Comments on: Time pressure = bad decisions

By: tony

tony — Fri, 22 Dec 2006 12:28:39 +0000

I would have bought or sold a good stock Future

By: Enrique

Enrique — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 17:21:08 +0000

By law, Banks have to report deposits greater than $10,000 cash to guard against laundering drug money to the Federal Reserved Bank.

By: moom

moom — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 03:16:46 +0000

Setting up new accounts usually takes time due to security provisions…. I guess if you don’t know this you are upset that you are losing interest, but the answer is to be prepared and open it before you need it.

By: Brendan

Brendan — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 23:32:17 +0000

I have to agree that HSBC is painfully slow in their process. It seems that things get parked at various points in the process and are waiting for someone to look at them.

Besides the length of setup time, HSBC has been a wonderful bank with excellent service.

By: Landlord Shmandlord

Landlord Shmandlord — Tue, 12 Dec 2006 01:56:05 +0000

"If you find yourself under the gun to make a financial decision quickly, I'm willing to bet it's almost always a bad decision."

It is amazing how many salespeople/businesses/etc try to take advantage of this.

I've also found that people (including myself) tend to be more susceptible to these types of schemes when purchasing real estate (high excitement, nervousness, etc). That is, unless they're consciously looking out for sharks.

As you said, in these types of situations you have to remember that it is O.K. to pause and carefully think through the situation at hand.

Or, you could just GO GO GO.

By: jon

jon — Mon, 11 Dec 2006 22:38:51 +0000

hsbc is the worst for setting up online high yield savings, such a slow process through mail. emigrant is usually up to par and has good rates and recently updated their site.

By: Eric M.

Eric M. — Mon, 11 Dec 2006 21:46:30 +0000

Ramit, I think you missed the point! This isn’t about getting rich, this is about taking advantage of a window of opportunity (in this case, one month) to leverage the $80k. I agree that it’s not much money we’re talking about, but I think the point is that Vanessa was saying “I recognize a short-term opportunity here that I don’t want to lose,” which I can respect. If she had $400,000 liquid in a very-short-term situation (as I did once) you can bet that every day of dumping into a quickie 30-day account would make a larger difference. (In my case? I couldn’t risk the money so I hustled it into a 45-day CD as quickly as I could!)

By: kms2

kms2 — Mon, 11 Dec 2006 21:43:00 +0000

How does she have that much cash and no high yield savings account? It seems like she should have planned this out better. She shouldn’t be upset at the banks, she should be upset at herself.

By: Ramit Sethi

Ramit Sethi — Mon, 11 Dec 2006 20:41:12 +0000

Yep, got the question last week by email. I agree about the phone call, too.

By: eR0CK

eR0CK — Mon, 11 Dec 2006 20:38:26 +0000

Was this really asked of you? I’d imagine a quick call to the bank would have expedited the process.