[Laughter]
That guy thinks I'm really weird. Schwaaab!
Bad life decisions. So what are the important details that you need to know? Well, I've
heard quite a few people say no one ever gets that exchange rate unless they're
like an investment bank on Wall Street. But.
Hey Tangerineys! We are fulfilling a video request today, it's something a lot of you have asked us to talk about.
And it is Mexico money madness!
We want to yell that from the streets, but there's people, so...
[Laughter] This video is all about money and banking in Mexico. How we go about doing it. Yeah, so before we
came to Mexico, we really had no idea how we were gonna handle it. We were at first
going from bank to bank to bank, asking what their conversion ratio was from
u.s. dollars to pesos. And we thought, are we gonna have to carry an obscene amount
of cash with us in order to like avoid all the ATM fees? And generally what are
we gonna do about using credit cards and different things like that. So we'll be
talking about all those things and more in today's video per your guys's
questions and requests. So as US citizens ourselves, it is pretty much impossible
for us to open a bank account anywhere else in the world. Foreign banks will not
deal with US citizens unless you have a crap ton of money, there's just too many
regulations that come with having you as a customer. So you have to come up with
other solutions. Stick around in this video, we're going to be sharing it
towards the end, how you can get a hundred US Dollars and also be able to
have thinking be able to do your banking in Mexico, without ATM fees, without
foreign transaction fees. This is the solution that we figured out after hours
and hours and hours of research. So hopefully this saves you guys a lot of
time. Just as heads up on this, we don't get any
referral fees, or bonuses, or anything from sharing all this information. We're
just doing this to hopefully help you guys out and save you some money, and
time, and frustration in regards to banking here in Mexico. So in the
beginning we thought that our best option might be to just get out a
crap-ton of pesos in the u.s. from our bank, and bring it, and hope it
didn't get stolen. Yeah, so we were thinking it wouldn't really be a viable
option to be constantly getting money out of the ATM here, because the ATM charges
a fee, there's a fee that our bank charges, and then there's, the conversion. Yeah then you
probably get a terrible conversion rate. And then like to bring a bunch of US
dollars here, and convert it at a currency exchange, you're gonna be
getting a terrible rate! So we were looking into what other options there
are. Bad life decisions. (Maddie speaking for the fly) "No I just wanted a sip! AYE No!"
So ultimately, after doing
tons of research, and comparison shopping, and making calls to banks, and looking up
stuff online. What we ended up going with because it was by far the best option
available was Charles Schwab Investor Checking. And we're going to tell you why.
The reason number one why we picked Charles Schwab, is because compared to
all the other banks, it is the most fun to say. Shwaaaab!
[Laughter] That guy thinks I'm really weird! Schwaaaab!
Just kidding. But seriously, number one priority
was ATMs. The best way for you to get cash here is to take it out of an ATM,
regardless of whether you have Schwab or not. But the benefits of having this
particular bank account is not only Schwab doesn't charge you any ATM fees. Schwaaaab! [Laughter]
At the end of each month, they refund all the ATM fees any other bank charged you.
So you can pretty much go to any ATM, it doesn't matter, Santander, Banorte.
Banorte, I don't know how to say that. HSBC. HSBC. Any bank you want, and no matter
what their fee is, they will refund it at the end of the month. So this past month
I got five dollars back at the end of the month for ATM fee refunds. The month
before was ten bucks. The month before that was like twenty bucks. So it's worth it. Yes. It will add up very quickly
otherwise. And this way we don't have to worry about taking out a huge amount of pesos
and having that, you know somewhere hidden in our apartment to worry about someone
stealing it or anything like that. We can take out as much as we need at any time
and it doesn't really matter Charles Schwab refunds any fees that you incur.
Although this particular factor doesn't really interest me that much, and I don't
know a lot about it, Charles Schwab does offer 20 times the amount of interest
that you would get from another bank. For instance, Bank of America where I was
getting about three pennies per month for basically no matter how much I had
in a bank, you might be getting like 25 cents instead, so. It'd be 60 cents. That's pretty cool. Okay
that's my math for you guys. [Laughter] The next important and really cool detail is that there are no
transaction fees. So with your average credit card or debit card, you're going
to be charged approximately 3% per transaction no matter how big or small
it is. And with Charles Schwab, there is nothing. 3% might not sound like too
awfully much, but consider if you're spending about a thousand US
Dollars per month, that's $30 a month or 360 dollars a year. So it does add up.
Did you just math? I just mathed! And really important to us was the no account
minimums and no maintenance fee. Almost every other bank charges a monthly
maintenance fee unless you have a certain amount of cash in the bank. With
this one, even if you only have $20 in the bank, you won't be charged any
maintenance fees at all. Absolutely no Moo-tenance fees at all. Mooo.
So what are the
important details that you need to know? Well one we would both recommend
probably doing this when you're in the United States versus after you've
already come to Mexico. We're not entirely sure if it's possible to sign
up for an account once you're in Mexico. You might be able to, but we
definitely know the process is super easy when you have a u.s. address where
they can send the card, and a u.s. number that you can call on verify your account,
and all that good stuff. So if you look up on Google what they Peso to dollar
exchange rate is, it might be something like twenty pesos to the dollar right
now. Well, I've heard quite a few people say no one ever gets that exchange rate
unless they're like an investment bank on Wall Street. But, what you can get is
Visas exchange rate, which is pretty freakin close. So, and with Charles Schwab
they offer you that exchange rate. Which means, instead of going to a money
exchange place where if it's 20 pesos to one US dollar, you would actually end up
getting like seventeen or eighteen pesos to every dollar, and you're losing
quite a bit. If you're getting visas rate, it's something like nineteen point nine
eight pesos per dollar, so it's not that much at all. So if you guys are
interested in doing this and you want to sign up for Charles Schwab we have a
little cool thing for you, which is, if we refer you, then you get a hundred US
dollars, assuming you meet a few of their very basic easy conditions. As far as our
research, it doesn't look like we get anything if we refer you but what you
get is that hundred dollars. So if you're interested in doing that just send us an
email at our tangerine travels at gmail.com and we will help you get the
sign-up process started. Like we said, we don't get anything. We're just doing it
to be nice. Hopefully, we answered all of the
questions you guys have had about banking in
Mexico and money management. What we do while we're here. It's pretty
straightforward once you have a Charles Schwab account. I don't think we've
really encountered any issues, or extra fees, or hidden surprises, or anything
like that. Can you think of anything? No nothing like that, they've been great.
Yeah and the customer service is even great. There was, I think a time where
there were some confusing charges on my account, and I got someone who called me
to handle it with me personally. Very polite and professional, so we would
recommend if you're looking for something, some way to manage your money
in Mexico, this is a great option. And just to reiterate, we are not getting
anything from them. We're not being sponsored by Charles Schwab, we just know
that this is a great, safe way to do banking, and so we thought we'd share all
these details with you guys. And for clarity, we can't give you a promo code
they don't offer that. We do need your e-mail address to enter into their
system to refer you. Which is why, if you're interested, you'll just have to email us.
Well, if you appreciate this information and you enjoy this video, please give it
a thumbs up and consider subscribing to our channel if you haven't already. And
also be sure to follow us on social media, you can find all those links down
below. And GONG That Bell! No, you need more emphasis on "Gong That Bell."
Oh, I thought the laugh, you meant the laugh [Maddie's loud evil laugh]
Okay, there's no one. Thank goodness.
[Laughter] GONG That Bell if you want to be notified the next time we put out a
new video, and we will see you in the next one.