My friend Rachel told me about Suze Orman’s Save Yourself promotion with TD Ameritrade. Open a non-retirement Save Yourself account at TD Ameritrade, make 12 consecutive monthly deposits of $100+, don’t touch the money, and TD Ameritrade will give you $100. The Save Yourself account is essentially a high-yield money market deposit account with a 0.50% APY and FDIC insured as the funds are held at TD Bank USA. It’s a bank account, not a brokerage trading account.

In addition to the $100, you get online access to her book Women & Money (you don’t have to be a woman to take advantage of this offer).

Seems like a pretty screaming hot offer, $100 for $1200 in deposits? Am I missing a catch?

(Click to continue reading…)

This promotion has ended, you can look at this list of the best credit card offers to find additional sign up bonuses.

Discover Business is running a promotion where you can get $100 bonus cashback after $1000 in purchases within the first three months. Discover Business was the card I decided was the best business card because it offered a 0% APY on balance transfers and purchases for 12 months, had no annual fee (rare in a business credit card), and now with this $100 cashback promotion offer… it’s certainly worth considering if you run a business.

Some other notable features of the card:

• 0% introductory APR on purchases and balance transfers,
• 5% cashback bonus on office supplies,
• 2% cashback bonus on gas purchases,
• 1% cashback on everything else.

So, who can apply for a business card? Anyone can apply, simply enter your social security number as the TIN. The beautiful thing about the United States is that anyone can be a business as a sole proprietorship and there are no additional tax implications or forms to fill out for the sole proprietorship business entity. This means that anyone can take advantage of this business card offer even if you don’t have a business.

If this card isn’t your thing but you are still interested in the best cash back credit cards, I invite you to click that link and check out the hottest offers available.

Credit card offers total value: $1695.

Here is every credit card promotional offer I am aware of, listed in a handy table along with fulfillment requirements. The only rules about having a card appear on the list is that the promotional offer be worth at least $50 and it must be a mainstream brand like Citi, Discover, Capital One, American Express, etc. No offers available only to a small geographic region, these are all mainstream ones that are potentially available to everyone if you qualify.

They are listed in order of value and I will attempt to keep this list updated monthly. (this list does not include free airline miles promotions, i.e. those cards that give only miles as a promotions, but some of these cards allow you to convert points into miles) For the cards that have (pts) next to the dollar value, which currently is all of them, you will get your rewards in points (which can often be converted into gift cards) and the maximum value is displayed there. $100 in points is usually 10,000 points, but not always, so be sure to read the terms and conditions. Without further ado, here are nearly a thousand dollars in promotions!

Who is eligible for a business card? Anyone can be a sole proprietorship without filling out any additional paperwork. Put in your name as the business name, your social security number as the ID number, and you can apply as a business. You don’t pay extra taxes, you don’t have to fill out any extra paperwork, this is 100% legal and acceptable.

If you know of an offer that isn’t on the list, please leave it in the comments or email me, thanks!

(Fat stack photo taken by Refracted Moments™ on Flickr)

I’ve recently posted the latest and greatest in credit card offers and promotions with over a thousand dollars in bonuses!

If you’ve had your eye on getting the American Express Preferred Rewards Gold Card or the American Express Preferred Rewards Green Card, you’re in luck because each has a hot new promotional offer of points with your first purchase. With the Gold card, you get 10,000 points after your first purchase; With the Green card, you get 5,000 points after your first purchase. 10,000 points can get you a $100 gift card and 5,000, coincidentally, can get you a $50 gift card.

American Express Preferred Rewards Gold Card

This card also has some other benefits such as exclusive access to Gold card events such as concerts, shows, sporting events, etc. as well as a Global Assist Hotline. The card also gives you access to the Membership Rewards Program, which lets you convert those points into gift cards. The card also comes with a $125 annual fee that is waived for the first year.

American Express Preferred Rewards Green Card

The green version is very much like the gold version except you don’t get access to Gold card events (and the promotional offer is half that of the Gold card). The card still gives you access to the Membership Rewards Program and all the typical American Express benefits such as purchase protection, return protection, and car rental insurance. The annual fee on the green card is $95 and that is waived for the first year.

Lesson of the Day: Don’t open a Bank of America checking account unless they’re offering you at least a hundred bucks to sign up. This time, Bank of America is saying “welcome to the neighborhood” with their latest re-packaging of this offer. The offer itself is pretty simple, just open a new personal checking account with BoA, deposit $100, and in 90 days BoA will deposit $100. This offer only applies if you are a new customer. If you don’t apply online via this link, then visit a branch and tell them you want offer AOU2611. This offer expires Jan 01, 2008.

