Posted by 
You have decided to keep your money in the house which may be because of one reason or the other, but at some point, you keep wondering about the benefits of keeping cash at home.
Both the rich and the poor keep some amount of money at home. As a matter of fact, a recent survey from the FDIC confirms that 36 % of citizens are unbanked and underbanked because they don’t trust banks.
This same lack of trust is the reason financial experts recommend that you should always keep money in your house that will serve you for at least three months of your living expenses in case of any unforeseen circumstances that may hinder you from getting money from your bank.
At the same time, It is also advisable to save a higher amount of your money in the bank for safety purposes, as you keep a little amount of money at home that will cover your daily necessities in the face of an emergency.
Instead of keeping $50 at home for a day meal, at least keep more cash at home for housing payment, food staples, water, gasoline, and basic living needs that will serve you for at least three months.
Since we have done the benefits of saving money in the bank, we are going to list down the benefits of keeping cash at home. After reading this article, you will find more reasons to keep some cash at home.
1. Your money is readily available
Although the bank makes it easier for you to have access to your money at a given time, you can’t compare it with the benefits of keeping cash at home when it comes to your money being readily available to you.
If your bank’s servers go down or are temporarily unavailable because of some technical issues, you won’t be able to have access to online or mobile banking if you are in urgent need of your money.
So one of the benefits of keeping cash at home is because the money at home is always ready and available with no need of going to automated teller machines and bank counters.
2. No fees are needed to keep your money at home
Another benefit of keeping cash at home is that it is free of charge to save your money at home when compared to the many fees charged by banks.
Although banks claim to offer interest for keeping your money with them, they charge you hugely for any transaction you do in the bank and in addition to other fees.
For instance, Bank of America charges $35 for nonsufficient funds fee, while Alliant Credit Union which is among the largest credit unions open to the public charges $25 for an NSF fee.
If you go over the limit of a particular free transaction in your bank account, then you will be charged overdraft fees. Most banks also charge a monthly account maintenance fee, ATM card maintenance fee, among other fees. Avoiding these fees is among the benefits of keeping cash at home.
Based on a Pew Research Center study, 1/3 of unbanked individuals complained that the reason they stopped banking with the traditional banking institutions is because of excessive or unexplained bank fees.
Talking about the excessive fees, many believe that banks are not transparent and clear when it comes to explaining their fees and fee structure.
So the benefits of keeping cash at home are to prevent you from these unexplained, unnecessary, and hidden fees the banking system charge because keeping your money at home is totally free with no charges.
3. Your money is safe from government raid
A government bank raid is also one of the benefits of keeping cash at home which seems to be the most common one that touches both the rich and the poor.
For instance, if the state decides to convert all foreign currency in every bank accounts to local currency accounts. This usually happens if a country is experiencing an economic crisis, and I have once heard counties like Argentina and Iceland did this.
If you have foreign cash in your home, you will not be affected by this kind of government policies which is among the benefits of keeping cash at home.
In 2013, Bank account owners in Cyprus lost up to 47.5% of their savings because of the government raid. The banks did not have enough capital and the government decided to convert debt to equity. In this case, you will reap the benefits of keeping cash at home because the government has no control over cash at home.
4. There are little or no protocols to keep your money at home
Avoiding the difficult processes in the banking system is one of the benefits of keeping cash at home especially to those who don’t like too many protocols and processes when doing something that involves finances.
Although so many banks claim to make the banking system more easy and simple, the hassle of setting up a bank account alone can be a discouragement in using the banking system in the first place.
In most countries especially high populated countries, you will have to wait long hours in the bank to deposit your money and when you want to make use of the ATM, you will have to stand long queue before you withdraw your money.
Some communities don’t even have enough nearby bank branches to use them regularly. So they benefit more from keeping their money at home than in the bank.
It’s actually frustrating and inconvenient to be forced by banking protocols to queue for at least one hour to 30 minutes for you to be served in the bank. Meanwhile, the banks are still making millions in profits.
All these difficult banking processes are the benefits of keeping cash at home. If you save money at home you don’t have anything to do with banks’ complicated processes.
5. Debt collectors can’t have access to your money
The benefits of keeping cash at home include the avoidance of debt collectors from easily having access to your money.
