This column was the first in a series of articles that offer insights into personal experiences with the products and services that you read about on Investopedia every day.

After getting engaged, I was excited to jump into wedding ౠplanning immediately. But my eagerness faded whe♈n I started crunching the numbers. My fiancé and I hoped to save $15,000 by the time the big day rolled around in July 2024, and to do that, we knew budgeting and saving money needed to be a priority.

Most weddings aren’t cheap, but I didn’t understand how expensive they can be until I started planning my own. The average cost for a wedding in the U.S. in 2024 was $33,000, according to wedding planning website Zola. To have the celebration my fiancé aꦗnd I wanted, we needed to be diligent about saving money.

We started brainstorming the best ways to save money for major expenses and decided to look into the best high-yield savings accounts (HYSAs).

A High-Yield Savings Account Was Our Best Bet

As a freelance writer who covers financial topics, I consider myself pretty well-versed in personal finance. I knew that keeping cash in our low-yield personal bank accounts wasn’t the best way to grow our money, and opening a high-yield savings account together would help us earn more in interest. It would also simplify payments for wedding expenses because we could pull all of the money from a sing🌠le account.

However, I wanted to be sure that a high-yield savings account would be the best way to reach our financial goal of 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:saving for a wedding. I considered other options, like short-term 𒁃investments, but realized we needed something low-risk and easily accessible when making vendor payments.

After I settled on a high-yield savings account and got my fiancé on bo🌌ard, I started looking for the best one. 

How I Found the Best High-Yield Savings Account for My Weddi🍸ng

I’ve been a Bank of America client for over a decade, but Bank of America doe🌸sn’t offer a high🐈-yield savings account. So, I started researching institutions that offer high-yield saving✱s accounts and made a list of so✨me promising options. 

I first looked on Reddit. I knew that most high-yield savings accounts were similar, but I wanted to understand people’s experiences with the bank, the ease of depositing and withdrawing funds, and, of course, the current annual percentage yield (APY). I also read reviews on sites like 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Trustpilot and checked for any glaring complaints on the 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Better Business Bureau (BBB).

How I Compared High-Yield Savings Accounts

While I didn’t rely on Reddit to make my final decision, I did use it to narrow down the list of banks to evaluate further. My next step was to compare the 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:best high-yield savings accounts I thought would work for my fiancé and me.

Some of the options I considered were 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Marcus by Goldman Sachs, 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:LendingClub, 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Ally Bank, 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Wealthfront, and 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:SoFi Bank. ♐I analyzed each one based on my most important criteria, which included:

• Current APY
• Minimum balance requirements
• Transaction limitations
• Monthly maintenance fees
• FDIC insurance
• Website and/or mobile app experience

We Decided to Open a Wealthfront Cash Account

When I first started looking at high-yield savings accounts, I thought they were all the same. However, I quickly realized t𓂃hat some accounts (and the financial institutions that provide them) are better than others.

In the end, my fiancé and I opened a cash account with 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:Wealthfront. While Wealthfront is a robo-advisor, it offered a great cash management account with a competitive APY of 4.80% (back in 2023 when we opened it), which you get regardless of your balance (well above the national average of 0.46%). As of November 2023, the interest rate on Wealthfront's cash management account is 5.00%.

We started with $2,000 in the account in July 2023, and hoped to save $13,000 more over the course of 12 months. That's an average of about $1,083 per month that we needed to save in our account. Interest in the account compounds monthly, which helped us save even more than $15,000. For example, sticking to this plan for 12 months resulted in a total of $15,387.58 in the account—almost $350 more than if we saved in an account with a 0.46% interest rate.

We found Wealthfront's website and mobile app incredibly easy to use, and we were able to quickly transfer money from our personal bank accounts to our Wealthfront cash account. We also liked that Wealthfront charges very few fees (just a wire transfer fee and an out-of-network ATM fee) and has unlimited transfers and withdrawals. Money in the account is also protected with up to $8 million in 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:FDIC insurance.

It’s worth noting that Wealthfront didn’t have the highest APY you can find, and it still doesn't—the top interest rate on a savings account that is available nationwide as of Sept. 17, 2024, is 5.50% APY. However, I found that I liked Wealthfront's user experience more than these other financial institutions, so I was OK trading a lower interest rate for a better experience.

With a high-yield savings account, the interest rate (APY) will fluctuate. I felt more comfortable choosing an account that was secure, flexible, and easy to use, even if it meant getting a slightly lower rate.

It's Easy to Save for Big Expenses With a High-Yield Savings Account

Since opening our Wealthfront cash account, I’ve realized just how easy it can be to save money for big expenses. We scheduled regular deposits into our account and just watched the mon🅘ey grow. Plus, it’s completely separate from our pe☂rsonal savings accounts, so there was no temptation to spend the money we were trying to save.

If you’re actively saving money for something in the short term, whether it’s a wedding, vacation, new car, down payment, or just a rainy day fund, I would highly recommend opening a high-yield savings account to make your life easier.

Many reputable financial institutions offer 澳洲幸运5官方开奖结果体彩网:high-yield savings accounts with no monthly fees and generous APYs. Whether you set up recurring deposits or contribute what you can, when you can, it’s a great tool to save money with very little risk.