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Barclays vs. Ally Bank: Which Online Bank is Better?GMAC Bank Raises Money Market Savings to 5.25%
POSTED ON BY Ken Tumin
With all the buzz lately with the new E-LOAN savings account, GMAC Bank may have decided to create some of its own buzz with a large rate increase on its money market savings account. The rate increased from 5.00% to 5.25% APY. The last money market rate hike at GMAC was on July 28th when it went from 5.05% to 5.10% APY. This didn't last long. The next week it fell back to 5.00% APY and has remained there until today. Hopefully, this 5.25% won't drop any time soon.
Although E-LOAN's savings account has a higher rate, there are some advantages with GMAC Bank's Money Market Savings account. The biggest advantage in my opinion is that it offers limited check writing. You can write up to 3 checks per month from this account (and the first 50 checks are free). The other big advantage is GMAC's bank-to-bank transfer system. You can easily established links to many external accounts online. Transfers done through GMAC are fast.
For those who are just deciding to get into online banking, GMAC Bank would be a good choice. In addition to check writing, they deliver monthly paper statements in the mail. So it will look a lot like the accounts that you currently have with brick-and-mortar banks.
Please, refer to my GMAC Money Market Account review post for more information. In addition to listing the benefits and downsides to the money market account, I describe my experiences with opening this account. A reader had asked if I had any new pros or cons about this account after 6 months. The only negative that I can think of is that their money market and CD rates have fallen behind in the last few months. But as I describe in that post, GMAC does have a history of competitve rates, and as today shows, they haven't dropped out of the high yield game.
There were also changes in GMAC Bank's CD rates. Short term CD rates went up significantly. However, some of the long term CD rates dropped again. GMAC Bank now has a very inverted yield curve with a money market rate that's higher than the 5-year CD rate. Below shows how the yields have changed in the last few weeks:
For more information on opening a GMAC Bank CD, please refer to this post.
Thanks to the reader who mentioned this rate update in the finding deals post.
Although E-LOAN's savings account has a higher rate, there are some advantages with GMAC Bank's Money Market Savings account. The biggest advantage in my opinion is that it offers limited check writing. You can write up to 3 checks per month from this account (and the first 50 checks are free). The other big advantage is GMAC's bank-to-bank transfer system. You can easily established links to many external accounts online. Transfers done through GMAC are fast.
For those who are just deciding to get into online banking, GMAC Bank would be a good choice. In addition to check writing, they deliver monthly paper statements in the mail. So it will look a lot like the accounts that you currently have with brick-and-mortar banks.
Please, refer to my GMAC Money Market Account review post for more information. In addition to listing the benefits and downsides to the money market account, I describe my experiences with opening this account. A reader had asked if I had any new pros or cons about this account after 6 months. The only negative that I can think of is that their money market and CD rates have fallen behind in the last few months. But as I describe in that post, GMAC does have a history of competitve rates, and as today shows, they haven't dropped out of the high yield game.
There were also changes in GMAC Bank's CD rates. Short term CD rates went up significantly. However, some of the long term CD rates dropped again. GMAC Bank now has a very inverted yield curve with a money market rate that's higher than the 5-year CD rate. Below shows how the yields have changed in the last few weeks:
:
Term 9/15 APY 9/22 APY 9/29 APY 10/06 APY
3 month 4.95% 4.95% 4.95% 5.25%
6 month 5.00% 5.00% 4.95% 5.30%
9 month 5.30% 5.30% 5.20% 5.30%
12 month 5.35% 5.35% 5.25% 5.30%
18 month 5.30% 5.30% 5.20% 5.30%
2 years 5.30% 5.35% 5.20% 5.15%
3 years 5.30% 5.30% 5.20% 5.15%
4 years 5.30% 5.30% 5.20% 5.15%
5 years 5.35% 5.35% 5.20% 5.20%
For more information on opening a GMAC Bank CD, please refer to this post.
Thanks to the reader who mentioned this rate update in the finding deals post.
A quick note of thanks for keeping up with all of these rates. I'm seriously thinking of moving most of my money from ING, if they don't get with the program soon.
Your site totally rocks,
NCN
This comment is part of my "100 Comments Series" over at No Credit Needed
I initiated a GMAC account set-up today. It was easy, my only real surprise being that the initial deposit has been dated to take place further in the future than I'd expected, only by a few days.
At present it lists the applicable APR as 5.02 (APY 5.15), but it shows my balance as $0 so I assume that once the initial deposit actually gets there the tiered higher rate will come into effect.
Even 5.02 is looking good to me!
Thanks again!
Hopefully they will update that soon.
further in the future than
you expected because
Monday is a bank holiday
(Columbus Day).
1. GMAC does not tell me of the lock. I found it out by myself when I try to setup a transfer.
2. I called several GMAC CSRs and supervisor. No one could tell why my acct was restricted.
3. They all refused to transfer or give me a phone number of their "Operation" dept which restricted my acct.
I am VERY frustrated.
I sent an email to GMAC about the credit pull for opening a money market account and got this response(quite quickly I might add)...
"Thank you for contacting GMAC Bank. The credit check
would be a soft hit on your credit report."
I was thinking about going to Amtrust Direct, but I take it GMAC might be a better place to start. Is it better going with a MMA or a savings account?
VERY frustrated as well.
I called and one CSR noted that many people's accts are locked, not only me.
I would accept they locked acct for security reasons. But I would NOT accept their NO communication at all and refusing communications!
Also they just lied about calling me once they got the the fax. They NEVER call me at all after I faxed TWICE!
It's clear that these banks need to improve their process for handling this issue. I wonder if the bad CSR issue is due to them being overloaded or is it just bad procedures. Seems like CSRs are doing a very bad job at communications.
Please keep us updated on your progress of getting back access.
It is good to have a working bank account:)