Updated August 2022. Navy Federal Credit Union is the nation’s largest credit union, with a long history of serving active military members. More recently, they have expanded their field of membership to include veterans and family members of veterans. NavyFed often offers special rates on their share certificates, and they just released the following for August 2022:
- 33-Month Regular/IRA/ESA Certificate at 3.30% APY. $1,000 minimum and a $100,000 maximum balance. Additional deposits are allowed at any time, subject to the maximum balance.
- EasyStart Certificate at 3.00% APY. Open with as little as $50. Make additional deposits anytime (up to $3,000). 12-month term. Certificate owner(s) age 18 and older must have Direct Deposit of Net Pay or payroll allotment and a Navy Federal checking account within 90 days of the certificate issue date.
The new 33-month CD is most interesting because of the add-on feature optionality. 3.30% is a competitive rate at this moment, although not the top rate. However, as long as you open the CD with $1,000 initially, you now have the option of adding on more funds in the future (up to $100,000 maximum). This can be appealing if rates ends up dropping. This time it is also available for regular taxable accounts (not just IRAs).
I simply transferred $1,000 to my NavyFed share savings account via ACH, and then used those funds to open this special certificate.
Fine print:
1 Limit one 33-Month Special Certificate (Share/IRA/ESA) per member. The 33-Month Special Certificate is available July 11, 2022. Effective July 11, 2022, the stated Annual Percentage Yield (APY) was 2.60%. Effective August 1, 2022, the stated Annual Percentage Yield (APY) is 3.30%. Navy Federal reserves the right to end or modify this offer or update the stated Annual Percentage Yield (APY) at any time. The 33-Month Special Certificate (Share/IRA/ESA) has a $1,000 minimum balance and a $100,000 maximum balance. Additional deposits are allowed at any time, subject to the maximum balance. Once the promotional rate is applied to a purchased certificate, it will remain in effect for the length of the product term. IRA/ESA certificates are subject to IRS contribution limits. Penalties apply for early withdrawals from certificates. Other restrictions may apply. ?
Navy Federal Credit Union has solid bank and loan products, including checking accounts with ATM rebates, competitive mortgage rates, and limited-time 0% balance transfer promotions.
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Jonathan….I was about half way through their application process when I decided to check their reviews….which range from somewhat mixed to somewhat terrible especially on Yelp.
And then when I got down to their terms and conditions I noticed that an e-Checking account carries a $5/month fee which seems to be required to open a CD.
Looking beyond the 3.5% rate which sure looks attractive right now do you think the whole
package is really worth the effort?
Any predictions for the July 30th Fed meeting? It would seem with 224,000 new jobs this month there is no logical reason for another cut. But as soon as that number came out, Mass Media changed the entire narrative to an “insurance rate cut”. In my whole life I never heard of the Fed making an “insurance rate cut.
Any thoughts on which way they will go?
I don’t use NavyFed as my primary checking account, so I don’t really have a lot of customer service interactions with them. For my purposes, they have been fine.
I have the Free EveryDay Checking. No monthly fees, no minimum balance. No ATM rebates, but again I don’t use the ATM card. Just be sure to have some sort of activity (transfer in, out) once a year to avoid having a dormant account.
I’ve seen some 5 year Fixed Annuities at 4%. And they allow you to take some withdrawals if you want to.
“This 3-month certificate rate would be a top rate”
Which 3 month certificate? Do you mean the 37 month one?
Looks like the easy start CD is still yielding 3.5% APY despite the latest FED move.
I’m looking to open one of these for my son. Do you know what the typical lag time is between FED rate cuts and banks and CU’s dropping their APYs on savings products?