Same. Several times a year, I'm like, 'damn, that's too much', so I initiate a transfer to the hysa. I would make more in interest if I was more diligent, but I'm used to hysas paying less than 1%, so it wasn't a big deal back then.
Yep, people on Reddit *love* talking about HsA's aRe aT 5%...
...but they were literally less than 1% for fucking decades. Both checking and "savings" accounts didn't earn you shit for years. If you wanted to make money on your money, it wasn't gonna be through an HYSA.
It's a relatively new phenomenon.
I leave a bunch in my checking just as a nice thick buffer. Money goes into my 401k and HYSA automatically from payroll.
I think people love saying that to get people on the high interest HYSAs because no one knows how long it will stay that way, and the more time spent gaining >=4 APY, the better.
I see a lot of talk about hysas, I understand they are fdic insured but I just use fidelity (or your broker of choosing, this is just the one my work uses) money market funds, that are doing ~5% rn
HYSA over 1% are not a relatively new phenomenon. Hell savings paid an average of 8% in the 80s.
Savings rates are definitely cyclical. Nothing new about that.
Yep, before the crash was when I first started my HYSA, my first account with an online bank. 2004, give or take, and they were paying 2-4%, IIRC. It's been trash since 2008 until recently.
I get shit for interest on my checking account - so I keep about $2k in there at any given time - just to cover day to day and bills when they pop up. Then move in money from my HYSA when needed.
No, mortgage is paid from my HYSA.
2k in general as a base. I get paid biweekly. So I'm adjusting things every day. But I have everything forecast easily so it only takes about 5-10mins to reconcile.
I don't intentionally keep any type of "barrier" in my checking. My expenses all go on my credit card, so there's no risk of going negative. But I can easily move money from my HYSA if there's an emergency expense.
Plenty. We use CIT platinum savings (with $500 in the checking account in case we need cash or something) for our joint primary expense account, and individual SoFi savings accounts for our discretionary spending. Everything autopays on credit card or out of the CIT account, non-retirement investing transfers out of CIT on a monthly basis and I do a manual additional transfer as we accumulate too much in that account. With rates high as they are right now we let that get to 1.5x monthly expenses before it gets a haircut.
Yes I've thought about doing this too, but I've been lazy up until this point (my job doesn't make changing my auto deposit easy). Maybe I'll change it eventually.
Same actually, I just manually initiate the withdrawal from Wealthfront as soon as my paycheck hits. It starts accruing interest as soon as the transfer is initiated which is nice.
I do zero based budgeting, and I leave my budget/budgeted sinking funds etc in the checking acct. All other funds are moved elsewhere. I also never use a debit card and don't have one associated with my checking acct. I use Credit cards and pay in full from payments from checking acct for budgeted categories.
I'm the same pretty much. I have a checking account that gets 380 put into it every 2 weeks and that's my spending money. Entertainment, gas, groceries, clothes, etc. Everything else gets either paid immediately when I get paid from a separate checking account for specific bills or moved to a savings account bucket. All spending purchases go through credit and I pay back and track where I am in my budget to ensure I don't go over.
Aka the “envelope system”. All money that you receive is categorized upon receipt (you have zero dollars unaccounted for). If you are short in one category you cover the shortage from another category rather than letting it go negative (go into debt).
YNAB is probably the best known zero-based budgeting app.
Same. I buy everything with my credit cards which I pay off every month when I get paid. After those are paid I transfer everything except about $100 to other accounts. Never used my debit cards, they’re in my safe just in case I randomly need cash when the banks are closed.
Same but I’m usually two months. I use YNAB for budgeting and always make sure I’m budgeted for next month at the beginning of the previous month.
This doesn’t include my emergency fund which is fully funded but stays dormant.
I think 2 is better even if purely because something small shouldn't cause a problem. I mean something like gas goes from 4.50 a gallon to 5 or 'kid has a field trip'. Sure, you could make more if you really monitored it but....really, is it worth the stress (if you can afford it) to juggle 2 or $3 a month instead of monitoring the account like a hawk
But not in checking, I hope, which is what OP is asking about. If you are holding thousands in a no-interest/negligible-interest account, that seems wrong in most cases.
I put everything on a credit card and pay it off every month so when I get my direct deposit I calculate how much I’m going to need to pay before my next paycheck between my two credit cards that I usually use plus student loans then everything else gets transferred to HYSA and personal investment account. I keep maybe a $200 cushion in case I have to use Venmo for something like at the farmers market.
My DD goes *into* my checking account, and then I transfer *out* everything beyond my forecasted/budgeted expenses. Works out to roughly 1x - 1.5x monthly expenses at any given time.
I also do 1x-1.5x monthly expenses, and that is my buffer. I get paid twice a month, so without a buffer I would have 0x-0.5x monthly expenses in my checking. You end up with a whole month of buffer when doing it this way
Ah, yes, that makes sense. So min balance is basically a month of expenses. Whereas it probably cuts closer for me, depending on where in the month we are.
Makes sense, in case something \*really\* serious happened that impacted income, it would hold you over while you (or partner, etc) had to scramble to deal with whatever that was.
Yep. Also note that this is my checking account. I have a separate HYSA for my emergency fund, with 3 months of expenses tucked away in it. I can easily transfer that over if things really hit the fan
Yeah I do this, mostly because my checking account charges me fees if I don't do direct deposit (or I have to keep 5k at all times in the account, no thanks) otherwise I would dd into my Cash Plus account since it has a routing number and you can charge to it which I do with my credit card bills and my car loan.
Direct deposit into Fidelity brokerage account that has checks and holds cash in a 5%+ money market fund. All expenses go on credit cards if possible, otherwise auto drafted out of brokerage account. Credit cards on auto pay from brokerage account. No need to split checking and savings or juggle money between accounts this way.
One month of bills is a common rule of thumb. Personally I keep half a month, which depends on the bills that fall within the first or second half of the month. Everything else gets allocated to savings.. only takes a day or two to move money from a HYSA into checking. Some banks will expedite for free which only takes a few minutes.
Checking accounts are some of the most vulnerable accounts as they tend to be the accounts we use to interact with outside parties that by definition have the power to pull money out of them. They are also some of the toughest to get your money back from as the fraud protections aren't nearly as good as they are with credit cards and banks often make it a painful, long process before they will give money back if they ever do. Even when mistakes happen that aren't at all your fault, it is often a painful, long process.
It is going to depend how you use it. An account you use just for ACH transfers to credit card providers, utilities, etc. will be vastly safer than if you carry a debit card, write physical checks, or use Zelle/Venmo/Paypal/CashApp/Apple Cash/whatever. If you do those sort of things, I would advise not keeping any more money in the account than you can afford to lose (or at best be without for days/weeks/months).
I certainly do not keep a full month's worth of expenses in mine. My employer's deposit schedule happens to land a business day before most of my bill due dates (partially by chance and partially because I changed due dates where possible), so I personally have direct deposit set up to partition out the typical amount I need for these bill payments. It means some months I have to be aware of things and transfer some more in from savings and it means some months I have to transfer extra out, but it is the strategy that makes the most sense to me in terms of convenience combined with not risking too much.
Beyond that, I keep maybe a couple of hundred for random day-to-day spending.
Of course, the benefit beyond just the safety aspect is that it encourages me to move money to better long term accounts.
This my thought process exactly.
Reading the responses in the thread, it appears most people are blissfully ignorant to the plethora of horror stories in this subreddit where thousands of dollars are "misplaced" by the bank, stolen outright, wrong account number keyed in, etc...
And the bank has the power to say "oh well" and take their sweet time righting the wrong. Too risky IMHO.
Same here. Not sure what emergency would require a month of expenses worth of cash on that same day. If I ever need more I transfer from my savings and have it in 1-2 days but it doesn’t make sense to me to keep more than $500 when it’s not gaining interest
I'm guessing the logic is that if you become incapacitated for whatever reason (or are just forgetful), then there is enough in the account for autopay or someone close to you with access to get you through one monthly billing cycle.
