Get a free year of TripIt Pro and access to an $800 First Republic checking account bonus ($50,000 deposit, 90 day lifecycle) by signing up for a free year of Founders Card, which is a glorified coupon book for … people. They have other coupons of dubious value in case you want to poke around too. Sign up with code VIPTRIALRIUN12, and use a burnt out gift card or a virtual credit card number when you sign up so they can’t charge you in renewal fee in a year.
For what it’s worth, I really like TripIt and use it weekly despite its old, clunky, IE6 era interface. Deal from Holly at DoC.
10,000 points toward elite status (A-List or A-List Preferred)
3x bonus Rapid Rewards points one or more flights, depending on the offer
2x bonus points on flights to and from Southwest hub cities (I saw Houston)
Plastiq is offering a widely targeted offer for $10 in gift cards for each $1,000 in payments sent, up to $3,000 in total spend. Look for an email with the subject “Earn up to $30 when you make a payment this month”. Hint: If this feels like a snoozer, honestly it’s actually not. Try a few things!
Like inflation of the US dollar, the deals this week have started out with a nice “up and to the right” graph shape:
SoFi will deposit $100 into your account if you set up a new direct deposit in the next 90 days, and deposit at least $1,000 in a 30 day period. This only works if you set up a new SoFi account or if you haven’t already had direct deposits into your existing SoFi account.
SoFi will also give you $20 for checking your mortgage rate by June 1. This only involves a soft credit pull, not a hard pull, so it won’t affect your credit score.
There is a Barclay AAviator credit card link floating around that gives 60,000 AA miles after making any purchase with the card within the first 90 days, and the annual fee is waived the first year. 60,000 AA miles for a hard pull and no annual fee is a great deal. I applied an my application went pending, probably because I haven’t put a ton of spend on my other Barclay cards and they care about that. I’ll call reconsideration in a couple of days and should be able to get it pushed through. #bonvoyed for now though.
Don’t forget that this card is a personal credit card, and will thus impact your 5/24 status with Chase.
MileagePlusX is offering 25x United miles on Raddison stays of up to $330 spend by September 30, but only for a single transaction. I’d move to a Radisson for an upcoming stay for this deal if it had showed up in my MileagePlusX app, but sadly I was #bonvoyed again.
Office Depot/OfficeMax has $15 off of $300 or more in Visa Gift Cards. Buy two $200 cards for $398.90, and use a Chase Ink credit card or another card that bonuses at office supply stores. I went yesterday and bought two, but I forgot my Ink and had to use a non-bonusing card. #bonvoyed three times in a row.
My pending Barclay’s AAviator application, on pause for 7 to 10 business days.
I have a travel hacking thought for you to mull over during the weekend: Inertia kills. Inertia kills deals, accounts, stores, good cashiers, loopholes, and redemptions. It’s easy to fall into a rut and ignore this but you really shouldn’t. What do I mean?
First a little refresher: Inertia is the tendency for something to continue as it has been, to avoid change*. In travel hacking, having big inertia means hitting the same technique over and over again. If your game is just buying a gift card every day and turning it into a money order, you’re in the rut I’m talking about. The same goes for singular focus on sign-up bonuses, or focusing on just gift card reselling, or sticking to cell phone burners. Or it could be using the same bank account for every single money order deposit.
When you’re singularly focused you’ve got massive inertia. The means you’re not:
Diversifying risk
Diversifying earning
Spreading spend
Exercising new techniques
Preventing burnout
If your bank decides they’ve had enough of your shenanigans, a shutdown there could cause a grinding halt to everything if you don’t have other bank accounts. If you visit the same grocery store every single day you’re going to stand out and you’ll be remembered. All it takes for the grocery axe to come down is a decision from an assistant-manager having a bad day that they don’t like what you’re up to. They may hold a store meeting to tell everyone to not sell to you, call the police, or you may even find your picture on the wall behind the customer service counter. Believe me, it happens.
When you’re constantly changing your game by switching your activities, stores, and techniques, you’re less likely to be noticed. As an added bonus your credit card company is less likely to be suspicious over buying “$506.95 worth of gas” every day when you call for a retention bonus after the annual fee posts. Frankly you’ll earn more and play more in the long run.
The same principle applies to the whole community; when everyone pounded uncle Tio, he passed away. When Plastiq‘s compliance team figured out why nearly every single account was sending $500 payments, they put a quick end to it. When Kroger awarded fuel points on variable load gift cards and watched their profit and loss statement explode, they stopped it. When the community collectively pounded the British Airways 4,500 mile partner redemption in the US for city pairs less than 650 miles apart, the chart changed.
Moral of the story: Keep your accounts, your methods, and your targets diverse and changing, and they’ll all live longer. You’ll probably end up earning and burning more too.
An unfortunate self-commentary.
* Yes, there’s a scientific definition too, you may have heard of it. It’s called “Newton’s First Law”. However my very real physicist hat is off right now and yours should be too.
