Savings in the News: July 6, 2009

I hope everyone had a great Independence Day weekend. Now that most of us are back to work, we're also back to thinking about savings. Here are some articles about savings accounts that caught my eye recently.

The Charlotte Observer has an article about different savings plans in light of recent economic difficulties. One person profiled discussed using gold coins to pay off his credit cards!

Construction worker Tony Anthony, 54, saves when he can but says he doesn't do it systematically. He has a 401(k), but mainly deposits money into a savings account so he can reach it if he needs it in a couple months. For instant access to cash? Anthony gets 10 one-dollar gold coins out of the bank each month and puts them in an 18-inch copper piggy bank. That's come in handy when he needs to pay off credit card debt immediately.

“I recently paid the credit card company $1,265 with the gold coins,” he said.


Meanwhile, the Four Pillars blog has an article on the benefits of an online high-yield savings account (such as the ones you can acquire through MoneyAisle):

One of the times in your life when you might have a lot of cash is when you are saving up a down payment for a house. Sums like $10,000, $25,000, $50,000 are not unreasonable for someone who has been saving for a while. In this scenario we have savings of $35,000 and we are going to buy a house in exactly 1 year. Should you be happy with getting 1.0% from your bank or should you shop around for a higher rate of around 2%?