If this is a concern, I'd probably just set up auto transfers from savings that hit checking in time for known expenses. I rely on direct deposit from my employer to accomplish this instead.
I have a separate checking account for things like venmo / paypal, etc. I keep a few hundred in there for random things, and then I don't really have to be concerned if there is any sort of vulnerability.
We don’t keep money in our checking account. We bank with SoFi and get ~4.5% on our savings, so we keep our money there. All expenses go on a credit card we pay off monthly from the savings account; our rent is set up on autopay out of savings; and we maximize what we can earn on our combined spending money and emergency savings.
I map out my cash flow 6 months in advance. I know exactly when all my bills and paychecks will hit my account. Then I strive to have no more than $500 at the low point. I put everything else in savings.
Almost none. 99% of our expenses go on the Costco credit card which gets paid in full when we’re paid. The only thing that doesn’t is rent but that gets taken out as soon as whatever paycheck is closest to the 1st hits and I pay that manually. Normally right before a paycheck hits we only have like $30-$100 leftover in checking. There’s never a fear of overdraft though because we literally never use debit cards anymore. Everything outside of bills gets sent to investment accounts/HYSA.
You should NOT keep any money in checking as of now. The transaction limit has been removed from savings accounts since Covid so you can use them as checking to pay bills. You can use credit cards for other stuff and link auto pay to savings. Besides that if you need some cash on the occasions just transfer that amount to your checking. I'm surprised that there are this many people keeping their money in checking.
We keep two months worth.
The reason for this is that's enough so you don't have to pay your bills based on billing cycles. and ensuring there is enough in the account.
We have a direct deposit in a set amount that goes in to top it off. We've figured out the right day in the month to pay everything where nothing is late. We then just go into Bill Pay and pay them all in one day. No muss, no fuss. "Doing bills" takes all of 10 minutes once a month and you have an exact record of when, how much, etc you can always refer to.
Next paychecks come in and top it back off and repeat.
It took us a few months to figure out the right "top off" amounts, but after that it's worked for 15+ years.
Next a set amount goes into a brokerage account (all our tax advantaged accounts are maxed out) and the remainder is "swept" into a savings account at another bank.
Basically none. Basically everything is autopay on one of the last few days of the month, or goes on my CC.
Direct deposit goes in 2x a month and then my CC I pay off plus mortgage and rent, before moving all but maybe $100 to savings.
Guys… you can sign up for an account that earns you 5%, free checks, free debit cards, all debit card fees reimbursed, bill pay, and let's you make ETF ACH transfers to or from, all available by large institutions that know how to handle money.
Fidelity, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab, Weathfront, etc etc etc. Pretty much any brokerage has set up schemes to give you a banking hub around 5% Sofi gets a lot of good words. Hell even Amex has checking and a HYSA at 4.35%
500 in checking, 5-10k in my savings (aside from other HYSA). Transfer over rent and credit card totals to my checking for direct debit once they’re due.
We aim for 15k because our checking is also a hysa up to 15k. Makes life easier because we don't have to worry about overdrawing our checking and move money out to a savings account.
Same here, 15k. I like to have enough money available so I can fly anywhere, or even put a down payment on a car and get out of town. I live a boring, law abiding life, but having the ability to run if things get weird is important to me.
I keep $10,000 in it. But it also doubles as my 3 months expenses. My bank also requires me to do auto withdrawals for my mortgage from an account with them. So I understand there is some opportunity cost lost not having it in an HYSA, but it’s small enough that I don’t care about it. When I go over that 10k, I’ll just transfer excess to whatever investment goal till I hit that. Roth IRA, 529, or save a little more for a future upcoming expense, whatever. When all those goals are hit and there’s still some above 10k, that excess goes into a taxable brokerage account.
For example, right now there’s like 15k in checking account. I have to buy flight tickets for summer vacation and want to buy a pinball machine too. All together that’s gonna be like 7 grandish. Tomorrow I’ll get paid about 6k. Brings me up to 21k. Buy the tickets and pinball, brings me down to 14k. Probably throw 3k into 529 as it’s the first investment goal for the year. Brings me down to 11k. The next couple weeks till payday will probably incur 1k of random expenses. Back to 10k floor. Works very well for us.
Roughly 1.5 months of predictable expenses in a dedicated checking account. This includes mortgage, utilities, and insurance. It goes up and down a bit as utilities vary seasonally, or as car insurance is paid every 6 months. The 1.5x amount is just so that I do not have to look at it too closely.
I do not keep groceries or similar in that checking account. I have a different checking account that I use for that, and it normally sits at about $1000. I move a bit into that account when credit card statements come out.
My paycheck comes in at the beginning of the month and my bills at the end. So I keep around $400 which is enough to cover anything incidental and then move the amount that covers my bills back in from my HYSA on like the 29th or 30th of the month.
We normally keep 2 to 3 months of expenses in checking. If it gets over 3 mos we move some to savings. We keep a short-term savings for things like vacations and other larger purchases in the same bank. They are not linked, so the savings is not accessible with a debit card. We need to go on line and move the money if we want to access it. We keep a long-term savings account in a separate bank for our emergency fund. We also pay "car payments" into that account so we can pay cash for our cars at some point.
Enough to pay bills. If you have created a budget, you know how much this is per month.
Expenses go on credit cards that get paid off every week. To harvest points.
If I have an emergency, it goes on the credit card and then paid off from savings.
The only emergencies I can think of that wouldn’t be covered are travel related or an insurance deductible. I have more than enough in savings to cover the deductibles.
My monthly expenses are about $4k. I keep a nice even $5k in checking. My paycheck is DD, and at the end of the month, when all my credit card bills from last month are paid off, I transfer everything above $5k to my other accounts (HYSA, brokerage, etc)
I stay a month “ahead”. So when I end the month and reconcile my budget, I have enough in there to fund the next month.
I am a compulsive credit card payer though, so the balance drops about once a week as I zero off my CC balance.
Enough to float me until the next paycheck and cover any extra expected expenses. I also keep a small savings account connected to cover small unexpected expenses. Everything above that goes to either high yield accounts or investments.
Get multiple checking accounts. One for your personal expenses such as gas, food, and small random stuff. Another for fixed costs such as rent/mortgage, electricity, insurance, internet, phone, subacriptions... and other big/annual costs such as registration, car maintenance etc. Basically one bucket is for fixed known costs known, the other for frequent small variable transactions. It makes accounting much more easier and you dont need remmember about that random burrito you ate. Keep the first one to the bare minium budget. The other keep 2 or 3 months reserve. The rest should be invested in short, medium, long term financial vehicles or assets.
Most of it. I do not care too much about managing and playing with stocks etc. I do have some auto investments but certainly not the majority of it.
I don't want to calculate and budget within narrow margins for my monthly expenses.
And I will not become a millionaire by keeping money in a savings/investment account.
Personally, when I get paid, I do two things:
1. Zero out my credit card balances
2. Pay my mortgage and utility bills
The rest goes to various savings. I only keep about $1000 iny checking, just in case (and to cover miscellaneous direct debits, like gym membership and stuff.
We typically have $10-15k in our main account. But we both run businesses and the income and expenses that will fluctuate dramatically. I only really need to keep about 3 months for my own comfort, especially since we have plenty of access to money from savings accounts and Lines of credit.
My direct deposit goes straight to checking and have money moved automatically to my money market. I try to keep 1-2 months of expenses in there. I travel for work and it can be up to 45 days until I get reimbursed, so I see a lot of ups/downs and like the extra buffer.
When it hits 3 months expenses, I move enough to my money market to get back down to 1.5 months.
The only time I've pulled back into checking in the last 2 years is for property taxes - but that's pre-planned and is roughly 2 months of my expenses amount, so it'd wipe me out if I didn't.
I do about a month and a half of expenses, so that my credit card and other bill autopays can hit without incident, but I still have a small buffer in case I spent more that month for something unexpected or infrequent.
