I have a love (mostly)/hate with USAA lately. I do car insurance and my primary banking through them. I have a World MC through them, with what is by far highest CL, and they were good enough to not lower it or raise my APR when others were in 2008.
Without doing your primary banking there they may be stingier with CLs though. Their rewards program is very average though, absolutely nothing to write home about. I would say the biggest utility for me was a high enough CL to get the attention of some higher end cards.
Oh, and despite what I said about USAA Membership Rewards being average it is still better than their other option, Cash Rewards. The % cash back is based on spending and you would really have to put a lot of spending through to make it worth it and I can't imagine you wouldn't get better rewards for the same spending on another card.
New car?
They have decent auto loans and a nice layout for car buying.
Credit cards aren't great.
I would look into their insurance products; although, rules and regulations vary from state-to-state, so YMMV. Some people report saving money by switching away from USAA, others save a chunk; when I lived in the Philadelphia area (suburbs) I saved a good amount of money on my insurance. Philly at the time had the second highest premium costs in the country.
Used Car purchasing, you can do better shopping elsewhere.
Do you ever rent a car? Would you ever rent a car in an emergency? With USAA you get a discount, no underage fee, no additional driver fee, "loss of use" fees are waived, and some other rental car coverage features - although you will need to use your USAA credit card for booking
@D-Wall wrote:How exactly do the car rental benefits work? Which cards do they apply to? I'm only 23 and I can't stand the underage fees. They are ridiculous when your driving record is spotless. I have a full membership, but no products with USAA right now. Their insurance just costs too much compared to Geico.
Oh, I'm sorry I was mistaken. They are membership benefits, and do not require use of a USAA CC. I believe at one time you had to use a USAA credit card, but I'm mistaken. No need to have USAA insurance product(s) with theme, although their could be a benefit there in the unfortunate case of damages/loss of rental car.
You will need the Discount Code for the rental agencie; you can find out a little more here: https://www.usaa.com/inet/pages/rental_cars_main
"No Additional Driver Fees for spouses and USAA members"
Young driver fee "Waived for 21 to 24 year olds"
Loss of use fee waived
Loss or damage to a rental: "The member is responsible for the first $5,000 of damage to a rental vehicle." Hey, at least you don't have to buy the whole car 