[MENTION=52130]radonc1[/MENTION] I think you're correct that it's not worth it, because of your point about the money market funds (and other related products); your point about whether it's really worth it; and your point about the risk of "dicey activity." In addition to those points, there's the fact that I could easily go with one of these accounts, I could do a lot of work to set everything up, then a better (maybe simpler) deal could pop up later and now it's hard to switch because maybe it's another Chex, maybe I have to maintain a minimum balance in the old account, etc, compared to how easy it is to sell a bond or cash out of a money market fund. So I'm probably not going to do anything, or at least bide my time and see how things look in 6 months.

However, as it stands today, the best rewards checking rates (like the ones requiring the x # of transactions) I can find are higher than the best money market/bond/short-term CD returns I can find. I kinda just wanted to plan for the future in case the rewards checking rates really pull ahead. I was kind of spurred to action by the recent announcement of 6% on up to 35k balances from Union Square Credit Union, although that one doesn't seem like a good fit for me (they don't seem very friendly to MS-adjacent stuff ^-^).

Unfortunately I don't really grab coffee or do very much other small-transaction type stuff; I just checked and I haven't even made 12 transactions per month total across all payment methods in the past 3 months. But to your point, maybe I could shuffle some things around, change some habits, and it would work.