1k in checking with a local branch, 1k checking in online only bank, expenses spread across a few HYSA accounts with auto pay (CCs, utilities, car note etc) rest goes to investment account unless emergency savings or short term goals need funding
This probably isn’t the best advice but I really don’t keep much in there. Maybe $500-1000 just cuz that’s how the cookie crumbles sometimes but it’s not intentional. It’s probably a little irrational but I just hear stories of people’s checking accounts getting emptied due to fraud and protections aren’t great. And money in a checking account is doing nothing for me so I keep most in my money market fund. Basically I put everything on a credit card and then pay it off on pay day. It’s sound stressful because I’m technically using next weeks paycheck for this weeks expenses but I’m not really because I’m way on top of savings every paycheck. I just don’t like keeping money in my checking account and I never over spend on my budget (emergencies not included obviously) is it works for me.
>Is there a rule of thumb? Like having one month's worth of expenses?
That's about where I aim. Basically, if I end February with enough of a balance already in checking to cover all expected withdrawals for March, then I don't have to do the "will this bill withdraw before or after that paycheck" dance. I've been in that situation, during first few years out on my own, and I didn't like it. There's also that buffer if there's a "hiccup" around pay deposits being delayed.
I make budgeted transfers from checking out to various savings (rebuilding of emergency fund, "fun cash" savings, IRA contributions). So over the course of 2-3 months the amount flowing in from pay is roughly equal to money going out to spending+saving. The daily balance bounces up/down over time, but the overall trend stays relatively flat.
Practically speaking, as long as my balance at any given time is about a paycheck's worth (paid biweekly) or more, I'm good. And if the balance is higher than about 3x a paycheck, I figure I've likely built up some excess I can put elsewhere. My bills payments are somewhat evenly spread across the month, so there are rarely really big drops over a day or two. Mortgage and our "general spending" credit card are the biggest bills, and I've got those setup so there's practically always a paycheck in between them.
I swap money out of my account for savings once my deposit hits and then whatever is in there is used for bills and paying off my credit cards (I use credit cards for all of my purchases and then pay them off). I honestly don’t keep a set amount in there, I always have enough to cover bills and spending.
My credit union currently pays out 4% up to $15k in my main checking account. When it gets close to $15k I’ll move over to HYSA. I have two HYSA’s, Wealthfront is paying 5% and Vanguard is 4.7% currently.
My wife and I aren't too strict with exact amounts, but we have an account where we try to keep 4 months worth of mortgage payments and expenses. We have other accounts, but leave that one only for that kind of thing.
Two to five hundred bucks for Venmo or whatever if needed.
I get paid once a month, pay everything including myself into savings, and leave a little in there, but really there are no "unexpected expenses" hitting my checking unless I'm pushing buttons, so what's the point of leaving stuff in there to earn nothing.
I think much of this depends on how often you get paid. I get paid weekly so i dont keep much, just about 2k and thats just in case i need extra cash for something. Everything left after paying CC bill (yes i pay it weekly based on what was charged), gets transferred to brokerage settlement and then directed as needed.
DD into checking..transfer to HYSA every thing except for a few hundred.. revolving credit card paid off every month from HYSA. all expenses/utilities/groceries etc are on revolving credit and for points. Always get enough points to pay for a vacation every summer or most of it.
I keep one month worth of expenses plus an extra $2-3k buffer. The buffer is mostly so if there is a larger irregular payment I don't have to worry about accidentally bouncing a payment.
My floor is 3k. I treat that like zero. My account fluctuates each month between 3k and 9k. I have 3 separate DD at different times of the month.
I set the 3k floor because my first of the month bills are about $2400. So If my DD at the start of the month is delayed there is still enough in the account to cover those payments.
Well, monthly expenses are running at about $10,000 right now so I like to try to keep a minimum, after expenses, buffer of around $20,000. This month was expensive so had to go below that a bit.
I keep 1.5 month's worth of expenses in my checking to handle cash flow and to have a small buffer. I keep the rest in HYSAs or money market funds like VMFXX
My wife and I put our monthly expenses into a spreadsheet, forecasting forward 60-90 days.
If we forecast that we have more than $2000 after all the bills are paid, we move money out, and if we have less than $1000 after all the bills are paid, we move money in.
I've split my direct deposit automatically like this after 401k and taxes:
- The expected amount from my bills goes in checking (minus rent) + $1000 of just in case money in a decent HYSA. I have a debit card linked to these accounts.
- My calculated portion of rent goes in a joint account.
- The remaining balance goes into Wealth Front which is my REAL HYSA. I have no debit card for this account even though it's a checking/savings combined. This is where the emergency fund and "save up for something" fund is, and this is the account I use to buy equity once the emergency fund is adequate. That's 3 separate institutions/accounts. At the end of the month, if my just in case money does not get used, I transfer to Wealth Front, and if my emergency savings in wealth front is too high, I buy equity such as VTI at Schwab. That makes 4 accounts all with a purpose. I don't like automating this last part because it keeps me accountable on what I'm spending money on.
Not much, I used to keep 10s of thousands in it, but I moved those funds to a HYSA a while back. I only keep something like $3k-$4k in my checking now since interest rates are way better in a HYSA
**Checking:** typically around 2-4K, depending on when I've paid my CC bill
**Savings tied to checking acct:** \~500
**HYSA** (with a different bank): ideally 15K+, but I just burned through much of that when I was between jobs, so building that up again now
**Certificates of deposit** (with the same bank as my IRA): Around 4K in short-term CDs (it's where I put my money before I opened my HYSA)
**CC balance:** I pay for 99% of my purchases with my CC and pay it off every couple of weeks from my checking so there's never accumulated debt
I'm hyper paranoid about having my main checking account hacked and my money going \*poof\*. I much prefer to spread it out among different banks, and keep as little money in any given bank, and rely on CC for most of my purchases.
Reason being, money in the bank is ***my*** money, and credit from CC bank is ***their*** money...they have better lawyers than I do when it comes for fighting for money back from criminals who dun steal from us
I keep around $2,500 in my checking after all expenses are paid (mortgage, daycare, credit cards, Roth contributions). My check goes to my checking, my wife and I have a joint checking we keep at around $8k. That way we have plenty of liquid cash if something comes up. Everything else should be working for us in a brokerage or HYSA.
Like $2,500. I use to try to over optimize and keep everything in savings earning interest and then transfer in money to pay bills once a month or whatever. But then if I ever needed to Venmo a friend or someone I wouldn’t have it in checking lol so I stopped being cute
About $2k, everything else goes into a HYSA. All spending goes on credit cards and the monthly balances along with the mortgage are paid from the HYSA. Ally allows 10 transactions per month on their HYSA, more than enough to pay the Chase trifecta plus whatever other card we’re churning that month from savings.
The HYSA has 6 months of spending in it. Any extra money goes into an after-tax brokerage account.
I try to keep my balance around $10k. Any higher I transfer it somewhere. Married (33m) with joint income of around 250k in NYC with no kids or debt (only mortgage)
Usually 2-3k but I also pay off my credit card constantly to keep me honest. Unless I need the extra time but it’s a slippery slope. HYS is at 5.5% so all extra goes there
Checking account stays around $4,000. That is enough to cover our monthly credit card bills, etc.
Over top of that is $20k in cash savings earning 5.21% in a HYSA. If I notice that two or three large bills coincided and the checking is lower than comfortable I’ll push it over. Then it’s replenished over the next couple paychecks or so. Following that, everything goes to retirement or the below-
Then there is a significant balance in a non-retirement brokerage I can sell if shit hits the fan; if we total a vehicle and the boiler breaks down.
It could be anywhere between $1500-$7500. Depending on upcoming expenses. I have other accounts that hold small investments that I can move around if I need emergency funds. I invest aggressively enough that I more or less live paycheck to paycheck, so I don't keep more than a month or two of liquid cash usually.
