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Live Oak Bank


Overview / Commentary
www.liveoakbank.com
866-518-0286
1741 Tiburon Drive
Wilmington, NC 28403

Live Oak Bank is the 178th largest bank in the nation. It was established in 2008 and as of December of 2020, it had grown to 594 employees. Live Oak Bank's savings rates are 15% higher than the national average, and it has a B+ health rating.

Related Posts

Rate Reduced To 0.60% APY For Savings - 11/24/2020

Starting tomorrow, November 24, 2020, you will earn 0.60% APY on the money in your Live Oak Bank personal savings account, which is 12x the national average. Guessing this means Ally will be reducing to 0.50% soon.

Live Oak Bank Increases 5-Year CD Rate - 11/13/2020

Live Oak Bank (internet bank) has added 40 bps to its 5-year CD resulting in a competitive rate. Minimum opening deposit is $2.5k and is capped at $250k per account.

Live Oak Bank Personal Savings Rate Falls To 0.70% APY Eff. 9/10/2020 - 9/9/2020

Starting tomorrow, September 10, 2020, you will earn 0.70% APY1 on the money in your Live Oak Bank personal savings account.

View all posts from:


Reviews (85)

Live Oak Bank - Excellent Rates, Service And Website

Posted by: |

After using Live Oak Bank for a few years, I figured it was time to provide some feedback to the depositaccounts.com community:

Over the past 2 years, Live Oak Bank has remained competitive with their interest rates - sometimes tops sometimes not, but reasonable. As a result, I don't have to worry about continuously monitoring and chasing rates - saving me time and stress that I had when utilizing other online banks. In addition, I can use either the LOB website/app to deposit and withdraw funds, or have them pushed/pulled from another institution using ACH - a feature I use often.

I have only had 2-3 customer service interactions, all via messaging on their website. Fast response time and excellent customer service.

I really enjoy both the Live Oak Bank website and the Live Oak Bank app. Easy to navigate, view interest rate, account and routing numbers, rename account "nicknames", transfer money, and more. My favorite feature is that they allow you to edit CD renewal preferences online easily, changing maturity instructions with ease. It is a huge incentive to why I open additional CDs with them.

There are a few things I wish they would integrate:

1. Electronic 1099-INT Forms (historically these are sent via physical mail)
2. Fix a few minor app crashes, such as when changing CD renewal instructions (needed to edit via website instead of app)
3. Add Interest Accrued / Interest YTD on the website - I like this feature at other banks so I can see right away how much interest I have paid without needing to go into statements.

Other than that, I have had a great experience with Live Oak Bank and would recommend them to anyone looking for a competitive online savings account.

26

A (Mostly) Good Experience So Far

Posted by: |

After doing a fair amount of research, I opened a Live Oak account last Saturday.

The process was fairly smooth, although when it came to answering the 4 random questions to verify who I was, one of the questions asked me in what city an obscure side street is located. I knew the answer (the city in which I currently live), but only because I happen to briefly date someone who lived there a decade ago. (That was easily the most obscure question I have ever had to answer to open an account.)

The application process now warns people that the questions must be answered in a limited amount of time, but fails to say how much time, which is really annoying.

The final part of the application process was to link an external bank account to fund my new Live Oak account. As other people have stated, you will be prompted to enter the user name and password of the external bank account you want to link.

I consider that option to be strictly unacceptable. Anyone who is tempted to do that really needs to ask themselves if they understand the basics of internet security. That information is gathered by some obscure company called plaid, which has existed for less than 10 years. Do you really think it is a wise decision to give some startup company your banking credentials?

I looked for an option to bypass that request and do the standard micro deposit method which I knew Live Oak supported. I finally gave up, wrote an email to customer support (which is only open Monday through Friday) asking for a way to bypass Plaid and instead use micro deposits, and then went to bed.

The next morning, I decided to try bypassing Plaid again, and eventually found a way to trigger the micro deposit option. (To bypass Plaid, do not exit the dialogue attempting to force you to use Plaid. Instead, just skip past every offer to "help" you select your bank, and eventually Plaid will give up and allow you to do micro deposits.)

On Monday morning, I got a response to my email to customer support. Instead of providing me the information I wanted, it just told me that Plaid was the Live Oak preferred option, which I already knew by how much Live Oak was trying to force me to use Plaid. A nonconstructive response by customer support is not a great way to start a business relationship.

This morning, the micro deposits appeared in my primary bank account, and it was painless to enter the values and complete my account creation by funding my account.

