Here’s a creative IRA promotion from my inbox. Zecco Trading will send you a free hammock if you open a new IRA between March 1st and April 17th, 2012 and maintain a $2,000 minimum account balance for 90 days after initial funding. Traditional, Roth, SEP, and even Rollover IRAs are eligible. Open to both new and existing Zecco Trading customers. I wonder if it will really be hot pink…
The Ohio CollegeAdvantage 529 Plan has a new promotion for existing account holders linked to tax refund season. If you make a new one-time contribution of $3,000 or more by April 30th, they will give you a $50 bonus. The $50 bonus will be applied on or before June 15, 2012. Account must be opened prior to March 1, 2012.
I received this offer by e-mail, but you can see it when you log in. There is no promotion code required. The $50 bonus contribution will be invested in the CollegeAdvantage investment option with the largest balance as of June 15, 2012.
$50 is only 1.7% of $3,000, but if you were going to contribute anyways it’s something – and sadly double what a savings account would pay you in interest on that same $3,000 over an entire year. Also, rollovers from outside 529s do indeed qualify as a contribution. I have money in the Ohio plan and have found it a solid plan with low-cost investment options, so if you’re in a more expensive 529 then this could be good time to move money over. It’s regularly ranked as a top plan by Morningstar.
Here are a few promotions from Amazon that can save you some time and/or money.
Amazon and Discover Card have teamed up to offer free 1-day shipping on select products (mostly electronics) if you use the promo code DSCVRSHP and buy with a Discover card. Saw a few Roku boxes for streaming Netflix that I’ve been thinking about. Offer valid from February 15th, 2012 through March 31st, 2012 or while promotional funds last.
Amazon has started offering free 3-month trials to Amazon Mom again, which includes the free 2-day shipping feature of Amazon Prime and 20% off diapers and wipes subscriptions. You should be able to turn off auto-renew so it just ends when time is up. (If you have ever received shipping benefits through Amazon Mom, Amazon Student, or have had a paid or free trial Prime membership within the past 13 months, you are not eligible for the Amazon Mom free period. You’ll need to use a new or different account.)
If you’re a student with a .edu e-mail address, sign up for Amazon Student which offers six-months of Amazon Prime for free, and after that you’ll get 50% off Amazon Prime ($39 a year) for up to four years with automatic renewal.
Update 2/24/12: Confirmed that this offer will expire at the end of February. Last year it also started in January and ran until the end of February, and didn’t come back until the next January. So get your applications in now if interested!
Update 1/9/12: Reader CC writes in with her success story, which differs from some previous reports of a one Discover card at a time limit. Please let me know if you have a different experience. I forget to add before – if you apply for the card and don’t get the credit line you want, call them up and tell them you want to do a $X,XXX balance transfer and they may work to accomodate you.
A few updates- I called Discover and they changed the policies again
1) you can have more than 1 credit card
2) You have to open a new card to get the promo they won’t apply it to the old one.
3)If you call and speak to a rep and give them a balance to transfer they will recalculate the credit line
4) They will let you transfer the old credit line to the new one ie I had a $7.3K balance on the old one so they left it open with $500 and gave me a new card with a $7K balance. I was able to keep my 5 yrs of credit history with the 1st card active. I’ll probably transfer the line back to the original place in a yr.
5) I just saved a year of interest on my Citibank student loans for $6,550 with 15 minutes of work 🙂
Back for 2012! Limited-time only. Just in time for some New Year debt-busting action, Discover has brought back the Discover More Card with No Balance Transfer Fee, offering 0% intro APR on both balance transfers and purchases for 12 months. You can literally borrow money for free and pay it back in 12 months (keeping in mind you’ll still need to satisfy the minimum payment each month until then). Use this opportunity to lower your interest rates and make every cent you pay go towards shrinking that principal. There are different versions of this card, so please use specific application link. No annual fee.
When you see the application, be sure to scroll down to the “Important Information” and verify that you are getting 0% for 12 months and no balance transfer fee. You should see the following text at the top under “Interest Rates and Interest Charges”:
APR for Balance Transfers: 0% intro APR for 12 months from date of first transfer, for transfers under this offer that post to your account by July 10, 2012.
And then the following a bit lower under “Fees”:
Transaction Fees * Balance Transfer – Intro fee of $0 for transfers that post to your account by 8/10/2012 with the 0% intro APR balance transfer offer described above. After that, 3% of the amount of each transfer.
Application Quick Tips
In order to get the highest credit limit possible, be sure to maximize your reported income as much as you can legitimately. You can no longer include the income of other people living with you, but do include things like freelance income, overtime, rental income, interest and dividend income, alimony, child support, etc.
If you wish to get cash directly from this balance transfer offer without it being classified as a “cash advance”, one tip is to request money to be transferred to other non-Discover credit cards that you have. This will create a negative balance, after which you request a refund check be sent to you. Citibank and American Express are recommended for this because they have automatic features on their websites to request a credit balance refund.