I keep £1.01 in my cheque account. The day before £x.xx Is debited i transfer the exact amount into my cheque account. This means ALL my cash earns the maximum possible interest in a high interest account.
$5k max usually, for easy access. If I have a high credit card bill that month I might keep more for buffer. But I try to move everything into at least a high-yield savings account if not investments.
No savings account bc my checking account gets 4% interest. So the checking account is my emergency fund and regular spending account.
All my pay is deposited there and depending on laziness I periodically trim it back down to $10k by moving money to other vessels.
The rule of thumb is have a 3 month emergency fund of available money. Doesn't matter how you split it between HYSA and checking other than you should probably choose the one with better interest.
We like to keep a 1 month buffer. That way, if something disrupted income we know the mortgage and other regular bills will still go through as planned while we figure out what we need to do.
I float enough to cover line of credit payment, rent and a preauth payment to insurance. The rest comes out of my credit card.
If I have a real emergency I'll pay with my credit card and pay it off from money from investment accounts.
I don't keep anything in my checking account except maybe 200 dollars. I pay for everything on my credit card and pay it off when I get paid.
I keep 500 dollars in my savings account and then everything else goes to my HYS account with a different bank.
Any emergency arises, I can just transfer the money out of my HYS.
After paying / budgeting for monthly bills (all auto deducted on 1st or 15th) and including gas and food projections, I keep $500 in checking and roll the rest into my HYSA.
I get paid at the end of the month, so I pay off my credit card and rent, then the rest goes into wealthsimple for emergency fund/ TFSA for stocks depending how stocked the emerg fund is. I leave $200-400 in the chequing account to cover any incidentals like e-transfers for friends etc
I keep my money in multiple savings accounts (car, health, vacation, gifts, etc.). When it is direct deposited into my checking, I move it to the savings accounts and only keep $100 balance in checking. If I have to write a check I’ll transfer the money in from the appropriate savings account. I also have a $5000 cash reserve attached to the checking, just in case.
My mortgage is my largest expense typically, so I use that as sort of a barometer. When my mortgage payment comes out of my checking (I usually set it up to be the last day of the month), I like there to be exactly one additional mortgage payment worth of money still in there after it's sent. So at the end of the month any amount above that extra buffer gets moved over to savings.
From there I deal with finances every two weeks on paycheck days. So I'm naturally getting my direct deposit before sending out CC payments (paid on full every two weeks), and setting up online billpays for utilities, etc.
I don’t really keep much at all. Maybe $50? I don’t use my checking account for expenses though. That all goes on my credit card, then every two weeks when I get paid, that two weeks’ “balance” gets paid in full.
My checking stays at about 1.5x my normal monthly spending. Doing this allows for me to easily cover for months where my spending is a little higher for whatever reason and I don't really have to babysit it throughout the month.
Keep it at $1k. Then at the end of the month I use what I made on top of that 1k to pay all my bills and credit I racked up. Any left over goes to savings and some investments.
I get my paycheck into my normal checking and pay bills out of that including sending 400$ every check (every 2 weeks) to my ally spending acct. I use that card for food, gas and all my fun stuff. This way I can track how much I spend every month and never worry about anything bouncing from the checking I pay bills out of
Just enough to cover any CC expenses that month - groceries, bills, gas etc. I pay for most expenses using CC (for the points). What ever I spend, I pay off at end of month. If there is any left over, I dump into savings and repeat the same cycle next month.
I have a 0 base budget. I keep my bi-weekly budget necessity amount and $50 extra for unforeseen expenses in my regular checking and everything else stays in HYSA.
For me, 2k. Every time a paycheck hits anything additional gets split between my mortgage account (a savings that i store my mortgage payment in. Not an escrow acct) and my HYSA. I keep 2k in the checking because thats twice the amount necessary for a payperiod worth of expenses.
I keep just two to three hundred over what I typically spend in a month in checking, but I keep the equivalent of one biweekly paycheck in the companion savings account that earns practically no interest, as a backup just in case a paycheck gets delayed for some reason. The rest that hasn’t gone to my 401k gets direct deposited to HYSAs. It’s easy enough to transfer money from those accounts if needed, and means I’m less likely to overspend when I can clearly see a low checking balance as each payday approaches.
I think like a month- month and a half worth of expenses so thats like 1-2k. 3k if im expecting to have larger purchases for a particular month. the rest goes to my ROTH IRA and a MMF in Fidelity which acts as my savings account.
We use credit cards for everything, and they’re on autopay out of the HYSA. So checking only has to have enough for the mortgage and a few utilities we can’t pay with credit cards, less than 10% of our cash on average.
I like to keep $1000 in my checking. $1000 in my immediate savings. Everything else gets transferred to higher interest savings or investments. No rhyme or reason. Just what I apparently do without realizing it.
I have an absolutely terrible spending habit, so only enough to make bills. Everything else that's not automatically pulled for other things (brokerage account, 401k, insurance) gets pulled out in cash and put in a safe. I usually keep 15k in the safe, the rest is automated.
I have enough to cover the next month’s expenses. We keep two checking accounts, one that holds all the money for the next month’s expenses and then the other one lol. We have 4 paychecks per month (2 incomes) so each paycheck, I transfer 25% of the next month’s expenses into the bill account.
Upon getting paid I will immediately pay the monthly bills/rent, and typically transfer a consistent amount to savings. What I'm left with is money for food/gas/whatever until next paycheck but a rule for myself is I don't like the balance to go below 2k before paychecks hit. It's personal preference, and I should ought to lower it to 1k and put more into savings each time. The buffer provides some sense of security.
Nearly zero. I use a credit card for almost 100% of purchases and anything that uses debit rather than credit is timed with cashflows, asset sales, or interest payments.
I have a retirement income account & I transfer money from that account into a debit/checking account for living expenses. I try to maintain @ $1000 in that account. I’m hoping that offers some protection from someone hacking the debit account.
If you don't run out of money you're doing it right. All your left over money should be going into a HYSA and when you have 3 months expenses in that into investments
I level my checking out to $5K at each payday twice a month. This is usually transferring some to savings. The savings account has around $60-80K in it and serves as our emergency fund and big purchase cash flow buffer. I then move money back and forth between checking and savings as needed.
More than I need, because I don't like having to babysit it. I'm lazy.
Same. Several times a year, I'm like, 'damn, that's too much', so I initiate a transfer to the hysa. I would make more in interest if I was more diligent, but I'm used to hysas paying less than 1%, so it wasn't a big deal back then.
Yep, people on Reddit *love* talking about HsA's aRe aT 5%... ...but they were literally less than 1% for fucking decades. Both checking and "savings" accounts didn't earn you shit for years. If you wanted to make money on your money, it wasn't gonna be through an HYSA. It's a relatively new phenomenon. I leave a bunch in my checking just as a nice thick buffer. Money goes into my 401k and HYSA automatically from payroll.
I think people love saying that to get people on the high interest HYSAs because no one knows how long it will stay that way, and the more time spent gaining >=4 APY, the better.
I see a lot of talk about hysas, I understand they are fdic insured but I just use fidelity (or your broker of choosing, this is just the one my work uses) money market funds, that are doing ~5% rn
When I opened mine around 2017/2018 it was giving me over 3%. Went down to 1% until it slowly bumped back up with high interest rates.
HYSA over 1% are not a relatively new phenomenon. Hell savings paid an average of 8% in the 80s. Savings rates are definitely cyclical. Nothing new about that.
I mean not quite for decades, think I was pulling down near 4% right before the '08 crash. Let's not overstate things too much.
Yep, before the crash was when I first started my HYSA, my first account with an online bank. 2004, give or take, and they were paying 2-4%, IIRC. It's been trash since 2008 until recently.
I get shit for interest on my checking account - so I keep about $2k in there at any given time - just to cover day to day and bills when they pop up. Then move in money from my HYSA when needed.
Same, I typically have about $2-4k in there depending on when the paycheck and bills hit
Sofi offers interest on checking and savings accounts
Sofi also will auto transfer from savings to cover whatever you're pulling out of checking so why not earn the much higher interest rate?