If you’ve got an American Express Personal Platinum (or literally five of them like me), then you’re probably repeatedly annoyed at the twice a year $50 Saks credit. The best option to liquidate these is to take your stack of Platinums to a physical Saks and buy a $50 gift card with each, which isn’t supposed to reimburse but always does. That’s all fine and dandy, but the closest Saks to me is literally 698 miles by car which leaves me either 1) schlepping a bunch of Platinums around to a store I wouldn’t normally go to while I’m out of town, or 2) buying some overpriced stuff on Saks.com.
Reader Ryan let me know about another way that has more modestly priced receptacles choices:
Check out at Saks Off 5th with PayPal rather than using the Saks checkout and the $50 American Express credit will still post, even though it’s not supposed to
Office Depot/OfficeMax has an instant discount of $15 when purchasing at least $300 worth of Mastercard gift cards between now and Saturday. Two $200 gift cards worth (checks notes) $400, will cost you $398.30. Use a card that bonuses at office supply stores (duh).
Check your American Express offers for $150 back on $1,000 spend at Dell.com. Don’t forget about the Xbox gift card XBOX10 promo code, and ideally add this offer to a Business Platinum with unspent Dell credit if available. With XBOX10 and the resale rate hovering around 82%, this deal is profitable and you’ll earn a nice shopping portal bonus at Dell to boot.
PointApp has 10x earning at BestBuy between now and Sunday with a cap at $500 in spend. It’s definitely worth it for a few clicks to buy a BestBuy GC for resale if you’ve already got a Point card. They’re also offering a targeted 1,500 point bonus for using the card once per day for five days in a row, at least $5 per purchase. For this one, just use Debbit.
Remember, we do this so we can buy tickets and hang out at the airport for 14 hours due to a mechanical delay.
Check CashApp for a 5% back on online orders at Sam’s Club boost, usable once per day for up to $400 in spend each day through Thursday. I’d buy a couple of Visa or Mastercard gift cards each time, and don’t forget to go through a shopping portal, which often tracks gift card purchases at Sam’s Club (though not always). If you don’t have CashApp, find a friend for an invite and you’ll earn $15 after sending another CashApp user five bucks.
Ting SIM cards with $30 credit are now $0.99 at BestBuy and $1.00 at Target. The Visible $100 Mastercard deal is still running strong, and reader Yun let me know that TopCashBack is currently at $40 for new bring your own phone plans with a port-in of an existing phone number, in addition to the $100 Mastercard that you’ll get from Visible after two months. Additional background is available here and here.
Those last two bullets will pair well together. If you don’t have CashApp, I guarantee someone out there that you know has it. Reach out, say hi, and get a referral. I reluctantly put a referral for Point in a post last week because it was the only way to get a good sign-up bonus, but I can’t bring myself to do it again this week, that’s not why I’m in this; so find a friend!
Three month long spending bonuses on co-branded credit cards seems to have become a regular event at Chase. The current iteration started on Saturday and runs through August 15. Going to chase.com/mybonus used to be the easiest way to get registered; however in the current iteration that link won’t always show your bonus. Instead, you’ve got a much better chance of getting an offer by going to one of the following links, painstakingly compiled by JC, with a few minor edits and updates:
Marriott Bonvoy Premier Visa: 9x points on Marriott purchases, 5x on travel and gas purchases up to $1,500 combined
Ritz Carlton Visa: 10x points on Marriott purchases, 5x on travel and gas purchases up to $1,500 combined
United Club Visa link 1 or link 2: 8x or 6x points on United purchases, 5x on travel and gas purchases up to $1,500 combined
Southwest Rapid Rewards (RR), RR Plus, RR Premier, RR Employee, RR priority Visa link 1, link 2, or link 3: 6x or 5x points on Southwest purchases, 5x on travel and gas purchases up to $1,500 combined
United Explorer Visa: 6x on United purchases, 5x on travel and gas purchases up to $1,500 combined
United Gateway Visa: 6x on United purchases, 5x on travel and gas purchases up to $1,500 combined
United MileagePlus Explorer Visa link 1 or link 2: 6x or 5x points on United purchases, 5x on travel and gas purchases up to $1,500 combined
For the “travel and gas” category, personally I’d pick up $500 Vanilla Visa Gift Cards at 7-11, $500 SecureSpend Visas at Speedway, or $500 BestBuy gift cards at Speedway. For the United cards in particular, consider funding the United Travel Bank. Of course, there are other options — a hint for experts that I’d use with extreme caution only: refunds usually only refund at 1x.
Finally, why are there so many damn versions of Marriott cards between Chase and AmEx? I actually don’t really care to know, so don’t tell me.
I had another Weekend Wisdom planned for today, but Meijer majorly blew it out of the water, clearly because they weren’t happy to be left out of yesterday’s Grocery Store Manufactured Spend Deals post, or something. So we’ll save the Weekend Wisdom for another weekend. In the mean time, this deal is crazy:
This includes BestBuy gift cards, which are currently selling at 96-96.5%. That means you can manufacture spend at 6% profit, plus grocery store rewards and credit card rewards. There are other options at slightly lower profit too. This is bananas, and if you’re near a Meijer you should hop on it. I’m unfortunately not near one myself, but I am almost ready to book a cheap round trip to Meijer country for a weekend getaway.
The only rental cars currently available in Meijer land, cause #carpocalypse