Arbitrage Opportunities?
Don’t have higher interest debt you wish to refinance? Really, the only thing I could see buying with this 0% money would be a US Savings I Bond that will earn you 3.06% for the first six months, and then a different rate based on inflation for the next 6 months. You can buy $5,000 in electronic bonds per person per year, and another $5,000 in paper bonds if you use your tax refund ($20k total for a couple).
Offer Comparison
Now, the Chase Slate® currently has a similar offer going, also 0% introductory APR for 15 months with $0 balance transfer fee. The good thing about Discover is that you can transfer balances on a Chase card to Discover, while you can’t transfer existing Chase balances to another Chase card. Other than that, why not take advantage of both? 🙂
“Disclaimer: This content is not provided or commissioned by the issuer. Opinions expressed here are author’s alone, not those of the issuer, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by the issuer. This site may be compensated through the issuer’s Affiliate Program.”
(Update 2/23/12: The Continental/United Airlines merger is almost complete, and the last official Continental flight taking off on March 2nd. The new company will be called United, so this Continental Airlines OnePass Plus Card will no longer be available as of the end of February (March 1st). This is your last chance to grab the 30,000 mile sign-up bonus if you’ve never had a Continental card before. “This one-time bonus offer is valid only for first-time Continental Airlines personal cardmembers with new accounts. Previous and existing Continental Airlines personal cardmembers/accounts are not eligible for this bonus offer.”
Note that the application for the United Explorer Card says that “United MileagePlus Explorer cardmembers will only receive one 25,000 bonus miles award if they apply for both the United Explorer Card and the Continental OnePass Plus Card after 7/19/2011.” This isn’t mentioned on the Continental application. If you only have the older United non-Explorer card, you should still be able to get the Continental bonus.)
The new Continental Airlines OnePass Plus Card from Chase has improved their sign-up incentive to include 30,000 free miles and a pretty nice mix of perks for travelers.
As you may have heard, Continental and United are merging, and the resulting airline is supposed to have the name United. Here’s a chance to rack up some miles that will eventually merge together.
Not good enough? Currently, there are also other ways to rack up $500+ in credit card bonuses…
Costco and American Express have a promotion where you can earn a $10 Costco Cash Card when you enroll on their page and then sign up to pay your wireless phone bill automatically with any American Express card. All wireless providers distributed by Costco are eligible: AT&T, T-Mobile, Verizon Wireless, Sprint and Alaska Digitel.
To receive a $10 Costco Cash Card, enroll any eligible American Express Card by filling out the information below. Then, sign up to pay your eligible wireless bill automatically on the same American Express Card – it’s as simple as that. Automatic bill payment is a convenient solution that helps ensure that your bills get paid on time every time. Plus, you can earn rewards if your Card is enrolled in a rewards program. Offer good from now until March 31, 2012.
I remember seeing this promotion in the past before, but you had to use the Costco AmEx card, whereas this promotion works for all AmEx cards.
Offer is back! Person-to-person loan site Prosper.com is having a another one-day promotion for borrowers who submit their loan listing on Friday, February 17th where they will actually make your entire 2nd loan payment (principal and interest) for you, up to $300.
* To be eligible for the offer, you (i) must post a loan listing on Prosper.com between 12:00 am PT and 11:59 pm PT on February 17, 2012; (ii) have to reach Verification Stage 3 within 1 week of posting the loan listing; (iii) cannot have posted a loan listing on Prosper.com within the past 30 days; and (iv) may not withdraw your loan listing. If you meet these criteria, Prosper will credit your second required loan payment up to $300. The credit will be posted to your account within 30 days of Prosper receiving your first payment. This promotion cannot be combined with any other promotional offer from Prosper.
Getting a rate quote is free, as their “soft pull” will not affect your credit score. If your loan does not find enough lenders to fund, then you can walk away with no obligation. If you do end up taking out a loan, then it will show up on your credit report. There are several ways you can use this offer.
The quick loan for profit. If you have an excellent credit score, you can get the AA loan rate of 5.65% for 1 year. Even if you don’t need it, take out a loan for about $3,500, and you would end up with a monthly payment of around $300. Your closing fee would be 0.5%, or $17.50. Your interest for a month at 5.65% would be less than $20. There is no pre-payment penalty, and your second payment is covered at $300. Just pay back the money they lent you after two months, and you’d be looking at over $250 in profit. You don’t need to risk any capital, just pay back the money they lend you and keep the profit. Decide quickly! Get your own rate quote at Prosper here.
Investor opportunity. As a result of the math above, there will be a mysterious surge in listings from AA borrowers for $3,500 loans today. If you like, you can invest in these notes today and tomorrow and earn some decent 4-5% interest for at least a couple months. Yes, there is still risk involved but my view is that people with AA credit scores are unlikely to default over only $3,500. I did this last time around, but didn’t have much money in my Prosper account. Sadly, still true this time. Just don’t be surprised if all your loans end up being paid off early!