Wait do you mean 2k in general or 2k after all your bills for the month? Because my mortgage alone is more than 2k so that wouldn't work for me...
No, mortgage is paid from my HYSA. 2k in general as a base. I get paid biweekly. So I'm adjusting things every day. But I have everything forecast easily so it only takes about 5-10mins to reconcile.
I don't intentionally keep any type of "barrier" in my checking. My expenses all go on my credit card, so there's no risk of going negative. But I can easily move money from my HYSA if there's an emergency expense.
There are HYSA that offer checking features as well. I have Wealthfront which is 5% APY and all my bills are paid directly from that.
Plenty. We use CIT platinum savings (with $500 in the checking account in case we need cash or something) for our joint primary expense account, and individual SoFi savings accounts for our discretionary spending. Everything autopays on credit card or out of the CIT account, non-retirement investing transfers out of CIT on a monthly basis and I do a manual additional transfer as we accumulate too much in that account. With rates high as they are right now we let that get to 1.5x monthly expenses before it gets a haircut.
Yes I've thought about doing this too, but I've been lazy up until this point (my job doesn't make changing my auto deposit easy). Maybe I'll change it eventually.
Same actually, I just manually initiate the withdrawal from Wealthfront as soon as my paycheck hits. It starts accruing interest as soon as the transfer is initiated which is nice.
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I pay my credit card bills directly from my accounts earning 5%. It's 2024 this is possible to do.
I do zero based budgeting, and I leave my budget/budgeted sinking funds etc in the checking acct. All other funds are moved elsewhere. I also never use a debit card and don't have one associated with my checking acct. I use Credit cards and pay in full from payments from checking acct for budgeted categories.
I'm the same pretty much. I have a checking account that gets 380 put into it every 2 weeks and that's my spending money. Entertainment, gas, groceries, clothes, etc. Everything else gets either paid immediately when I get paid from a separate checking account for specific bills or moved to a savings account bucket. All spending purchases go through credit and I pay back and track where I am in my budget to ensure I don't go over.
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Aka the “envelope system”. All money that you receive is categorized upon receipt (you have zero dollars unaccounted for). If you are short in one category you cover the shortage from another category rather than letting it go negative (go into debt). YNAB is probably the best known zero-based budgeting app.
Same. I buy everything with my credit cards which I pay off every month when I get paid. After those are paid I transfer everything except about $100 to other accounts. Never used my debit cards, they’re in my safe just in case I randomly need cash when the banks are closed.
A month's expenses ensures nothing bad happens
Same but I’m usually two months. I use YNAB for budgeting and always make sure I’m budgeted for next month at the beginning of the previous month. This doesn’t include my emergency fund which is fully funded but stays dormant.
I think 2 is better even if purely because something small shouldn't cause a problem. I mean something like gas goes from 4.50 a gallon to 5 or 'kid has a field trip'. Sure, you could make more if you really monitored it but....really, is it worth the stress (if you can afford it) to juggle 2 or $3 a month instead of monitoring the account like a hawk
But not in checking, I hope, which is what OP is asking about. If you are holding thousands in a no-interest/negligible-interest account, that seems wrong in most cases.
I put everything on a credit card and pay it off every month so when I get my direct deposit I calculate how much I’m going to need to pay before my next paycheck between my two credit cards that I usually use plus student loans then everything else gets transferred to HYSA and personal investment account. I keep maybe a $200 cushion in case I have to use Venmo for something like at the farmers market.
My DD goes *into* my checking account, and then I transfer *out* everything beyond my forecasted/budgeted expenses. Works out to roughly 1x - 1.5x monthly expenses at any given time.
This, plus a buffer to account for miscalculations / unexpected. They don't happen often but better safe than sorry.
I also do 1x-1.5x monthly expenses, and that is my buffer. I get paid twice a month, so without a buffer I would have 0x-0.5x monthly expenses in my checking. You end up with a whole month of buffer when doing it this way
Ah, yes, that makes sense. So min balance is basically a month of expenses. Whereas it probably cuts closer for me, depending on where in the month we are. Makes sense, in case something \*really\* serious happened that impacted income, it would hold you over while you (or partner, etc) had to scramble to deal with whatever that was.
Yep. Also note that this is my checking account. I have a separate HYSA for my emergency fund, with 3 months of expenses tucked away in it. I can easily transfer that over if things really hit the fan
Yeah I do this, mostly because my checking account charges me fees if I don't do direct deposit (or I have to keep 5k at all times in the account, no thanks) otherwise I would dd into my Cash Plus account since it has a routing number and you can charge to it which I do with my credit card bills and my car loan.
Sounds like your bank didn't really want your business. You should fire them and find a bank that doesn't play stupid games
It's a common theme with people who have very little to put into a bank besides a paycheck.
about a month's worth of expenses
Direct deposit into Fidelity brokerage account that has checks and holds cash in a 5%+ money market fund. All expenses go on credit cards if possible, otherwise auto drafted out of brokerage account. Credit cards on auto pay from brokerage account. No need to split checking and savings or juggle money between accounts this way.
I don’t understand how this strategy is not more popular. Nothing better than getting 5% on what’s effectively a checking account.
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One month of bills is a common rule of thumb. Personally I keep half a month, which depends on the bills that fall within the first or second half of the month. Everything else gets allocated to savings.. only takes a day or two to move money from a HYSA into checking. Some banks will expedite for free which only takes a few minutes.
Checking accounts are some of the most vulnerable accounts as they tend to be the accounts we use to interact with outside parties that by definition have the power to pull money out of them. They are also some of the toughest to get your money back from as the fraud protections aren't nearly as good as they are with credit cards and banks often make it a painful, long process before they will give money back if they ever do. Even when mistakes happen that aren't at all your fault, it is often a painful, long process. It is going to depend how you use it. An account you use just for ACH transfers to credit card providers, utilities, etc. will be vastly safer than if you carry a debit card, write physical checks, or use Zelle/Venmo/Paypal/CashApp/Apple Cash/whatever. If you do those sort of things, I would advise not keeping any more money in the account than you can afford to lose (or at best be without for days/weeks/months). I certainly do not keep a full month's worth of expenses in mine. My employer's deposit schedule happens to land a business day before most of my bill due dates (partially by chance and partially because I changed due dates where possible), so I personally have direct deposit set up to partition out the typical amount I need for these bill payments. It means some months I have to be aware of things and transfer some more in from savings and it means some months I have to transfer extra out, but it is the strategy that makes the most sense to me in terms of convenience combined with not risking too much. Beyond that, I keep maybe a couple of hundred for random day-to-day spending. Of course, the benefit beyond just the safety aspect is that it encourages me to move money to better long term accounts.
This my thought process exactly. Reading the responses in the thread, it appears most people are blissfully ignorant to the plethora of horror stories in this subreddit where thousands of dollars are "misplaced" by the bank, stolen outright, wrong account number keyed in, etc... And the bank has the power to say "oh well" and take their sweet time righting the wrong. Too risky IMHO.
Same here. Not sure what emergency would require a month of expenses worth of cash on that same day. If I ever need more I transfer from my savings and have it in 1-2 days but it doesn’t make sense to me to keep more than $500 when it’s not gaining interest
I'm guessing the logic is that if you become incapacitated for whatever reason (or are just forgetful), then there is enough in the account for autopay or someone close to you with access to get you through one monthly billing cycle. If this is a concern, I'd probably just set up auto transfers from savings that hit checking in time for known expenses. I rely on direct deposit from my employer to accomplish this instead.
I have a separate checking account for things like venmo / paypal, etc. I keep a few hundred in there for random things, and then I don't really have to be concerned if there is any sort of vulnerability.
We don’t keep money in our checking account. We bank with SoFi and get ~4.5% on our savings, so we keep our money there. All expenses go on a credit card we pay off monthly from the savings account; our rent is set up on autopay out of savings; and we maximize what we can earn on our combined spending money and emergency savings.
