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Showing posts from November, 2012

Why Hyatt is My Favorite Hotel - Part 2

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Yesterday I spoke about the ease with which you could book a Hyatt award stay by transferring Ultimate Reward points into your Hyatt Gold Passport account.  Today. I want to discuss the benefits of the Hyatt Gold Passport program.  First of all, it is very easy to obtain entry level status in the Gold Passport program.  The only thing you need is a Chase Hyatt Visa card.  The annual fee for this card is $75/year.  The card comes with a sign up bonus of two free nights at ANY Hyatt worldwide.  That is a great deal!  If you already have Hyatt Gold Passport Platinum status when you sign up, in addition to your two free nights, you get two confirmed suite upgrade certificates.  The suite upgrade certificates are good for paid stays up to 7 nights. All you have to do is book the least expensive eligible room, then call the Gold Passport line and they will confirm your upgrade. Pretty Suite! Eligible room rates can usually be discounted rates like AARP or AAA discount, but rooms boo

Why Hyatt Hotels Are My Favorite and Why They Could be Yours Too

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I wrote previously about "Why I Believe the Experts Are Wrong About the True Value of Points". The basic premise of that article was that we make decisions about purchasing things based on how easy or difficult it is to replace the currency that we are about to spend.  In other words, "the value of a dollar".  Intuitively we know how easy or difficult it is for each of us to replace the money in our bank account. The decision about how easy or hard it is to replace miles or points in our account is not so clear.  We don't understand the "value of a point" as intuitively. Today I want to use a specific example demonstrating my point.  To me, flexible points like Starpoints or Ultimate Rewards points are a very valuable currency.  Starwood points are probably the best way to accumulate airline miles because of the 25% bonus you receive when transferring into any one of their 31 airline partners.  You are earning the same 1:1 ratio of dollars spen

Trip Review- Aruba. One Happy Island.

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Today's post is a departure from previous articles.  Today I am going to review our recent trip to Aruba. My wife and I just returned from a two week trip to our favorite Island-Aruba.  We own a timeshare at the Marriott in Palm Beach there.  For those of you who aren't familiar with timeshare jargon, we have a 2 BR lock-off unit.  That means it's a 2 BR unit that can be "split" into a one BDRM suite (full kitchen, LR, DR) and a second efficiency unit (more like a regular hotel room with a connecting door).  If you want, you can use the whole 2 BR suite for one week, or you can"lock off" each of the two units separately for one week each.  We chose the latter option this year so we we could stay in Aruba for two weeks consecutively. We have been going to Aruba at least once a year for several years now.  I understand why they call it "One Happy Island". If anyone is interested, we do rent out the unit periodically.  PM me and I can give

Southwest Companion Pass-The Best Airline Perk in the Industry

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The Southwest Companion Pass - Best Airline Perk The Southwest Airlines companion pass is probably the best perk in the entire airline industry. Most companion passes are good for one use only and they come with at least a $99 fee for the companion.  The southwest Companion pass is good for up to 2 years and is reusable over and over again. The fee is only $5 for the companion (security fee).   Now is the perfect time to prepare yourself to earn the companion pass in 2013 so that it is good for ALL of 2014 as well. Here's how. You must first apply for the Southwest Airlines Business and Personal cards. There is a $69 annual fee for each card that is not waived for the first year.  Each card comes with 50,000 Rapid Reward miles as a sign up bonus with a $2000 minimum spend requirement within 3 months.  The $1000 minimum spend requirement is very reasonable. For easy tips to meeting the minimum spend requirement, click here . Once you have both the business and personal ca

The True Value of Points - Why the Experts Are Dead Wrong

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The True Value of Miles – Why the “Experts” are Wrong   I really never understood why anyone would buy miles for their Frequent Flyer account.   If I could “earn” 1 mile per dollar spent on my credit card (or sometimes more), paying more than a penny per mile to purchase them never seemed to make economic sense. OK, I understand there might be times that you need to top off an account to purchase an award ticket that you would like to book NOW!But, to go to the airlines and say “I want to buy 50,000 miles ” seems crazy to me! I don't care that you use it for aspirational award travel and can get 5 cents per mile for your 1st class seat. I was reading one of my favorite blogs the other day. The author is one of the most respected Bloggers on the subject of points and miles.   He is widely considered to be an expert on the subject.   His blog has some great tips and he seems to really know how to work the system.   In this particular post he was touting this great Am

Why You Should Put Your Airline Credit Card in a Drawer.

