NetBank is going out of business.  Most everything but the savings, checking and mortgage have already been sold and EverBank has agreed to buy the savings and checking portion of the business.

In a previous post, I mentioned that the pending EverBank purchase caused me to investigate other online banks.  As I explained to one commenter, I have nothing against EverBank, if fact I have heard great things about them.  One is that they are rated number one by Forbes magazine.

But that wasn’t the issue.  I wanted to be in control of who my bank was, and just felt that I shouldn’t automatically accept a transfer to EverBank without at least finding out what other online banks had to offer.

EverBank has a relatively high deposit requirement to get their highest interest, and it is only in the mid 4% range.  HSBC pays 5.05% on anything greater than $1.  But they have a horrible billpay system.  It seems that the system pays the bills you request, but you must keep the records of when they were paid, and when the next payment is due.

EverBank on the other hand has a Bill Pay identical to that of NetBank, at least as far as I can tell from the EverBank demo.  I have therefor decided to use HSBC for savings deposits and EverBank, when the transfer takes place, for checking and BillPay.  EverBank requires a minimum balance of $1500 for free BillPay, but pays interest at the rate of 3.35%, so is an acceptable trade off from NetBanks free BillPay and 2.5% interest.

Complicating the NetBank acquisition by EverBank, I suspect, is the facts that NetBank has missed the last two SEC filings, has been delisted by NASDAQ, and it’s stock, now listed on the OTC pink sheets closed today for 10 cents a share.