Help a newbie out on playing the Game... suggestions on a new card

[Anonymous]

I'm new to the points game and want to start earning points for travel and vacations. What are the cards to maximized my spend to earn the most points?  Im currently using the Chase Perfered for travel and dinning.... need cards for grocery and gas.  My current fico score is around 720 with an average spend limit of $14K.

Currrent cards -

Discover it card - 15 year relationship so keeping that, no fee

Capital one Platinum - 17 year relationship, was my first card, no fee

Amex everyday - 2 year card, no fee

Chase perffered - 1 month old.  Working on the minium spend so I  can get the bonus points, $95 fee

Furture card I want to get - 

1 months from now - Penfed pathfinder - to get bonuses such as Global entry and $100 incidentals (traveling on vacation in 3 months) and bous points. 

5 months from now - Chase freedom - to get UR points.  Need to wait to get my min spends on perffered and penfed card out of the way. 

2 years from now - Chase reserve -  plan is to use the perffered for 2 years... cancel and then get the reserve to get another 50k bonus. 

Other wants. 

A good hotel card to get free hotel nights - maybe IHG or Hyatt card

And No fee cards with travel benefits. 

How is my plan??? any suggestions???

Thanks in advance

[Anonymous]

For groceries I would for sure get the AMEX BCP for 6%.  Gas, you can also use the BCP.

The PenFed Platinum Rewards for 5x/$1 spent. No cash back on this, except, you can use points to redeem for travel.  I would take the BCP over teh PenFed.

Your plans sounds good but remember Chase has a 5/24 rule.  

AMEX Platinum gives you Gold status on Hilton, SPG and Marriot AND Global entry.  If you don't want an annual fee card, i would go with the Hiilton Honnors and PenFed Pathfinder for the Global entry AND $100 annual credit.

[Anonymous]

If you like Hilton and travel a at least a few times a year, the Aspire card ($450 AF) comes with Hilton Diamond status, one free weekend night each year, a $250 Hilton resort statement credit each year, $250 airline credit and Priority Pass Select. Currently has a 100k SUB.

The Everyday Preferred will give you 4.5 ppd (7.2%) at grocery stores and 3 ppd (4.5%) at gas stations if you swipe the card 30 times in a month. Only 15k SUB right now but frequently goes to 30k. Because you already have an Amex you'll have to go incognito to find the offer. 

If you are not brand loyal to a specific hotel, perhaps look into the Capital One Venture, you'll get 10x points on Hotels.com bookings as well as earn one free night for every 10 nights you book. Your free night voucher will be worth the average of the 10 nights you booked) The hotels.com vouchers are nice because there are very limited exclusions for hotels. You will not earn any hotel points or be able to receive any status benefits at hotels you booked through hotels.com. Overall you see about a 20% rate of return with the Venture card. 

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the reply. I believe under my plan I should be under 5/24 when I try to get the reserve. I believe I have room for maybe 1 or 2 hotel cards.

[Anonymous]

I for got to mention I would only travel 1 or 2 times a year... staying in a hotel about 5 days a year for vacation.

[Malcono]

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@Anonymous wrote:

I'm new to the points game and want to start earning points for travel and vacations. What are the cards to maximized my spend to earn the most points?  Im currently using the Chase Perfered for travel and dinning.... need cards for grocery and gas.  My current fico score is around 720 with an average spend limit of $14K.

Currrent cards -

Discover it card - 15 year relationship so keeping that, no fee

Capital one Platinum - 17 year relationship, was my first card, no fee

Amex everyday - 2 year card, no fee

Chase perffered - 1 month old.  Working on the minium spend so I  can get the bonus points, $95 fee

Furture card I want to get - 

1 months from now - Penfed pathfinder - to get bonuses such as Global entry and $100 incidentals (traveling on vacation in 3 months) and bous points. 

5 months from now - Chase freedom - to get UR points.  Need to wait to get my min spends on perffered and penfed card out of the way. 

2 years from now - Chase reserve -  plan is to use the perffered for 2 years... cancel and then get the reserve to get another 50k bonus. 

Other wants. 

A good hotel card to get free hotel nights - maybe IHG or Hyatt card

And No fee cards with travel benefits. 

How is my plan??? any suggestions???

Thanks in advance

---

Instead of canceling your Chase Preferred, I would just product change it to the Chase Freedom Unlimited, and then apply for the Reserve.

[Anonymous]

Thanks for the reply... I will definatly do that.  

Now I'm reading about the US bank altitude reserve infinite card.

$400 AF with $325 travel credit + other benefits.

3% travel, 3% mobile pay

Thinking about using this as a stop gap till I can get my CSR 2 years from now.  (still think CSR will be better in the long run due to UR points and points transfering)

Thoughts???

[longtimelurker]

OP wrote: My current fico score is around 720 with an average spend limit of $14K.

What do you mean by "average spend limit"?   Is that the average CL, or the amount you spend per something (month, year?)

Once you have the SUB, point cards in general need a "decent" amount of spend to get great travel (e.g. first class international flights) 

[Anonymous]

If you really want to play the game (as I do), check out reddit churning.