Here’s How You Can Get a Free $400 By Switching Banks

Last Friday we shared a quick hack to make a free $25.

It was a simple, easy, hack. And $25 for little effort is hard to argue with.

But what if you could do a different hack and make a lot more than $25?

What about $400?

Yes, you heard me right. $400!

 

The Bank That Will Pay You $400 to Switch

 
Citibank is currently offering $400 for anyone willing to apply for a Citibank account or a Citigold account.

There is one requirement, though: You must make a qualifying deposit of at least $15,000 (must not be from another Citi account) and maintain a minimum balance of $15,000 for 30 consecutive calendar days from the date you made your qualifying deposit.

$15,000 is a good chunk of change and I realize that this will disqualify many people from using this offer. But for those who do have $15,000 in available funds – perhaps in an emergency fund – I would highly recommend you go over and take advantage of the offer.

There are a number of other offers for opening bank accounts out there, including the make a free $25 hack I shared last week, but most require you to set up a direct deposit (the $25 offer I shared does not). The nice thing about the $400 Citibank deal is that it does not require a direct deposit.

If you are willing to shift your emergency fund (again, must be at least $15,000), you can get the free $400. And if you hate Citibank you can always shift the money back and close the account.

Note: This offer ends on October 31st so be sure to head over to the deal page if you plan on taking advantage of it.

 

I wanted to quick say thanks to Paige from Live, Laugh, Budget for sharing this hack with me! I would highly recommend checking out her site.

 

What should you do if you can’t do this hack?

Perhaps, like most people, you don’t have $15,000 lying around to deposit into the Citibank account and, therefore, will not be able to take advantage of the offer.

If this is the case, don’t get too bummed out! There is still a lot you can do to make extra money. Here’s a few things you could focus on:

• Sign up for a Capital One 360 bank accountThe Capital One 360 bank account is another bank account that will give you cash to sign up. You only need to deposit $250 to get the $25 bonus, and there are no direct deposit requirements.
   
  This is something everyone should take advantage of before the offer goes away.

• Take advantage of other easy ways to make money onlineIn my post 50+ Legitimate Ways to Make Extra Money At Home I shared a ton of ways to make extra money online. Some were time intensive, but there were many quick and easy ways to make money online.
   
  Some of the easy ways to make a few extra bucks online with little effort are Swagbucks, Harris Poll, Qmee, and Bing Rewards. Erin shared about these ideas and more in 7 Websites & Apps for Making Easy Extra Side Cash.

 
What do you think about the $400 Citibank offer? Do you think more and more banks and financial institutions will give big incentives to build their customer base?