Savings Account at Your Credit Union

When you want to save money, open a savings account at your credit union. That way you can earn extra money—just for keeping your money there!

This extra money that you earn is called interest. Interest is money that the credit union pays you for letting them hold onto your money and use it to help other credit union members. For example, they might loan some to another person—but when you need your money, you can always get it back.

Here’s an example:
You have $100 in your credit union savings account, and the credit union is paying you 10% interest every year. To find out how much money you'll earn in interest, multiply 10% by 100 and you get $10. You can write 10% as .10 for the math problem.

So your math problem looks like this: $100 x .10 = $10

The credit union will pay you $10 for keeping your $100 in your savings account for a year. At the end of the year, you will have $110 (your $100 + the $10 in interest from the credit union). That’s a pretty good deal!

There are two things you can do to earn more money in interest:

1. Keep your money in the savings account – Don’t take it out unless you really need it! Before you take any money out of your savings account, ask yourself, "Is this for something I really need...or is it for something that I just want?"
2. Put more money in the savings account – Every time you earn some money or get some money as a gift, put at least half of it in your savings account.

Click here for some tips on earning money.