Of course it's not lucrative! People who would be willing to pay a reasonable sum of money to protect their assets aren't going to rent a Safe Deposit Box with a 'your stuff will probably be there, but get insurance' guarantee. To make up for that problem, apparently, my local bank thought it'd be best to give them away to people, like me, who have no use for one. It's basically a product where the entire thing the customer wants to buy, security at the expense of convenience, is precisely what they are not selling you 'despite the name'. The paperwork reminded me that purchasing insurance for the Safe Deposit Box was a necessity and the bank would not be liable for losses. Reading the leasing agreement, the bank made it very clear that the 'Safe Deposit Box' provided far less assurance that my (non-existent) valuables would be protected than they would in a good safe in my home. At the age I was, I really had nothing of particular value to store there and it seemed like a silly thing to get but I was curious. I remember about 15 years ago the bank by my house opened up and passed on an offer that people who opened one of their high-deposit checking accounts would get a Safe Deposit Box for free. I think this article answers the question as to 'why'. They’re expensive to build, complicated to maintain and not very lucrative. Banks increasingly regard safe deposit boxes as more of a headache than they’re worth.
