I haven’t found a constantly updated list for free money out there, by free money I mean bonuses that financial institutions will offer you for opening an account(checking, savings, credit card, etc.). I plan to have this post constantly updated with free money deals if possible. We’ll see how things work out. Leave comments on stuff I’m missing. E-mail me if you need a referral or help with anything. hejustlaughs@gmail.com

Banks
ING Direct – $25 bonus with referral. $250 initial funing. No account balance minimums.
VirtualBank – $20 sign-up bonus with. $100 minimum to open. No minimum balance required.
Netbank – Various deals.
Principal Bank – $50 bonus for opening up a checking and savings account. $50 initial duning for both accounts for a total of $100. No minimum balance required.

Brokerages
Ameritrade – $500 free with $10,000 deposit and place an average of five trades per month over a 3 month period.

Finally got that Virtual Bank $20 sign-up bonus posted to me account. If anyone wants a referral e-mail me at hejustlaughs@gmail.com with your first and last name.

I thinkt he As Seen On TV Smart Spin deal is dead, glad I got in on it before it died. Maybe it’ll come back in the future.

In other news I just got out of a 3 hour exam so I’m gonna relax a bit.

I bought two things today that I thought are really great deals:

Altec Lansing Speakers
This Altec Lansing 121 3-Piece 10 Watt Speaker System is on sale for $9.99 w/ free shipping from buy.com. I just bought one for my laptop since the speakers on this thing are sub-par. (It’s a Dell Inspiron 710m I got for $764 shipped a couple weeks back). I don’t think you can go wrong with the $9.99 shipped price. Also check the box for Free $10 ProFlowers GC before adding to cart.

Smart Spin Storage System as Mother’s Day Gift
Also I got for mother’s day a As Seen on TV Smart Spin Storage System. List price $16.99, use coupon code 955400000009 at checkout for 20% off. Free shipping included. State sales tax vary.

$16.99 – 20% coupon = $13.59 shipped + applicable taxes

My sales tax came out to $0.82 cents and total was $14.41 shipped.

I really don’t know what else to get my mom for mother’s day as she has all the back massagers, foot spas, bath salts, bathtub pillows, etc. She saves EVERYTHING that can be leftover from dinner so I hope this helps her make things more efficient. The reviews on these things were great and they’re microwave and dishwasher safe.

I was reading a article titled “Personal Loans Made Easy” on PFBlog.com about Prosper.com. In a gist Prosper lets you make personal loans out to people. You accept a little risk and get a higher rate of return. Read more about it on the Prosper page or on the article page.

I applied and they couldn’t approve me for lending because they couldn’t verify my identity through my credit history. This has been happen to me quite a few times. I’m a young college student with no credit history. I had to jump through a lot of hassles to get my Citi Dividend card. I’ve only had the card for two months so I don’t expect to have much of a credit history. I know for sure I don’t have a credit history because I requested for one and it came back empty. Dead empty. Hopefully in 6-months to a year I’ll have some sort of credit history.

I just created an account on www.networthiq.com. That’s the badge you’ll see on the right from now on. My net worth is actually positive because of $300 I invested in Bank of America through Sharebuilder 9 months ago which has grown to $340 (with dividends reinvested).

I have about $243 in cash and $479 in credit card debt. My credit card has 0% apr until October so I should be good for now. Summer should be a good cash flow season and I should be able to pay down my debts then.

My NetWorthIQ page is located here.

edit: I no longer update my networthiq page as of 2/5/07

Guess it had to start somewhere, this is my first post. Hopefully this will be the start of many, not another project where I simply lose interest.