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Why You Should Put Your Airline Cards In a Drawer If you’ve been following me at all, you know how much I love flexible points like Chase Bank’s Ultimate Rewards (UR).   Chase has most of the great point earning bonus cards out there, so once in a while it’s nice to see a great card product that isn’t Chase.   You can’t have all the cards in your arsenal from one bank.   At some point Chase will not extend you any more credit.   However, Chase is pretty generous about moving around lines of credit from one card to another.   They may even allow you to mix business lines and personal lines. Since I’ve already discussed UR points in a previous post , today let’s talk about another two of my other favorite cards; the Amex Starwood Preferred Personal and Business Cards. Starwood Hotels are among some of the nicest hotels in the World.   If you aren’t familiar with the Starwood chain, they have the Sheraton brand, as well as the Westin, W, St. Regis, The Luxury

Why Credit Card Churning Doesn't Lower Your Credit Score

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The most common question I get asked when it comes to credit card churning to rack up hundreds of thousands of points every year is, "doesn't it hurt your credit score"?   The answer to that is both yes and no.  In the short term, it can take 5-6 points off your credit score when making an application for credit. So far this year I have applied for and received 8 new credit cards. My credit score has actually improved by 1 point.  (Figure 1). To understand how this happens, you need to know how a credit score is made up. There are approximately eight main factors that go into your score. 1) Probably the most important is your percentage of on time payments.  Paying bills on time is the best way to show the banks you will be paying them back.  Importance: High 2) Utilization Ratio.  The utilization ratio is the primary reason that credit card churning can actually improve your credit score! Here's why.  Let's say that you spend $10,000/month on yo

Why Ultimate Reward (UR) Points Are So Valuable

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I am a HUGE fan of the Chase lineup of personal and business cards.  They are great cards for everyday spending that happen to come with a great sign up bonus.  I would recommend that anyone who doesn't have a business and a personal card from Chase to apply for one now.  (At the same time).  Here is the phone number for the Chase reconsideration line if you don't get immediate approval. Just tell them you need both a business and personal card to keep the expenses separate. 1-888-245-0625 Here is the lineup of the current Chase cards that are not branded to a hotel or airline. Ink Bold 50,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 in the first three months $95 annual fee waived for the first year No foreign transaction fees Ink Plus 50,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 in the first three months $95 annual fee waived for the first year No foreign transaction fees Ink Classic 20,000 bonus points after you spend $3,000 in the first three months No annu

5 Top Secret Tips on Meeting Minimum Spending Requirements

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There are many ways to meet minimum spending requirements.  Here are just a few tips. 1) Pay EVERYTHING by credit card .  This tip is pretty obvious, but there are plenty of bills which come in the mail that you are probably still paying by check or online bill pay .  If they charge a fee to use a credit card, unless that charge is less than of the value of the points earned, avoid it.  I pay my cable TV for the home and the office, cell phone bill,  and Internet with my Chase Ink Bold card that pays 5X points! The list is endless.  Very rarely do I ever pay cash for things anymore. There is a great deal out there for the Chase trifecta.  If you have either an Ink or Sapphire preferred card along with the chase Freedom card and Checking account, you can put really small purchases (under $10) on your Freedom card and earn cash back.  It also earns a fixed number of points for each sale in addition to the purchase points.  If you have one of the other Chase cards mentioned above, y

The Three Classifications of Credit Cards

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This is the second installment of the series "Getting Started With Hotel Points and Airline Miles.  In general there are three types of credit cards that you should apply for. The first type of card that I routinely apply for is for the sign up bonus itself.  The best of these types of cards will generally be offering a value of between $500-$1000 in sign up incentives.  The incentives may be in the form of airline miles, hotel points, free hotel nights, or cash to be used toward travel. This class of card is to be used until the minimum spend requirement is met.  After you have met the minimum spend, you will hold that card until just before the annual fee is due. At that point you will either cancel the card, or trade the card for a no fee version with the same issuing bank.  Maintaining the account can help your credit score as it increases the average length of your credit accounts. There are many cards out there that you can cancel, wait a specific period of time (6-1

Your Prescription For Free Travel - Part 3

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How To Use Miles and Points     How we choose to use our points is a very personal thing. Some of us are Weekend Warriors. We like to get away for lots of long weekends here in the US . Others of us like to take luxury vacations, choosing to fly in first class and staying at 5 star hotels. Others may choose to travel the world for weeks at a time staying at mid level hotels. All these travelers require a different miles and points strategy. Failure to execute the proper strategy can waste money fulfilling minimum spending requirements on a card with a bonus that is not useful to your travel needs. The Weekend Warrior who takes lots of 3-4 day trips with their spouse here in the US would greatly benefit from the Southwest Airline companion pass. This is one of the best airline perks in the industry. Unlike companion passes with other airlines, the Southwest pass is reusable for up to two years! This means your travel partner (that you must designate) can trav

Your Prescription for Free Travel - Part 2

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How Free Travel Works   The basic premise of this strategy is that there are three types of credit cards for which you will apply: 1) The first category of credit card to sign up for is the kind that have a BIG signup bonus. These signup bonuses can be worth between $500-$1000 or more. These cards you will most likely cancel prior to paying the annual fee when it comes due. You may even sign up for these cards again in 12-18 months and receive the bonus again! 2) This next category of cards you keep year after year. You will pay the annual fee because of the perks that come with the card. These cards usually stay in a drawer and are not used for spending. A good example of this card would be the Amex Platinum card that provides airline club lounge access just for having the card. The annual fee on this card is $495. 3) The third and last type of card is the kind that you will use for everyday spending. You may have as many as 5 or 6 of t