credit Union (FCU):

At one time anyone could join. That is when I joined. Today there is much tighter geographical restriction on membership.

Ken rates FCU A+. Weiss recently upgraded them to A. So a strong CU.

Historically FCU offered two classes of CDs. Their “promo” certificates paid somewhat higher interest but did not allow money to be added on. Their standard CDs paid just a bit lower interest rate but add ons were OK.

I bought almost all promo CDs, but I did open one five year standard CD last year, for the lowest amount allowed ($500), as “insurance”. Obviously I never believed I would need the insurance. Belt and suspenders.

Anyway, of course with the pandemic, which I did not foresee, it turns out that insurance CD is saving my butt. It’s an uncapped add on yielding 3.25% APY which I’m most fortunate to have opened back in 2019.

It is noteworthy FCU announced not too long ago that, commencing April first of this year, their standard certificates would no longer offer the add on privilege. That change did not apply to certificates, like mine, opened prior to the change date. But regardless I find it an interesting development and a sign of the times.

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I have their credit card. It’s a gold mine. But that is off topic here so 'nuff said.

You are one lucky boy!!

I bought in ONLY on Freedom FCU promo CD’s. One of those CD’s matured today (Saturday), don’t you hate it when that happens. So I will transfer those funds on Monday, which means I can’t do anything until Tuesday.

Sure wish I had had the insight to get the add-on CD’s. Now, I have a couple of options left for me. I do still have 1 add-on CD 2.25% matures 7/21. And I did get in on the TIAA mm 1.40% for 1 yr 5/21.

Life can be so cruel. I could have had 3.25% like you for more $$'s, but I was just to dumb… (just joking)

Interesting. We must have bought at the same time way back. Because one of my Promo CDs also matured today, Saturday. But I handled the maturity a little bit differently than yourself:

I arranged in advance for my funds to be moved, today at CD maturity, to my FCU share savings. This was executed perfectly by FCU. Good thing because:

Yesterday (Friday) early evening I ordered (at PurePoint) an ACH transfer from FCU savings to my PurePoint account, using their “instant interest” feature. PurePoint credited the funds instantly so I had one day of double interest, plus also earning interest on these two weekend days . . . at PurePoint. I will not have access to my funds until next Thursday, but that is planned for and is no problem at all. That money is headed for PSECU week after next, leaving me more headroom at FCU which I can, and will, use in future.

All in all a happy experience and FCU took excellent care of me. Course if that money had not moved into savings for any reason, computer failure or some other snafu, then on Monday morning my situation would have been dire. But things went to plan, the money moved today, Saturday, and it will be there when the PurePoint ACH withdrawal order finally reaches FCU very early Monday morning.

That’s interesting. Did you submit a special request for this to the CU? Perhaps you already had an earlier experience with them, whereby they successfully moved the money to savings even on a weekend?

I did quite a bit of checking in advance to be certain I could pull this off. You cannot take the word of just a single rep on something this critical.

At first I ascertained they would move the funds with just my telephone call request during their short, nine to noon, Saturday call center hours. But when I called back a second time last week, just to be sure, the rep on her own initiative set it up for me so I would not have to call on Saturday. Very nice of her. I did check my account online, just in case, and the funds moved VERY early Saturday morning.

There was no room for error with something like this. Those funds absolutely needed to be in my savings early Monday morning. It worked out fine.

Yes I know. Personally I won’t do this unless I’m very certain it will work.

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(all times eastern)

Agreed. I did not even initiate the ACH, at PurePoint, until about six o’clock PM Friday. This left me with just six hours of vulnerability, since at midnight technically speaking my CD matured and the ACH was covered . . . again technically. PurePoint is extremely lenient with their ACH cutoff timing. It’s one reason I do business there.

In reality I knew the funds withdrawal request would not hit at FCU until Monday morning. But you cannot be too careful.

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Like you I had requested that Freedom close CD Saturday & transfer funds into savings. Yes, & Sat morning funds were in savings. Maybe I should try using PurePoint instead of Alliant as a hub.

Does PurePoint allow the transfer of funds like Alliant $100k ACH into & $25k ACH out of?

Why is it that FDIC insured brokered CD’s were never mentioned here? They typically pay higher interest rates that regular cd’s…have longer terms up to for example 20 years…have callable and uncallable options (callable pays an even higher interest rate but the bank can “call” it at any time then you get your money back plus any interest to date…typically done when rates are going down. Uncallable is the safe bet)…also since they can be SOLD/TRADED you have the potential to get your money back at any time without penalty although if rates go down obviously you are going to take a loss to sell a cd with a lower interest rate and get a premium for a cd with a higher interest rate. Now is the worst time to be investing in these so how come they were never mentioned at least in the posts I’ve read to my knowledge. Finally since you can get CD’s from multiple banks each one is covered by FDIC 250K so you can cover larger sums of money without jumping through hoops. It requires a brokerage account but there are plenty of free one’s. Heck based on the criteria it should have probably been mentioning in the liquid funds thread.

To be clear, PurePoint has not replaced Alliant for me, and indeed I continue to have more transactions at Alliant than at PurePoint. Mine is sort of a “dual hub” setup. I end up using whichever one best suits my needs for a particular transaction.

The ACH dollar limitations at PurePoint are FAR more lenient than they are at Alliant. It’s night and day.

Whenever I’ve looked at brokered CDs, their rates were terrible compared to the best offers. Maybe higher than walking into your typical local bank branch, but nowhere close to the top rates available.

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I don’t recall brokered CD rates being higher?

Brokered Cds USE to have rates comparable to the online banks…that is no longer the case (after all the rate tumbles)…heck…even brokerage money market funds had rates comparable to online banks…that is also no longer the case…

Just to tidy up regarding the transaction about which I posted a short distance up thread:

The matured CD funds went into my FCU savings dated Saturday . . . . been there ever since until:

This (Monday) morning I logged into my FCU savings account early. But it was not early enough to see those matured CD funds still there. The PurePoint ACH withdrawal had already hit my FCU savings account, dated today. It must have happened VERY early this morning, long before the credit union opened its doors and also before the call center opened.

The lesson is if you ever decide to pull a weekend stunt like this you must be absolutely certain the CD money moves into your savings (or other transactional account) before Monday. This because there will not be opportunity on Monday to call them and put things right. If you end up having to call on Monday, you will be too late.

ETA

With a Saturday CD maturity like I had, I knew in advance worst case (i.e., if something went wrong) that I would have the three Saturday morning call center hours to contact them and try to put everything right. That was my backstop.

It is different if your CD matures on a Sunday. Fewer financial institutions offer call center hours on Sunday. This leaves you at the mercy of their computer system to (you hope) move your matured CD funds into your transactional account before the ACH withdrawal hits Monday morning.

Sunday CD maturities are tough. Be very circumspect about trying anything in that situation.