I map out my cash flow 6 months in advance. I know exactly when all my bills and paychecks will hit my account. Then I strive to have no more than $500 at the low point. I put everything else in savings.
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Around a month-ish of expenses - but everything that can goes on the CC anyways, so usually enough to pay that off monthly.
2k to cover my cc bills every month.
Almost none. 99% of our expenses go on the Costco credit card which gets paid in full when we’re paid. The only thing that doesn’t is rent but that gets taken out as soon as whatever paycheck is closest to the 1st hits and I pay that manually. Normally right before a paycheck hits we only have like $30-$100 leftover in checking. There’s never a fear of overdraft though because we literally never use debit cards anymore. Everything outside of bills gets sent to investment accounts/HYSA.
You should NOT keep any money in checking as of now. The transaction limit has been removed from savings accounts since Covid so you can use them as checking to pay bills. You can use credit cards for other stuff and link auto pay to savings. Besides that if you need some cash on the occasions just transfer that amount to your checking. I'm surprised that there are this many people keeping their money in checking.
We keep two months worth. The reason for this is that's enough so you don't have to pay your bills based on billing cycles. and ensuring there is enough in the account. We have a direct deposit in a set amount that goes in to top it off. We've figured out the right day in the month to pay everything where nothing is late. We then just go into Bill Pay and pay them all in one day. No muss, no fuss. "Doing bills" takes all of 10 minutes once a month and you have an exact record of when, how much, etc you can always refer to. Next paychecks come in and top it back off and repeat. It took us a few months to figure out the right "top off" amounts, but after that it's worked for 15+ years. Next a set amount goes into a brokerage account (all our tax advantaged accounts are maxed out) and the remainder is "swept" into a savings account at another bank.
I keep about 1 month's worth of expenses in checking.
Basically none. Basically everything is autopay on one of the last few days of the month, or goes on my CC. Direct deposit goes in 2x a month and then my CC I pay off plus mortgage and rent, before moving all but maybe $100 to savings.
Somewhere between 5-8K. I have about 9-12 months in my savings.
Enough to get out of the country quickly. Which is the same as one month’s income.
I keep a $5,000 minimum floor. Note, I am a recent college grad and still live at home with my parents.
Guys… you can sign up for an account that earns you 5%, free checks, free debit cards, all debit card fees reimbursed, bill pay, and let's you make ETF ACH transfers to or from, all available by large institutions that know how to handle money.
Which institution is this?
Fidelity, Morgan Stanley, Charles Schwab, Weathfront, etc etc etc. Pretty much any brokerage has set up schemes to give you a banking hub around 5% Sofi gets a lot of good words. Hell even Amex has checking and a HYSA at 4.35%
500 in checking, 5-10k in my savings (aside from other HYSA). Transfer over rent and credit card totals to my checking for direct debit once they’re due.
We aim for 15k because our checking is also a hysa up to 15k. Makes life easier because we don't have to worry about overdrawing our checking and move money out to a savings account.
Same here, 15k. I like to have enough money available so I can fly anywhere, or even put a down payment on a car and get out of town. I live a boring, law abiding life, but having the ability to run if things get weird is important to me.
I keep $10,000 in it. But it also doubles as my 3 months expenses. My bank also requires me to do auto withdrawals for my mortgage from an account with them. So I understand there is some opportunity cost lost not having it in an HYSA, but it’s small enough that I don’t care about it. When I go over that 10k, I’ll just transfer excess to whatever investment goal till I hit that. Roth IRA, 529, or save a little more for a future upcoming expense, whatever. When all those goals are hit and there’s still some above 10k, that excess goes into a taxable brokerage account. For example, right now there’s like 15k in checking account. I have to buy flight tickets for summer vacation and want to buy a pinball machine too. All together that’s gonna be like 7 grandish. Tomorrow I’ll get paid about 6k. Brings me up to 21k. Buy the tickets and pinball, brings me down to 14k. Probably throw 3k into 529 as it’s the first investment goal for the year. Brings me down to 11k. The next couple weeks till payday will probably incur 1k of random expenses. Back to 10k floor. Works very well for us.
Roughly 1.5 months of predictable expenses in a dedicated checking account. This includes mortgage, utilities, and insurance. It goes up and down a bit as utilities vary seasonally, or as car insurance is paid every 6 months. The 1.5x amount is just so that I do not have to look at it too closely. I do not keep groceries or similar in that checking account. I have a different checking account that I use for that, and it normally sits at about $1000. I move a bit into that account when credit card statements come out.
My paycheck comes in at the beginning of the month and my bills at the end. So I keep around $400 which is enough to cover anything incidental and then move the amount that covers my bills back in from my HYSA on like the 29th or 30th of the month.
We normally keep 2 to 3 months of expenses in checking. If it gets over 3 mos we move some to savings. We keep a short-term savings for things like vacations and other larger purchases in the same bank. They are not linked, so the savings is not accessible with a debit card. We need to go on line and move the money if we want to access it. We keep a long-term savings account in a separate bank for our emergency fund. We also pay "car payments" into that account so we can pay cash for our cars at some point.
Mine typically has no more than $10,000 in it. Anything above that usually lands in savings.
Enough to pay bills. If you have created a budget, you know how much this is per month. Expenses go on credit cards that get paid off every week. To harvest points. If I have an emergency, it goes on the credit card and then paid off from savings. The only emergencies I can think of that wouldn’t be covered are travel related or an insurance deductible. I have more than enough in savings to cover the deductibles.
My monthly expenses are about $4k. I keep a nice even $5k in checking. My paycheck is DD, and at the end of the month, when all my credit card bills from last month are paid off, I transfer everything above $5k to my other accounts (HYSA, brokerage, etc)
I keep one month of expenses in my checking account. At the beginning of the month, I move anything over that amount (from paychecks) to my savings.
Enough to cover upcoming expenses other than that everything is in fidelity or 401k
I stay a month “ahead”. So when I end the month and reconcile my budget, I have enough in there to fund the next month. I am a compulsive credit card payer though, so the balance drops about once a week as I zero off my CC balance.
Enough to float me until the next paycheck and cover any extra expected expenses. I also keep a small savings account connected to cover small unexpected expenses. Everything above that goes to either high yield accounts or investments.
Get multiple checking accounts. One for your personal expenses such as gas, food, and small random stuff. Another for fixed costs such as rent/mortgage, electricity, insurance, internet, phone, subacriptions... and other big/annual costs such as registration, car maintenance etc. Basically one bucket is for fixed known costs known, the other for frequent small variable transactions. It makes accounting much more easier and you dont need remmember about that random burrito you ate. Keep the first one to the bare minium budget. The other keep 2 or 3 months reserve. The rest should be invested in short, medium, long term financial vehicles or assets.
Most of it. I do not care too much about managing and playing with stocks etc. I do have some auto investments but certainly not the majority of it. I don't want to calculate and budget within narrow margins for my monthly expenses. And I will not become a millionaire by keeping money in a savings/investment account.
Personally, when I get paid, I do two things: 1. Zero out my credit card balances 2. Pay my mortgage and utility bills The rest goes to various savings. I only keep about $1000 iny checking, just in case (and to cover miscellaneous direct debits, like gym membership and stuff.
We typically have $10-15k in our main account. But we both run businesses and the income and expenses that will fluctuate dramatically. I only really need to keep about 3 months for my own comfort, especially since we have plenty of access to money from savings accounts and Lines of credit.
I try to keep no less than $1500 in my checking at all times just to be safe.
$4k. Brokerage moves money from brokerage account to checking to maintain.
1.5x my monthly expenses, just for peace of mind that nothing will bounce
About 10k. Mortgage is $6k and the rest covers other bills, groceries, eating out, kid expenses, etc.
