HM Bradley
Strengths
- Free combination spending/savings account
- Tiered interest rates that encourage you to save more money
- Intuitive cash back credit card
Weaknesses
- Annual fee of $60 for the credit card (waived the first year)
- Strict parameters to be met to get the highest savings rate
- No check writing
Neobanks and financial technology companies (fintechs) are becoming increasingly popular by making banking easier and more accessible for a broader audience of consumers.
It’s no longer necessary to visit a brick-and-mortar location to conduct most personal banking transactions. HMBradley takes online banking one step further with its combination of attractive banking features. But the competition is stiff, and other fintechs are also fighting for your business.
In this HMBradley review, I’ll cover everything you need to know, so you can decide if you should take advantage of HM Bradley’s banking benefits.
❗❗❗HMBradley sent an email to users that beginning November 15th, HMBradley is winding down their consumer deposit and credit card programs. We first saw this on Doctor of Credit.
Table of Contents
🔃 Updated November 2023 with news of their pending shutdown.
What is HMBradley?
HM Bradley is a neobank founded in 2019 by Zach Bruhnke, Germain Cassiere, and Dmitry Gritskevich. The company is based out of Los Angeles.
The fintech’s design is based on three personal finance goals:
- Build credit,
- Spend wisely, and
- Save more.
Let’s see what HMBradley has to offer that makes it so popular.
How Does HMBradley Work?
HMBradley provides an FDIC-insured deposit account through its partnership with New York Community Bank (NYCB).
They changed their partner bank from from Hatch Bank to New York Community Bank (NYCB) in late 2022.
HMBradley offers a high interest rate on their savings account but you have to satisfy a few conditions to get this higher rate.
When you open an HMBradley account with NYCB, you are rewarded with a baseline 2.00% APY. You are not required to set up a monthly direct deposit or save any of your deposits to get this baseline interest rate – but you can get a higher rate if you do.
Your interest rate can be higher if you satisfy a few conditions:
- If you make a direct deposit of at least $500 per month to your HMBradley Deposit Account with NYCB, and you maintain a monthly positive cash flow, you will earn 3.60% APY the following month. Maintaining a positive monthly cash flow means that your monthly deposits exceed your withdrawals, except for HMBradley Credit Card payments.
- Customers who fill the previous requirement and spend $500+ per month on their HMBradley Credit Card will earn a higher 4.20% APY in the following month.
For more details, check out the following Terms & Conditions.
What If I Miss the Requirements in One Month?
If you miss the requirements in a given month, you only get the baseline APY.
You can still work towards re-qualifying for the higher APYs in future months but for that month, you’ll only get the baseline.
HMBradley NOW Account
Your account with HMBradley is known as a NOW (Negotiable Order of Withdrawal) transaction checking account. It is a type of deposit account that has features of both savings and checking accounts. It pays interest but also lets you use it like a checking account.
For practical purposes, there’s really no distinction. You can think of it like a checking account that pays interest except you can’t write checks.
HMBradley’s NOW account has a $100 minimum to open, according to its Deposit Account Agreement page, but no minimum account balance. To open an account you must satisfy these common conditions:
- Must be at least 18 years of age
- Be a U.S. citizen, a legal resident alien, or a legal non-resident alien
- Must have a permanent physical address in the U.S.
- Must have a U.S. phone number
- Have a Social Security number or tax ID number
As we mentioned earlier, you can’t write checks so all your spending must be done through your HMBradley debit card.
HMBradley “Plans”
Your HMBradley Plans are subaccounts in your HMBradley account. Plans are sort of like savings buckets within your HMBradley NOW account.
For instance, you might create a Plan within our HMBradley account for:
- New car fund
- Vacation fund
- Emergency fund
- Home purchase fund
You can have as many or as few Plans as you’d like.
Your Plans balances are shown separately from your available balance. The deposits you make into your HMBradley account go into your available balance.
From there, you transfer money into each of your Plans at your discretion. Once you transfer money into a Plan, your available (spending) balance will decrease by that dollar amount.
“Tier” Interest Rates
HMBradley offers attractive interest rates on its account, but the rate of return depends on how much money (of your previous quarter’s deposits) is left in your account on the last day of the quarter.
They set your “Savings Tier” on January 1st, April 1st, July 1st, and October 1st based on how much of your deposits in the previous quarter remained in your account. This is known as your “savings rate.”
For example, if you had deposits of $1,000 in the previous quarter and your balance increased by $200 – then your savings rate was 20%. This is the highest tier.
