In a prior post, I gave three quick ways to greatly reduce the volume of junk mail and telemarketing calls that you receive. Those tips do not cover “Current Resident” mailings or some Catalog mailings, particularly from companies you may have ordered from in the past. Well, here are 3 quick, FREE ways to reduce your catalog and current resident junk mail.
1) Opt-out of Val-Pak coupon mailings. These guys are high volume “current resident” mailers, and the mailing are untargeted. It’s like blanketing the Earth with random flyers and hoping that people will buy things from you.
2) Opt-out of ADVO mailings. This is the same type of mailing as Val-Pak.
3) The best one that I’ve seen is CatalogChoice.org This site allows you to specifically seek out catalogs that you are receiving and get your name off the list.
The purpose here is threefold. Getting less junk mail simplifies your life. There is less garbage to throw away or recycle this way. Next, there is a positive environmental impact, which CatalogChoice articulates nicely. Finally, the less of this junk that you get, the less likely you’ll be to buy things that you don’t need AND encourage more companies to send you even more catalogs to repeat the cycle!
Perhaps you’ve seen a TV ad here and there advertising some great rate on an online only savings account or certificate of deposit. HSBC Direct, ING, and E-Trade come to mind for me. E-Trade loves to tout the fact that their savings account yields 8 times the national average. Well that sounds very impressive, and if it motivates you to find a better place to park your savings, then great! But don’t sign up just yet…
Use BankRate.com to find the best opportunities, and check that these opportunities are relatively safe. First, go to the checking and savings tab, and be sure to select “High Yield MMA/Savings”. This will show you all the high yield savings products available. Very many of these products are FDIC insured, and the site also shows you a star rating to indicate how “safe and sound” the institution is. This information can be accessed separately as well.
Here is a checklist of things to watch for when evaluating these accounts.
1) FDIC Insurance — As I said, most if not all of what’s on BankRate is FDIC-insured, but it would be negligent not to double check.
2) Safe and Sound star rating — 3 or more stars indicates that this institution shows no signs of trouble. Bank failures that make the news are rare, but I do recall NetBank going belly up in 2007, but this bank had a one-star rating long before that happened.
3) Annual Percentage Yield (APY) – Superior returns…this is why we are bothering with this in the first place!
4) Minimum Balance Required to Open — Many have no minimums.
5) Fees — Many are no fee accounts.
6) Number of Withdrawals Allowed Per Month — These accounts tend to be dressed up money markets, and as such typically restrict withdrawals to somewhere in the area of 3 to 6 per month.
7) How to Make Deposits and Withdrawals — In order to give you these great yields, most of these products are online-only, meaning that you link them to a checking account at another institution and transfer money to and from the savings account online only, but some of these will offer a debit card for withdrawals as well.
The king of this space is ING Direct. Despite the fact that they are not at the top of the APY list, lots of folks seem to like them because of the additional features they provide, such as sub-accounts for specific savings goals and linking to multiple external accounts.
You can also repeat this process to find the best deals on certificates of deposit, but in today’s interest rate environment, you may find that that the yields you can get on a CD are not much better than what you can get on a savings / money market account.
Happy saving!