Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Fortunoff (in Hewlett) 29% off
Monday, February 18, 2008
Sunday, February 17, 2008
Circuit City 10% off
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
Staples $30 off $150 coupon
Monday, February 11, 2008
Best Buy 10% off
Lord & Taylors 15% and 20% off
J. Jill's $25 off of $50 coupon
Express Coupon for 15% off
Borders 40% off cds and 20% off other stuff coupons
Take 20% off of everything else (well, one item), good until 2/18/08.
When you shop online through Ebates, you get an additional 3% off your purchase.
Border's store locator is here.
Thursday, February 7, 2008
Save up to 18% at Barnes and Noble
For a free $25 gift card to Barnes and Noble, just apply for their Visa card and use it once. If you are a true B&N bibliophile, you will receive 5% off at their stores and at bn.com whenever you use it. Their rewards program gives you additional $25 B&N gift cards whenver you accumulate 2,500 points. Even if you use the card only once and then cancel it, it's worth the application for the free $25 gift card.
First Banking Center offers 6.01% APY
So here's an anomaly. First Banking Center, which is an FDIC-insured bank based in Burlington, Wisconsin, is offering a 6.01% APY Rewards Checking account, which is pretty remarkable right now, considering that the Fed rate keeps dropping. The catch is, it is for amounts under $25,000! On any deposit amount over $25,000, you earn a measly 0.50% APY.
The account also has some other strange requirements. You must use your debit card at least 10 times in a month (!), you must set up either direct deposit or ACH auto-debits, and you must "think green" and receive online (as opposed to paper) statements. If you fail to meet any of these three requirements in a month, you will receive only 0.10% APY on your balance, which is like no money at all...on a $25,000 balance, that comes to about $2.08/month (versus the $125.21/month that you would have gotten at 6.01%). Whether or not you meet the serequirements, they reimburse you for ATM fees, there are no minimum balance requirements and no monthly fees.
This account is not for me, largely because of the ten monthly debit card transactions. I'm a credit card points chaser. But if you don't care about points, all you need to do is set up an automatic payment to a utility like the gas company or electric company, or get your paycheck deposited directly (which you should do anyway), and you can earn a nice tidy little pile of interest for a chunk of your nest egg. What's nice about this APY is that it doesn't seem to be introductory either...as long as you can meet their requirements, it's yours.
Revolution
Revolution Money Exchange is an amazing service. Like Paypal, they allow you to transact money between two parties, but unlike Paypal, they don't charge for it. They are listed with the FDIC (which you can look up here), and they are backed by First Bank & Trust, Brookings, South Dakota (Member FDIC). Since they are technically a bank, they do ask for a social security number for identity purposes, which had my red flag waving, but they do not perform a hard credit check so total impact on your credit is ZERO.
Best of all, they will give you $25 for signing up and me $10 for referring you. Once you are signed up, you can send your friends the same deal...they make $25 and you make $10 for each referral. This is a no-lose situation. Even if you close the account, you can still walk away with at least $25, for filling out a 20-second form. Another no-brainer. And I have checked these guys out; they are reputable. If you would like to sign up for the $25, please email me with the email address you plan to use for the account I will happily email you a referral. Enjoy the money!
Ebates
There are many, many shifty, unscrupulous ways to make money on the Internet. There are also time-consuming, pain-in-the-neck ways, where you have to click and click and click, you've got to accumulate points that turn into stupid rewards, etc.
Ebates is neither of these.
I have received three checks from Ebates so far. That's right, CHECKS. For CASH. Each one was over $50. Even if you buy something once a year off the Internet, you should sign up for Ebates; it is worthwhile. They have every major online retailer in their stable, and some minor ones too. If you want to buy from a store that is not listed on Ebates, send them the name of the store and wait a few days...more often than not, that name will be added to their list. All you have to do is shop through Ebates, and you get a percentage back in cash. This is a no-brainer. Seriously.
Click here to get $10 automatically deposited in your Ebates account, until February 14th. After 2/14, you will get $5 deposited in your Ebates account.
If you can think of a good reason not use Ebates, please contact me and let me know.