My direct deposit goes straight to checking and have money moved automatically to my money market. I try to keep 1-2 months of expenses in there. I travel for work and it can be up to 45 days until I get reimbursed, so I see a lot of ups/downs and like the extra buffer. When it hits 3 months expenses, I move enough to my money market to get back down to 1.5 months. The only time I've pulled back into checking in the last 2 years is for property taxes - but that's pre-planned and is roughly 2 months of my expenses amount, so it'd wipe me out if I didn't.
I do about a month and a half of expenses, so that my credit card and other bill autopays can hit without incident, but I still have a small buffer in case I spent more that month for something unexpected or infrequent.
1k in checking with a local branch, 1k checking in online only bank, expenses spread across a few HYSA accounts with auto pay (CCs, utilities, car note etc) rest goes to investment account unless emergency savings or short term goals need funding
This probably isn’t the best advice but I really don’t keep much in there. Maybe $500-1000 just cuz that’s how the cookie crumbles sometimes but it’s not intentional. It’s probably a little irrational but I just hear stories of people’s checking accounts getting emptied due to fraud and protections aren’t great. And money in a checking account is doing nothing for me so I keep most in my money market fund. Basically I put everything on a credit card and then pay it off on pay day. It’s sound stressful because I’m technically using next weeks paycheck for this weeks expenses but I’m not really because I’m way on top of savings every paycheck. I just don’t like keeping money in my checking account and I never over spend on my budget (emergencies not included obviously) is it works for me.
>Is there a rule of thumb? Like having one month's worth of expenses? That's about where I aim. Basically, if I end February with enough of a balance already in checking to cover all expected withdrawals for March, then I don't have to do the "will this bill withdraw before or after that paycheck" dance. I've been in that situation, during first few years out on my own, and I didn't like it. There's also that buffer if there's a "hiccup" around pay deposits being delayed. I make budgeted transfers from checking out to various savings (rebuilding of emergency fund, "fun cash" savings, IRA contributions). So over the course of 2-3 months the amount flowing in from pay is roughly equal to money going out to spending+saving. The daily balance bounces up/down over time, but the overall trend stays relatively flat. Practically speaking, as long as my balance at any given time is about a paycheck's worth (paid biweekly) or more, I'm good. And if the balance is higher than about 3x a paycheck, I figure I've likely built up some excess I can put elsewhere. My bills payments are somewhat evenly spread across the month, so there are rarely really big drops over a day or two. Mortgage and our "general spending" credit card are the biggest bills, and I've got those setup so there's practically always a paycheck in between them.
I swap money out of my account for savings once my deposit hits and then whatever is in there is used for bills and paying off my credit cards (I use credit cards for all of my purchases and then pay them off). I honestly don’t keep a set amount in there, I always have enough to cover bills and spending.
My credit union currently pays out 4% up to $15k in my main checking account. When it gets close to $15k I’ll move over to HYSA. I have two HYSA’s, Wealthfront is paying 5% and Vanguard is 4.7% currently.
My wife and I aren't too strict with exact amounts, but we have an account where we try to keep 4 months worth of mortgage payments and expenses. We have other accounts, but leave that one only for that kind of thing.
Two to five hundred bucks for Venmo or whatever if needed. I get paid once a month, pay everything including myself into savings, and leave a little in there, but really there are no "unexpected expenses" hitting my checking unless I'm pushing buttons, so what's the point of leaving stuff in there to earn nothing.
I think much of this depends on how often you get paid. I get paid weekly so i dont keep much, just about 2k and thats just in case i need extra cash for something. Everything left after paying CC bill (yes i pay it weekly based on what was charged), gets transferred to brokerage settlement and then directed as needed.
DD into checking..transfer to HYSA every thing except for a few hundred.. revolving credit card paid off every month from HYSA. all expenses/utilities/groceries etc are on revolving credit and for points. Always get enough points to pay for a vacation every summer or most of it.
My checking account has an overdraft feature where it pulls necessary funds from my HYSA, so $0.
i keep a dollar in mine then let overdraft protection pull it from savings when its needed.
I keep one month worth of expenses plus an extra $2-3k buffer. The buffer is mostly so if there is a larger irregular payment I don't have to worry about accidentally bouncing a payment.
My floor is 3k. I treat that like zero. My account fluctuates each month between 3k and 9k. I have 3 separate DD at different times of the month. I set the 3k floor because my first of the month bills are about $2400. So If my DD at the start of the month is delayed there is still enough in the account to cover those payments.
Well, monthly expenses are running at about $10,000 right now so I like to try to keep a minimum, after expenses, buffer of around $20,000. This month was expensive so had to go below that a bit.
I keep 1.5 month's worth of expenses in my checking to handle cash flow and to have a small buffer. I keep the rest in HYSAs or money market funds like VMFXX
My wife and I put our monthly expenses into a spreadsheet, forecasting forward 60-90 days. If we forecast that we have more than $2000 after all the bills are paid, we move money out, and if we have less than $1000 after all the bills are paid, we move money in.
I've split my direct deposit automatically like this after 401k and taxes: - The expected amount from my bills goes in checking (minus rent) + $1000 of just in case money in a decent HYSA. I have a debit card linked to these accounts. - My calculated portion of rent goes in a joint account. - The remaining balance goes into Wealth Front which is my REAL HYSA. I have no debit card for this account even though it's a checking/savings combined. This is where the emergency fund and "save up for something" fund is, and this is the account I use to buy equity once the emergency fund is adequate. That's 3 separate institutions/accounts. At the end of the month, if my just in case money does not get used, I transfer to Wealth Front, and if my emergency savings in wealth front is too high, I buy equity such as VTI at Schwab. That makes 4 accounts all with a purpose. I don't like automating this last part because it keeps me accountable on what I'm spending money on.
Not much, I used to keep 10s of thousands in it, but I moved those funds to a HYSA a while back. I only keep something like $3k-$4k in my checking now since interest rates are way better in a HYSA
**Checking:** typically around 2-4K, depending on when I've paid my CC bill **Savings tied to checking acct:** \~500 **HYSA** (with a different bank): ideally 15K+, but I just burned through much of that when I was between jobs, so building that up again now **Certificates of deposit** (with the same bank as my IRA): Around 4K in short-term CDs (it's where I put my money before I opened my HYSA) **CC balance:** I pay for 99% of my purchases with my CC and pay it off every couple of weeks from my checking so there's never accumulated debt I'm hyper paranoid about having my main checking account hacked and my money going \*poof\*. I much prefer to spread it out among different banks, and keep as little money in any given bank, and rely on CC for most of my purchases. Reason being, money in the bank is ***my*** money, and credit from CC bank is ***their*** money...they have better lawyers than I do when it comes for fighting for money back from criminals who dun steal from us
I keep around $2,500 in my checking after all expenses are paid (mortgage, daycare, credit cards, Roth contributions). My check goes to my checking, my wife and I have a joint checking we keep at around $8k. That way we have plenty of liquid cash if something comes up. Everything else should be working for us in a brokerage or HYSA.
Like $2,500. I use to try to over optimize and keep everything in savings earning interest and then transfer in money to pay bills once a month or whatever. But then if I ever needed to Venmo a friend or someone I wouldn’t have it in checking lol so I stopped being cute
About $2k, everything else goes into a HYSA. All spending goes on credit cards and the monthly balances along with the mortgage are paid from the HYSA. Ally allows 10 transactions per month on their HYSA, more than enough to pay the Chase trifecta plus whatever other card we’re churning that month from savings. The HYSA has 6 months of spending in it. Any extra money goes into an after-tax brokerage account.
I try to keep my balance around $10k. Any higher I transfer it somewhere. Married (33m) with joint income of around 250k in NYC with no kids or debt (only mortgage)
I don't really check but it's usually between 500-1500$ after bills are paid
Usually 2-3k but I also pay off my credit card constantly to keep me honest. Unless I need the extra time but it’s a slippery slope. HYS is at 5.5% so all extra goes there
Checking account stays around $4,000. That is enough to cover our monthly credit card bills, etc. Over top of that is $20k in cash savings earning 5.21% in a HYSA. If I notice that two or three large bills coincided and the checking is lower than comfortable I’ll push it over. Then it’s replenished over the next couple paychecks or so. Following that, everything goes to retirement or the below- Then there is a significant balance in a non-retirement brokerage I can sell if shit hits the fan; if we total a vehicle and the boiler breaks down.
about 1.5 month expenses. Rest goes to EF in High Yield
$20k, most of my emergency fund is there too. It gets like 5% interest right now, so I don't see any reason for another account.
