Bank of America Safety Deposit Box issue

I just moved to the east side of the Dallas/Ft Worth metroplex, and am having a bear of a time moving my safety deposit box. The closest Bank of America to my house claims that there is a 3-5 year waiting period for a 3x5 box. I called 6 other banks in a 10 mile radius, and they all said the same thing. One claimed to get 20 calls a day about safety deposit boxes.

WTF?

I mean, BoA is giving away 3x5 boxes as an incentive for being an Advantage customer, so that's got to be producing some scarcity, but why on earth aren't they expanding capacity? Is it really a 'perk' of keeping a big account with them if you can't use it?

I was particularly annoyed that they have no central inventory. If you want a safety deposit box, they suggest that you contact each bank individually to find one. That's some wonderful customer service!

Do you have a suggestion about how to find a convenient safety deposit box? Or, would I be better off getting a box 20 miles away to 'spread out my risk' in the event of a wildfire or other major disaster?

 

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I pay around $125 a year for my BoA box. As far as I know there are plenty of empty boxes in that CT town.

You could always try a storage unit with good security. There is something in the contract against having more than $5000 in storage units, but that is written by their lawyers to protect them.

 

My question. Why in the world are you still doing business with BofA? (aka North Carolina National Bank) I would have thought that by now, everyone, especially here, would have learned how this bank operates.

 

Expand Capacity

How are they going to expand capacity? The deposit boxes are inside their vaults. The ones i've seen in my banks are wall to wall. Unless they spring for a new vault or new branch, I doubt there is room for expansion.

 

At at least one BoA location, they added a vault in an area where they had unused office space. If there are 20+ people calling daily, then it seems like the demand is certainly there.

However, during my calls I found out that the only bank that's been opened in the area in the last 3 years was designed with 0 safety deposit boxes. So, the cost/benefit is either out of whack, or BoA is just following standard operating procedure and continuing to shoot itself in the foot.

 

+1
Credit unions! Where the depositor is an owner.

 

Who said SDB are profitable? You are assuming they are, when maybe they lose money offering them and really only do it as a service.

Personally, I would buy a safe for a closet downstairs. Bolt it to the floor, and have a lot more space than a puny SDB provides. Buy some nice shiny new silver and shiny new cents in there to take the hit for toning. That and some dessicant bags.

 

Buy a safe and bolt it into your slab..it will pay for itself in no time at all.
It is at your disposal and you will never be locked out or taken over!!

 

You trust a big coporation with your saftey deposit box? Get a safe already!

 

do you own a house???
if you do does it have a basement??? is the basement finisihed??
if soo are you handy with building materials??? build yourself a vault thats what i would do.. its not that hard a few bricks some steel reinforcement, fire shielding.. do it yourself its the same way you build a bomb shelter

 

I am very familiar with the area. I used to have a SDB in Haltom City which cost me about 150 a year. The best ever was the Winstar Casino SDB's. Sounds silly.. I don't know if you are a gambler or not, but they are large enough that you can store magazines in them. Poker chips, money, coins, and it is FREE OF CHARGE! All you have to have is your Winstar VIP Card. Now that they are 24/7 I'd take a drive up there an check it out. (3rd largest Casino in the world).

 

take about 1000 dollars or less depending on who you know.. and some late night work.. and really depends on how creative you are,,

 

i build one for a friend that had a large closet once in p.a. and well that was when his house was new..

 

when i settle down and start a family i plan on building my own house that includes a secret room and a vault.

 

Safe? Check
Gun? Check
Bullets? Check

Your stuff is safe living in Texas if you have those 3 things.

 

Personally I would opt to store my collection in a buried Jar next to my sewage tank instead of dealing with BOA in any way. When it was NCNB years ago my own mother was a long time employee. But as the years progressed that bank has had some sort of fungus eat away any good they ever had. Please find another safe way to store your goods instead of that place.

 

I do business with them because they have more user-friendly systems than the smaller banks. That is why many numismatic companies have chosen them too.

Banks and ethics, good luck trying to make sense of that equation. Yes they are corrupt but most of the other ones are too. Plus, they have to play by the rules more than ever because we know how they ripped people off.

 

^This is why I dumped my accounts at the Banks years ago and only deal with Credit Unions now. They offer far more free services than BofA and they couldn't be more user friendly. (Co-incidently one of the banks I got away from was BofA)

 

Nope. And my landlord would probably be a bit upset if I drilled into the slab. :rollling:

I do have some hefty safes, but I want some off-site protection for items that I can't protect entirely from fire. Somewhere with on-site monitoring would be nice... like, you know, a bank.

 

Amen brother down with the 1%