Not sure if this should be posted on a strip club site, but this pursuit of happiness is by no means inexpensive, so financial talk is perhaps not so far fetched.
Anyone have any thoughts on high yield savings accounts offered by the on-line banks? 4 to 5 percent interest is intriguing when my old school brick-and-mortar bank is paying virtually nothing.
The bulk of my money is invested in stocks, ETF’s and mutual funds, but I do want to keep low 5 figures on hand for any potential emergencies. But I’m earning less than the price of a stick of bubblegum per month.
How accessible is your money if I need it now? Any pros or cons?


I’d suggest one of two options for your cash to earn higher interest. Either go online and create an account at Treasury Direct, or open a brokerage account at Charles Schwab.
Treasury direct will allow you to purchase directly 4 week notes (or longer) and bonds with longer durations. Since this is cash you may need in an unforeseen pinch, I recommend purchasing only 4-8 week notes as their yields are at 5.45% and annualized at 5.7% or more (reinvested with interest). Once the note expires they’ll automatically returned to where you do your banking or you can auto renew to another 4 week or 8 week note by a push of the button.
If you prefer immediate liquidity of your cash, then direct it to a brokerage account (Schwab or fidelity), and once it has been deposited into your brokerage account simply by a short term etf like SGOV (1-3 month treasuries) or SHY (1-3 year treasuries). These are funds invested in US treasury notes and bills with a minute charge. The SGOV still gives me close to 5.4% ROR and the SHY is around 5%, but at least my 1-3 year duration on the SHY fund is guaranteed for a longer duration. You could go out further on the yield curve 7-10 years with IEF etf, but my guess is rates on the long end will rise so you’re better of sticking shorter duration. The problem with going to the online banks that offer higher yields on their money markets is that you’ll only get that rate for a minute until the fed decides to cut rates, which is about to happen soon(albeit only a 1/2 % or so). The treasury direct or brokerage account option will lock in your rate of return for a longer duration than those online banks, which will only have the high yield temporarily. The brokerage account funds on short term durations can be liquidated immediately for your needs, and the treasury direct option allows you to ladder out your amounts for differing periods in case you can’t wait too long for them to expire. Good luck, you got some homework but after a couple hours of research you’ll be getting 4-5% higher return on your cash.