Is this for me?
If you are one of the guys below than this is definitely for you:
1. One who loves travelling but cannot afford to pay for expenses or rather scared of expensive flights and hotels.
2. One who is a regular shopping person and wants to save some money or get stuff for almost free.
3. One who wants to take almost "free" travel and is ready to do some work to get there. May be few hours of work per month :)
4. One who dreams of travelling without making a dent in the pockets?
5. One who is a regular traveler and wants to know on how to travel in business class and stay in top rated hotels for fraction of the cost.
1. One who loves travelling but cannot afford to pay for expenses or rather scared of expensive flights and hotels.
2. One who is a regular shopping person and wants to save some money or get stuff for almost free.
3. One who wants to take almost "free" travel and is ready to do some work to get there. May be few hours of work per month :)
4. One who dreams of travelling without making a dent in the pockets?
5. One who is a regular traveler and wants to know on how to travel in business class and stay in top rated hotels for fraction of the cost.
How to get started?
So the initial question which comes to mind is how do I get started on either saving money on everyday expenses or accumulating miles for free travel? Since saving money on everyday expense is a little different from earning miles I have highlighted the steps separately. But invariably the first step is to check how good is your credit history. Kindly check this article for more info. This is important because the most bulk of miles or cash back that you will earn would be through credit card signup. You could even sign up for just two credit cards and secure enough miles for a return coach flight ticket from USA to Asia/Australia or a business class flight ticket from USA to Europe.
Earning Miles
Step1. Make sure you know your credit Score. You can get started here.
Step2. Determine where you want to have a dream vacation or what are the places you want to visit. This will help you determine which airlines can get you there.
Step3. Find out which airline has its hub in your city? Does this airline has any partnership with the one that will take you to your dream destination?
Step4. Join the frequent flyer program for your choice of airline determined from Step2 & Step3. The four major US frequent flyer programs are United Airlines MileagePlus, American Airlines AAdvantage, US Airways Dividend Miles and Delta Airlines Skymiles.
Step5. Determine which hotel chain has hotels in the location of your dream vacation. Find out if they have any co-branded credit cards or are they transfer partner for any major credit card carrier.
Step6. Your choice of airline will help you shortlist which rewards credit card would be a good choice for you. For e.g. United has its hub in Los Angeles, San Francisco etc, so a good idea for some one residing at this place is to earn miles so on United.
Step7. Most of the airlines and hotel chain have a co-branded credit card with major banks such as Chase, American Express, Bank of America, Barclays Bank etc.
Step8. Some bank have points earning credit card of their own from which you can transfer the points to various airlines and hotels. Find out if the airline or hotel of your choice is one of the transfer partner? American Express and Chase are two financial companies which have this kind of cards available.
Step9. Find out the best available offer for the credit card. Do note that most of the great credit cards have annual fees but the benefits are worth more than that. Some of the good personal credit cards are:
a. Chase Sapphire Preferred ($95 Annual fees, waived first year).
b. American Express premier rewards gold card ($175 Annual fees, waived first year).
c. Co-branded credit cards for American Airlines, United Airlines, US Airways & Delta Airlines.
Step 10. Determine alternative ways of racking up miles. Do watch out for the article on this soon.
Step2. Determine where you want to have a dream vacation or what are the places you want to visit. This will help you determine which airlines can get you there.
Step3. Find out which airline has its hub in your city? Does this airline has any partnership with the one that will take you to your dream destination?
Step4. Join the frequent flyer program for your choice of airline determined from Step2 & Step3. The four major US frequent flyer programs are United Airlines MileagePlus, American Airlines AAdvantage, US Airways Dividend Miles and Delta Airlines Skymiles.
Step5. Determine which hotel chain has hotels in the location of your dream vacation. Find out if they have any co-branded credit cards or are they transfer partner for any major credit card carrier.
Step6. Your choice of airline will help you shortlist which rewards credit card would be a good choice for you. For e.g. United has its hub in Los Angeles, San Francisco etc, so a good idea for some one residing at this place is to earn miles so on United.
Step7. Most of the airlines and hotel chain have a co-branded credit card with major banks such as Chase, American Express, Bank of America, Barclays Bank etc.
Step8. Some bank have points earning credit card of their own from which you can transfer the points to various airlines and hotels. Find out if the airline or hotel of your choice is one of the transfer partner? American Express and Chase are two financial companies which have this kind of cards available.
Step9. Find out the best available offer for the credit card. Do note that most of the great credit cards have annual fees but the benefits are worth more than that. Some of the good personal credit cards are:
a. Chase Sapphire Preferred ($95 Annual fees, waived first year).
b. American Express premier rewards gold card ($175 Annual fees, waived first year).
c. Co-branded credit cards for American Airlines, United Airlines, US Airways & Delta Airlines.
Step 10. Determine alternative ways of racking up miles. Do watch out for the article on this soon.
Earning cashback & buying stuff for great discount
Step1. Make a list of places where you shop often. Most of these places you can buy stuff at great discount as well as get cashback from the cashback websites as well earn cash back from credit card merchant.
Step2. Determine which category you shop most. This could be either Departmental Stores, Dining, Gas or Groceries and would help you determine the card you need.
Step3. Check which cashback credit card has a great sign-up bonus as well good category bonus. Although some of them have annual fees, the amount of reward dollars you earn makes the annual fee negligible. Some of the good ones are:
a. Chase Sapphire Preferred ($95 Annual fee, waived first year)
b. AMEX Blue Cash Preferred ($75 Annual fee)
c. Chase Freedom (No annual fee)
d. AMEX Blue Cash Everyday (No annual fee)
e. Discover More Card (No annual fee)
Step4. Check the aggregator site CashBack Holics, Evrewards, Topcashback to find out best cash back rates. In fact you can get cash back on hotels stays as well as airlines tickets.
Step5. You can buy the gift card for the store you want to purchase from the gift card resale site. You can check the rates at Giftcardgranny. Two of the popular gift card resale sites are Plastic jungle and Cardpool. You can even earn cashback while buying gift card using Topcashback.
Step6. Check for Free After Rebate deals or discount coupons for the specific store you want to shop. You can even buy discount coupons at further discount on Ebay. Just make sure you buy from a genuine seller. Some of the other website which publishes good deals are Fat Wallet & Dans Deals.
Step2. Determine which category you shop most. This could be either Departmental Stores, Dining, Gas or Groceries and would help you determine the card you need.
Step3. Check which cashback credit card has a great sign-up bonus as well good category bonus. Although some of them have annual fees, the amount of reward dollars you earn makes the annual fee negligible. Some of the good ones are:
a. Chase Sapphire Preferred ($95 Annual fee, waived first year)
b. AMEX Blue Cash Preferred ($75 Annual fee)
c. Chase Freedom (No annual fee)
d. AMEX Blue Cash Everyday (No annual fee)
e. Discover More Card (No annual fee)
Step4. Check the aggregator site CashBack Holics, Evrewards, Topcashback to find out best cash back rates. In fact you can get cash back on hotels stays as well as airlines tickets.
Step5. You can buy the gift card for the store you want to purchase from the gift card resale site. You can check the rates at Giftcardgranny. Two of the popular gift card resale sites are Plastic jungle and Cardpool. You can even earn cashback while buying gift card using Topcashback.
Step6. Check for Free After Rebate deals or discount coupons for the specific store you want to shop. You can even buy discount coupons at further discount on Ebay. Just make sure you buy from a genuine seller. Some of the other website which publishes good deals are Fat Wallet & Dans Deals.