(Click to continue reading…)

Update: I’ve since created a comprehensive list of credit card offers & promotions that contains far more than the handful of promotions available here.

It costs credit card companies $200 per new credit card sign up, so make them give you some of that via gift cards or straight cash:

• Business Gold Rewards Card – Get $250 in free money! (this deal will be expiring very soon) It is a business card but you can use your Social Security Number as your EIN (that’s what sole proprietorships do). Just as a warning, this card has a $125 annual fee that is waived for the first year.
• Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card from American Express – 10,000 StarPoints good for a $100 gift card to Amazon.com after your first purchase. Unfortunately no balance transfer and the $30 annual fee is waived for the first year.
• American Express Preferred Rewards Gold Card – 10,000 Membership Reward points will be credited to your Membership Rewards account 6 to 8 weeks after your first purchase, annual fee waived for the first year. 10,000 points is worth $100 in gift cards or 10,000 miles.
• CitiBusiness Card with ThankYou Network – $100 worth of Thank You Rewards after $250 in purchases.

All the “where to invest $100″ articles telling you to buy CDs and open money market funds are dead wrong. Absolutely dead wrong. Where should you be investing $100? Look for promotional offers from online bank accounts (where you can generate some more income by referring friends and relatives), brokerage firms, and other financial institutions to get the most bang for your $100. Then, after you’ve earned enough through those offers you can start thinking about “conventional” investment vehicles.

Don’t have $100 you want to invest, consider signing up for a credit card that offers statement credits or gift cards that you can convert to money to invest.

To learn more, plow onward!

1. Sharebuilder

First step is to open up a Sharebuilder account using a promotion code that will give you free money. Currently there’s a $50 bonus code 50GO28 if you deposit some funds and make a purchase. Stock purchases are a mere $4 but stock sales are a pricy $14.95. Let’s say you put in $50, make a purchase, get the $50 bonus money, and then sell your stock back at your purchase price. Net result is a gain of $30.05 ($50 less $4 purchase commission and $15.95 sale commission) which is a 60.1% gain on a $50 investment. Now you have $130.05 to invest. Some have reported being able to repeat this process over and over again on multiple promotion codes. I list all of the codes I know of on this Sharebuilder promotion code post.

2. Bank of America

BoA frequently has promotional offers for opening a checking account such as this $50 promotion (MYA). The minimum you need to open most accounts is $100 and account fees are lower if you setup a direct deposit into the account. The “cheapest” account is the MyAccess Checking account which actually has no minimum and $5.95 monthly fee, waived if you have a direct deposit. Once you open an account, the $50 bonus will be deposited into your account within 50 days. Deposit $50, wait 50 days, get the $50 bonus. You can sign up for a BoA promotion every 60 days. According to their representative, the verification department runs a credit bureau report and a report from ChexSystems. After doing this once you’ll have $180.05 waiting to “invest.”

Now you’re on a roll… you can repeat these types of signup deals until you reach $250… (here’s a great list of bank signup promotions)

3. ING Direct

This promotion is for only $25 but it’s an easy $25. Just get someone who already has an ING Direct account to send you a referral (I have some available, hit up this self-serve $25 ING Direct promotion page if you’d like one). All you have to do is deposit $250 and ING will send $25 your way, a quick painless $10% gain with no risk. In return, your friend will get $10. Now, you can give out twenty of your own referrals and start earning a little extra cash with no risk whatsoever. If you get all twenty, that’s $200 in your pocket. So, now you have $450 to “invest,” where to turn now?

4. Virtual Bank eMoney Market

Virtual Bank has a $20 referral bonus, much like ING, except the referrer gets $20 too and you can refer up to fifty people (that’s $1,000 in your pocket, contact me if you need a referral). This offer is available to new accounts only, you’ll have to ACH money from an existing bank account, and the $20 isn’t available for the first 30 days. That’s all pretty standard online banking terms and conditions. So, after your account is approved you’ll immediately be eligible to start referring your friends. After you sign up, refer fifty people and you’ll have $1470 to invest.

Now that you have close to $1500, you should start moving towards conventional investments like investing in those stocks you always get emails about (just kidding!). Vanguard’s STAR fund with a minimum account balance of $1000 is an option but it’s up to you what you’d like to do. You can always peel off some of that money and go back into doing bonuses but at least now you can read “How To Invest $1000″ articles which are typically more exciting.