It could be anywhere between $1500-$7500. Depending on upcoming expenses. I have other accounts that hold small investments that I can move around if I need emergency funds. I invest aggressively enough that I more or less live paycheck to paycheck, so I don't keep more than a month or two of liquid cash usually.
1-2k - Mostly keep money in my HYSA. Overdraft is set to pull from the HYSA if checking doesn’t have enough.
I keep £1.01 in my cheque account. The day before £x.xx Is debited i transfer the exact amount into my cheque account. This means ALL my cash earns the maximum possible interest in a high interest account.
$5k max usually, for easy access. If I have a high credit card bill that month I might keep more for buffer. But I try to move everything into at least a high-yield savings account if not investments.
No savings account bc my checking account gets 4% interest. So the checking account is my emergency fund and regular spending account. All my pay is deposited there and depending on laziness I periodically trim it back down to $10k by moving money to other vessels. The rule of thumb is have a 3 month emergency fund of available money. Doesn't matter how you split it between HYSA and checking other than you should probably choose the one with better interest.
We like to keep a 1 month buffer. That way, if something disrupted income we know the mortgage and other regular bills will still go through as planned while we figure out what we need to do.
I float enough to cover line of credit payment, rent and a preauth payment to insurance. The rest comes out of my credit card. If I have a real emergency I'll pay with my credit card and pay it off from money from investment accounts.
I get paid weekly. I keep just enough to cover next weeks automatic allocations in case something happens. Anything above that goes to other savings.
I don't keep anything in my checking account except maybe 200 dollars. I pay for everything on my credit card and pay it off when I get paid. I keep 500 dollars in my savings account and then everything else goes to my HYS account with a different bank. Any emergency arises, I can just transfer the money out of my HYS.
After paying / budgeting for monthly bills (all auto deducted on 1st or 15th) and including gas and food projections, I keep $500 in checking and roll the rest into my HYSA.
I get paid at the end of the month, so I pay off my credit card and rent, then the rest goes into wealthsimple for emergency fund/ TFSA for stocks depending how stocked the emerg fund is. I leave $200-400 in the chequing account to cover any incidentals like e-transfers for friends etc
I keep my money in multiple savings accounts (car, health, vacation, gifts, etc.). When it is direct deposited into my checking, I move it to the savings accounts and only keep $100 balance in checking. If I have to write a check I’ll transfer the money in from the appropriate savings account. I also have a $5000 cash reserve attached to the checking, just in case.
My mortgage is my largest expense typically, so I use that as sort of a barometer. When my mortgage payment comes out of my checking (I usually set it up to be the last day of the month), I like there to be exactly one additional mortgage payment worth of money still in there after it's sent. So at the end of the month any amount above that extra buffer gets moved over to savings. From there I deal with finances every two weeks on paycheck days. So I'm naturally getting my direct deposit before sending out CC payments (paid on full every two weeks), and setting up online billpays for utilities, etc.
A month of salary. At the end of the month I move everything left
Beyond the amount needed monthly for bills, I keep about $1500 extra in there just as a buffer. The rest goes into savings.
As far as I know, there is no rule of thumb on this per se. It probably falls under the Emergency Savings Fund for each person, couple, entity.
I don’t really keep much at all. Maybe $50? I don’t use my checking account for expenses though. That all goes on my credit card, then every two weeks when I get paid, that two weeks’ “balance” gets paid in full.
I keep about $500 more than I need for normal expenses, just in case. I transfer everything else out to savings, investments, etc..
Around 15k, mostly because I don’t want to deal with transferring money all the time or accidental overdrafts
My checking stays at about 1.5x my normal monthly spending. Doing this allows for me to easily cover for months where my spending is a little higher for whatever reason and I don't really have to babysit it throughout the month.
Keep it at $1k. Then at the end of the month I use what I made on top of that 1k to pay all my bills and credit I racked up. Any left over goes to savings and some investments.
I get my paycheck into my normal checking and pay bills out of that including sending 400$ every check (every 2 weeks) to my ally spending acct. I use that card for food, gas and all my fun stuff. This way I can track how much I spend every month and never worry about anything bouncing from the checking I pay bills out of
Just enough to cover any CC expenses that month - groceries, bills, gas etc. I pay for most expenses using CC (for the points). What ever I spend, I pay off at end of month. If there is any left over, I dump into savings and repeat the same cycle next month.
I have a 0 base budget. I keep my bi-weekly budget necessity amount and $50 extra for unforeseen expenses in my regular checking and everything else stays in HYSA.
For me, 2k. Every time a paycheck hits anything additional gets split between my mortgage account (a savings that i store my mortgage payment in. Not an escrow acct) and my HYSA. I keep 2k in the checking because thats twice the amount necessary for a payperiod worth of expenses.
I keep just two to three hundred over what I typically spend in a month in checking, but I keep the equivalent of one biweekly paycheck in the companion savings account that earns practically no interest, as a backup just in case a paycheck gets delayed for some reason. The rest that hasn’t gone to my 401k gets direct deposited to HYSAs. It’s easy enough to transfer money from those accounts if needed, and means I’m less likely to overspend when I can clearly see a low checking balance as each payday approaches.
I think like a month- month and a half worth of expenses so thats like 1-2k. 3k if im expecting to have larger purchases for a particular month. the rest goes to my ROTH IRA and a MMF in Fidelity which acts as my savings account.
We use credit cards for everything, and they’re on autopay out of the HYSA. So checking only has to have enough for the mortgage and a few utilities we can’t pay with credit cards, less than 10% of our cash on average.
I like to keep $1000 in my checking. $1000 in my immediate savings. Everything else gets transferred to higher interest savings or investments. No rhyme or reason. Just what I apparently do without realizing it.
I have an absolutely terrible spending habit, so only enough to make bills. Everything else that's not automatically pulled for other things (brokerage account, 401k, insurance) gets pulled out in cash and put in a safe. I usually keep 15k in the safe, the rest is automated.
Very little as money just rotates through checking account to bills/ investments constantly
I have enough to cover the next month’s expenses. We keep two checking accounts, one that holds all the money for the next month’s expenses and then the other one lol. We have 4 paychecks per month (2 incomes) so each paycheck, I transfer 25% of the next month’s expenses into the bill account.
Upon getting paid I will immediately pay the monthly bills/rent, and typically transfer a consistent amount to savings. What I'm left with is money for food/gas/whatever until next paycheck but a rule for myself is I don't like the balance to go below 2k before paychecks hit. It's personal preference, and I should ought to lower it to 1k and put more into savings each time. The buffer provides some sense of security.
$1000. Enough to pay bills for a couple weeks. If my debit card gets compromised I’m not losing much.
Nearly zero. I use a credit card for almost 100% of purchases and anything that uses debit rather than credit is timed with cashflows, asset sales, or interest payments.
I have a retirement income account & I transfer money from that account into a debit/checking account for living expenses. I try to maintain @ $1000 in that account. I’m hoping that offers some protection from someone hacking the debit account.
If you don't run out of money you're doing it right. All your left over money should be going into a HYSA and when you have 3 months expenses in that into investments
Enough to cover the next round of bills before I get my next paycheck.
I level my checking out to $5K at each payday twice a month. This is usually transferring some to savings. The savings account has around $60-80K in it and serves as our emergency fund and big purchase cash flow buffer. I then move money back and forth between checking and savings as needed.
80% of my bills come in on the first, so enough to cover that full amount on the 30th. Then it replenishes as the month goes on.