I called customer support on the phone, and asked about the statement cycle (which is thankfully the standard first/last day of the month), and the ACH transfer limits ($250,000). The wait time was minimal and the customer representative was great, which makes up for the failure of the email support.

All in all, not a perfect start, but I have certainly had worse experiences.

15

Five Day Hold With No Interest For Transfers!

Posted by: |

UPDATED: Live Oak no longer puts the hold I described years ago on funds that are transferred in and out. I have continued to use this bank as their rates are better than others even now in this terrible environment. Their customer service is responsive, too. Sometimes it takes them a while to provide statements at the end of the month, but they do eventually show up.
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I opened a Savings account with this bank this past week. I already had a CD there. The CD provides no statements, just an online list of transactions and a 1099-Int. The interest rate was good at the time I opened it, so no big deal.

However, it turns out that there is a 5 day hold on the money I deposited in my savings account. The money came out of my other bank account on Thursday but the CSR says I won't see it in my account until the next Wednesday. Meanwhile, the CSR confirmed and that I am NOT going to earning any interest on that money during that hold period.

There will also be a five day hold on any withdrawals. The CSR said this is because they use an "intermediary bank" for transfer transactions.

This was not made clear in any way before I opened the account. Despite the nice interest rate I won't be moving in any more money. That hold coming and going effectively lowers the interest rate paid.

70

Not Recommended

Posted by: |

Good customer service and loved the ability to assign and delete beneficiaries within my online account. You can even print a copy for your records. I wish all banks had that feature. However, I think I stayed too long. Throughout the three years I had accounts with this bank, found errors in totals on two occasions. Then I realized that the savings account activity page did not give me the balance after each transaction, which made it very difficult to trace if your deposits are being added correctly. That did it: No more business with them.

4
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Health
B+

Data as of Q4 2020

Capitalization grade does not factor in PPP loans and the use of the PPP Liquidity Facility.
Learn why bank health matters

Health Grade Components

Overall
FDIC Certificate #58665
Year Established2008
Employees594
Primary RegulatorFDIC
Profit Margin
Return on Assets - YTD0.68%
Return on Equity - YTD9.15%
Annual Interest Income$287.2MM
Assets and Liabilities
AssetsQ4 2020vs Q4 2019$7.83B$4.79B
LoansQ4 2020vs Q4 2019$6.27B$3.57B
DepositsQ4 2020vs Q4 2019$5.73B$4.24B
Equity CapitalQ4 2020vs Q4 2019$516.4MM$484.7MM
Loan Loss AllowanceQ4 2020vs Q4 2019$52.3MM$48.2MM
Unbacked Noncurrent LoansQ4 2020vs Q4 2019$20.5MM$3.5MM
Real Estate OwnedQ4 2020vs Q4 2019$4.2MM$5.6MM
Rates
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Live Oak Bank Savings Account Rates

APYMINMAXACCOUNT NAMEVIEW DETAILS
0.60%-$5mHigh Yield Online Savings
0.60%-$5mBusiness Savings

Live Oak Bank CD Rates

APYMINMAXACCOUNT NAMEVIEW DETAILS
0.70%$2.5k$250k2 Year CD
0.70%$2.5k$250k3 Year CD
0.70%$2.5k$250k5 Year CD
0.70%$2.5k$250k4 Year CD
0.70%$2.5k$250kBusiness 2 Year CD
0.70%$2.5k$250kBusiness 3 Year CD
0.70%$2.5k$250kBusiness 4 Year CD
0.70%$2.5k$250kBusiness 5 Year CD
0.65%$2.5k$250k1 Year CD
0.65%$2.5k$250k18 Month CD
0.65%$2.5k$250kBusiness 1 Year CD
0.65%$2.5k$250kBusiness 18 Month CD
0.25%$2.5k$250k6 Month CD
0.25%$2.5k$250kBusiness 6 Month CD
Locations

Live Oak Bank is an Internet only bank and does not have branch locations. Its headquarters is located at 1741 Tiburon Drive - Wilmington, NC 28403

The financial institution, product, and APY (Annual Percentage Yield) data displayed on this website is gathered from various sources and may not reflect all of the offers available in your region. Although we strive to provide the most accurate data possible, we cannot guarantee its accuracy. The content displayed is for general information purposes only; always verify account details and availability with the financial institution before opening an account. Contact [email protected] to report inaccurate info or to request offers be included in this website. We are not affiliated with the financial institutions included in this website.