Lowering your effective interest rate. If you don’t have an AA loan rating, you can use the free payment to lower your effective interest rate, especially if you pay off the loan early. For a $3,500 loan I got an A rating which meant either a 1-year loan at 6.08% or a 3-year loan at 9.99%. Your closing fee is 3.95% for A & B loans, which for a $3,500 loan that’s $138.25. So the free 2nd payment of up to $300 can knock that out completely and you can use the rest of the money to cover most of the first year’s interest.
(I went ahead and also got a free rate quote from LendingClub – their main competitor – but there all loans from $1,000 to $11,975 are only available with a 3-year term. With the loan rebate, I think Prosper would have had been the best 1-year rate anyway. However, my rate for the 3-year loan was only 6.78% APR (their highest A1 grade), which is much less than the Prosper APR. So it can pay to shop around.)
Bonus credit score. After getting the free rate quote, I was actually sent my credit score of 776 based on my Experian credit report. Prosper uses the Experian ScoreX Plus credit score, which has a range of 300 to 900. FICO range is 300 to 850. I assume this is due to new consumer laws that require them to send me my score if I’m not given the absolute best rate available. Not a bad side perk.
It looks like TDA is following the trend of combining checking account features with their traditional brokerage accounts. If you have a TD Ameritrade account, this looks like a pretty easy $200 bonus score.
Visit this promotion page to sign up for Online Cash Services and if you (1) sign up for a Visa debit card and make 4 purchases of $10+ by 3/31/12, and (2) enroll in BillPay and pay 4 bills totaling $100 between 1/15/12 and 3/31/12, you will get $100 each = $200 total. Both the debit card and online BillPay are free services.
Many of you many have old, inactive TDA accounts that are still open and you can fund them to take advantage of this promo. Offer not valid for existing debit card holders or bill pay users (boo). Via reader Michael via FW.
I love Dropbox. I like that it’s a real folder on my computer that is also invisibly synchronized and backed up in the cloud. The best part is that usually I forget it’s even there. Other online storage apps like Box.net or SkyDrive don’t work nearly as seamlessly for me.
The Dropbox free version offers up 2 GB of storage free to start, which you can increase to nearly 20 GB with various tasks. It may not be big enough for a full backup, but plenty for my important files. Check out this Lifehacker guide that details all the possibilities. You get 250 MB free by signing up under a referral link, and I get 250 GB extra too. I’ve only gotten 3 referrals up until now, but with other stuff was already at 4.5 GB free.
Today Lifehacker adds that right now if you install their new Beta version which lets you automatically back up photos and videos from your cameras/phones when connected to your computer, Dropbox will give you even more space – for every 500 MB of photos and videos automatically uploaded, you’ll receive another 500 MB of space permanently, up to 4.5 GB total. I synced up the photos from my iPhone and already have another free gig and counting. Sweet.
Interest rates looks to remain tiny for a long time, so if you want to boost your interest earned while keeping your money safe in banks, taking advantage of sign-up bonuses is one way to do it. Earning 1% APY on $10,000 is just $100 a year, and it’s even hard to get 1% APY now! Why not double or triple that with some new accounts.
Citibank $50 bonus if you open a Citibank account with $1,000 and complete 1 direct deposit and 1 electronic bill payment for 2 consecutive months. New checking account customers only. There’s no monthly service fee if you maintain a $15,000 combined average monthly balance requirement in eligible products; otherwise $20.00 monthly service fee is applied. Eligible products are linked deposits, loans, mortgages, and investment accounts. $100 bonus available with Citigold account.
Chase Bank $150 bonus when you open a Chase Total Checking account and set up direct deposit (new Chase checking customers only). This account is free if you make a $500+ direct deposit each month, or have $1,500 minimum daily balance.
M&T Bank $100 bonus when you open a MyChoice checking account and set up direct deposit within 90 days. This account is free if you maintain a direct deposit each month or have $500 minimum daily balance. $125 and $150 bonuses also available with upgraded accounts (and higher requirements).
Capital One $100 bonus when you open a Interest Online Checking account by 1/31/2012 using offer code CHEC168DF and make a direct deposit of $250 or more within 90 days. No monthly service fee, and pays 0.75% APY on balances less than $100k.
Clover is a new person-to-person payment system for use between phone numbers. Simple fees (none for personal use), simple interface. If you sign-up via invite from a registered user, you’ll get up to $10 off your first purchase. The referrer gets $5 too. You don’t even need a credit card or bank account to start, just a phone number (landline numbers work, but it’s optimized for Android and iPhone/iPod Touch users).
Here’s my invite link which will get you that referral bonus. Thanks if you use it.
After you join, go ahead and leave your own referral link in the comments.
LivingSocial is offering $20 to spend at The Body Shop for $10. Valid in-store only. Valid toward sale and promotional items. Over 65,000 purchased already. Psst guys… Valentine’s Day is less than 3 weeks away 😉
p.s. Groupon has $6 movie tickets to romantic comedy flick “One For The Money”
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