Investing in a CD is a great way to make money if you can commit your money to the full period of a CD and know that you won’t need those funds even in an emergency. When you’re looking to take out a CD you need to make sure you know the current CD rates on the market. The best way to do this is on the internet.
The internet is the easiest way to compare CDs from the best banks. You can literally compare rates from dozens of banks with the click of a button. In this forced competition atmosphere banks have to compete for your business so this is the best environment to find the best rates.
If you want to be very complete you can then check out what’s going on at your local banks. First go to your personal bank and see if they have any deals for current customers. After you do that check in with other local banks and look for advertisements. Banks will often advertise a particularly high CD rate in newspapers so that’s a good place to look.
The last place to look is the credit card companies. Many of these companies now offer certificates of deposit. Discover recently began offering CDs in addition to credit cards. These companies will often offer high rates to introduce consumers to their banking products.
It’s hard to predict exactly who is going to have the best CD rate at any one time. At times your local bank will have the best rate. Other times a big national bank will run a promotional high rate for a period of time. Credit unions are also a place you should look. Since the recession credit unions have been the best place to get a CD. The trade off is that you usually have to join a credit union unlike a bank.