For instance, if someone has been chasing you down to pay your past debt, the court may order the bank to collect the money from you. The only way court orders can have easy access to your money is through your bank account.
So if you are trying to stay off the grid by keeping your money away from the banking system, this is where the benefits of keeping cash at home come in handy.
Also, having all your money in the bank will make you go broke if you have an unpaid tax that may lead you to bankruptcy, especially when the government is in need of money. The bank usually stores a record of your income, which is very useful to tax collectors and other debt collectors.
6. Your money is safe from bank fraud and scam
Although the bank is secure for your money, one of the benefits of keeping cash at home is to avoid fraud and some insecurity in the banking system.
We all know the high rate of hackers and fraudsters all over the world looking for any loopholes in the bank to steal people’s money especially those who operate online banking. Wire fraud is the most popular one.
The fraudster usually steals the username and password of a banking customer and then empties the person’s account without any trace. The benefits of keeping cash at home are to prevent you from losing all your money through fraud or insecurity in the banking system.
Also, there are some cases where the people involved in the banking fraud are former bank employees who have known the in and out of the bank or current bankers who believe the account owner is dead and there’s no one to claim their money.
For instance, having up to a million-dollar worth bank account that is dormant for years and later checking your balance to see $500,000 in the account. I have witnessed this happen and the bank customer sued the bank for fraud and manipulation.
Although this doesn’t usually happen and the government is doing everything possible to prevent situations like this, but in a few cases, bank workers (fraudulent bankers) tend to mess with the money in an account that has been dormant for years.
One of the benefits of keeping cash at home is to prevent yourself from being a victim of situations like this, either from fraudsters or fraudulent bankers.
7. You are covered during a natural disaster
Most people live in areas struck by natural disasters. Hurricanes, earthquakes, or Tornadoes can interrupt the power supply, causing the banks to stop functioning and without a way of paying for your groceries.
So keeping enough cash at home can help them pay for their daily needs during a power outage when electronic payments may be down, and this also counts as one of the benefits of keeping cash at home.
Even in difficult situations like the period of the pandemic when there is lockdown nationwide and the banking system is not functioning frequently as usual. With the cash you have at home, you can use it to buy your daily needs down the street.
8. You can easily pay for minor work that doesn’t need bank payment
You don’t wish to make payment with your bank and your workers don’t want to receive their money in their bank account, this is where the benefit of keeping cash at home comes in handy
For instance, the kid down the street may help you to mow your lawn or do an errand for you but doesn’t have a way of taking credit cards, with the cash kept at home, you can easily pay the kid.
Also, some people prefer to tip their delivery drivers or service workers in cash and you don’t expect someone that wants to tip $3 to his delivery guy to do that through an online payment.
The most obvious benefit of keeping cash at home is that you never know when girl scout cookies will be at your door and you don’t want to pass up on thin mints because you don’t have money to pay, so keeping some cash at home will help you do the payment.
9. It helps Your Saving process
Many people find it easier to accumulate savings by keeping 10 to 20 dollars every day. The benefits of keeping cash at home for this kind of people are to save up at home and when the money is up to a reasonable amount, they will deposit it to their bank account.
Most times, the small amounts of money found on laundry day or lying around the house contributes to this savings over time. So you don’t expect them to be depositing such an amount of money to the bank on a daily basis.
10. It serves as a backup to your bank account
In general, serving as a backup to your bank account in terms of emergency is among the benefits of keeping cash at home.
For instance, If you lose your credit card or your banking credentials (such as online login details), it can take some time to get new credit cards or replace your lost credentials.
Having backup cash at home means that you will still have money for your daily expenses while you get a new credit card or replace your lost credentials with new information.
CONCLUSION
We hope the benefits of keeping cash at home listed above are able to help you know the things to gain for keeping some cash at home.
The major downside of keeping cash at home is that it may result in a security risk if people get to know that you have a large amount of money hidden in the home. With the benefits of keeping cash at home, it’s still advisable to keep security in mind when keeping huge cash at home.
Thank you very much for having time to read the benefits of keeping cash at home to the end. Please feel free to drop your opinion in the comment and also subscribe to our newsletter.