The four tiers are:
- Tier 1 – Save at least 20%
- Tier 2 – Save at least 15%
- Tier 3 – Save at least 10%
- Tier 4 – Save at least 5%
NOTE: Interest isn’t paid on balances above $100,000.
HMBradley Credit Card
The HMBradley credit card is a rewards card based on your personal credit situation. You’ll earn between 1% and 3% cash back on every purchase you make with the card.
The card personalizes your cashback amount based on where you spend the most money. In other words, it’s an intuitive card.
There is a $60 annual fee charge with this credit card. However, the fee is waived for the first year.
Bonus: HMBradley credit card holders earn up to 3X interest on their HMBradley banking account balance. See the Savings Tier Boost Terms and Conditions page for more information.
Loan Offers
Another feature of HMBradley is that it works to find you the best loan offers and credit card offers based on your relationship with HMBradley.
If you are interested in potentially getting a car loan, mortgage loan, or other credit accounts, this could be a useful feature.
Who Should Use HMBradley?
HMBradley offers features that could appeal to a wide range of consumers. They make it more lucrative for account holders to save money each month.
Because your interest rate on your NOW account is higher when you save more money, it’s enticing to save to earn the higher interest rate.
The cash back credit card HMBradley rewards you for every purchase. In addition, the card is intuitive and pays you the most cash back in your highest spending categories.
And the card helps you build credit as you spend. Your HM Bradley account offers loans, credit cards, and other borrowing recommendations for account owners.
Lastly, the site gives you an overall picture of your credit record, savings, and more to help you gain total control over your finances.
If any of these features are in line with your personal financial goal, opening an HM Bradley account could be a smart move for you.
HMBradley Pros and Cons
There’s a lot to like about HMBradley, but it’s not without its flaws. Here’s my list of pros and cons:
Pros
- Free combination spending/savings account
- Tiered interest rates that encourage you to save more money
- Intuitive cash back credit card
Cons
- Annual fee of $60 for the credit card (waived the first year)
- Strict parameters to be met to get the highest savings rate
- No check writing allowed
HMBradley FAQs
As of this writing, interest compounds daily and is paid monthly.
No. You can transfer money out of any of your Plans into your available balance (spending account) at any time with no fees or restrictions.
According to HMBradley, customers who meet their eligibility criteria can expect to receive an invitation to apply within an hour of opting in. If you don’t qualify, HMBradley will continue to check every month.
HMBradley offers a simple, One Click Credit process for credit card applications. Click here for more information.
HMBradley Alternatives
These HMBradley alternatives offer more banking accounts and were also created to help you better manage your money. Depending on what your needs are, you might find them more suitable.
If you’re looking strictly for the highest interest rates, you can do better than HMBradley especially if you don’t want to move your direct deposit. Our list of the best online savings accounts has rates higher than HMBradley’s base rate.
SoFi
SoFi has been known in the loan industry for several years, but you may not know that the company offers banking accounts as well.
Formerly called SoFi Money (a cash management account), the new SoFi checking and savings accounts offer accounts with no monthly or overdraft fees.
You currently can earn 4.60% APY (unlocked with direct deposit or by depositing $5,000+ every 30 days, otherwise 1.20% APY) on this account.
And if you have at least $1,000 in Direct Deposits each month, you qualify for up to $50 in overdraft protection, free of charge.
If you choose not to have Direct Deposit into your SoFi account, you’ll earn the lower interest rate. SoFi accounts are FDIC-insured. Learn more in our SoFi review.
ONE
The ONE bank account was created to help you organize your money and simplify your life. There are no fees and no minimums for this account.
The account features Pockets that help you to designate money for specific spending and savings purposes.
You can get your Direct Deposit up to two days early if you open a ONE account. The current interest yield on ONE account is 1.00%. Note that this may fluctuate.
Your ONE account is FDIC-insured through Coastal Community Bank.
The Bottom Line on HMBradley
The HMBradley account offers attractive features that encourage users to save more money, spend wisely, and build credit. The bank account is free, and the highest rate of 4.20% APY on savings is attractive if you qualify each month.
There are quite a few hoops you have to jump through to qualify for the highest rate and given that it’s not as high as some other banks (see our list of the best high yield savings accounts), it’s not one we can recommend getting at this time.
Also, the $60 annual fee for the credit card is high, especially since using it is required if you want the highest rate.
Depending on how much you use your HMBradley credit card, you could earn enough cash back to cover the annual fee, but I would probably opt for a better cash back credit card elsewhere.
The bottom line, however, is that HM Bradley provides a compelling value proposition along with healthy competition for other neobanks and online traditional banks – but it’s interest rate is no longer tops in the industry and the requirements to get it may be too much.
