Hello all,
This is my first post to the forum! I have been lurking here for about a few weeks now and have been doing hours upon hours of reading and have learned a thing or two.
A little background about me:
- Have over 10+ Credit Cards. Majority of my cards are a mixture of Chase and Amex products. Throw in a Citi DC, Discover IT, and a Local CU card with a 30k limit I never use since it was offered to me during a car financing agreement last year. Totaling about $100k in total credit available. Annual Fees like over $1k and want to make this zero for 2021.
- Bank with Schwab, Apple FCU (Northern VA Local CU), and NFCU (just became a member this week because of high praise here and realized I am eligible for membership.)
- Just closed on a house with my first mortgage in October @ 2.5% APR.
- I've only ever gotten my Credit Score from Credit Karma and it always fluctuates in the high 700's to low 800's. Score was 816 according to Ford dealer when we bought a car last year. Mortgage company said my score was 760 when we got our house a couple months ago. I’m sure these are different models reported based on my reading here.
- My first CC was opened eight years ago and AAoA is about 4 years.
Hopefully that’s enough to give you all an idea about me! Now onto my main concerns.
I have been chasing travel rewards for the past three years to get free trips. Started off with the Chase Trifecta back in 2017-18 and got my use out of all the points to get a free trip to the Philippines (COVID has made us cancel this trip three times now, hoping our March 2021 trip doesn't get botched at this point.) Chase Reserve will be PC'd here very soon as the AF will post next month I believe.
This year signed up for the AMEX Quadfecta (Plat, Gold, Green, BBP) and reached every SUB and have over 250k MR points now and growing. Planning to use these points for another trip to the Philippines or somewhere in Asia in the future.
With all the Chase and Amex SUBs both acquired now. I have thought long and hard and realized I really don't want to pay AFs anymore. The perks are nice with all the free credits and memberships to stuff, especially during COVID, the Uber Eats, Grubhub, Doordash, Phone Bill Credits, all from Chase and Amex was great and helped level the cost of all the AFs. However, I realized that credit card memberships that requires fees for membership aren't really for me. We don't travel all too much except for an annual flight to the Philippines to visit my wife’s family, which I don't think warrants all the fees to try to earn points as much as we can, it doesn't seem worth it.
I am planning on closing all three of my AMEX and just resort to basic cashback; I feel this just makes things simpler and easier to manage, cash is cash Afterall. I always add my wife as an AU so we can maximize on earnings too. We do need a card we can both use that can nullify FTFs since we are making purchases on Filipino storefronts sometimes and pay for stuff for my wife’s family. This led me to believe that just opening some NFCU credit cards and calling it a day would be the simplest thing, right? No AF, No FTF, Visa, checks everything to start.
However, more reading leads me to a thread that pointed out a unicorn that probably no myFico member has? It turns out I am eligible for this card. I contract with Aerospace and am eligible for AFCU membership and can apply for their card. Do you all think I should go for it? It checks all the boxes I need, and the cashback is generous and it’s no AF, no FTF, and a Visa! It's like the one card I can use everywhere, for everything and have good earnings 90% of the time.
What do you all think? Should I go for it? Should I go for any others come 2021? I appreciate anyone who reads my first post and provides feedback! Apologies for the wall of text but these have been my thoughts for days now and I needed to dump them on here to see what others think!
@GApeachy wrote:
@ZehTy wrote:It's like the one card I can use everywhere, for everything and have good earnings 90% of the time.
Does it matter to you that the ceiling is $20k cl on those Aerospace CU cards?
I don't think so, truly. My wife and combined would be under those limits by a significant amount I think. We dine out often and my wife is a foodie type but we would not reach the $9k cap by a large margin. The $12k travel we wouldn't even come close but is nice to have. $7k in gas is more then plenty for both of us. Of course, the 2% on all is uncapped which is very attractive too.
All that being said, the $20k ceiling is fine as we pay our balances down to zero every month, no matter how large the bill is. Each credit card is treated as cash that equates to what we can pull from our bank accounts.
Welcome to the board! I think most of us would pull the trigger on that AFCU card if we were eligible.
To get a better handle on your actual FICO 8 Score, your Discover card will offer that on your app or online portal.
NFCU offers a solid lineup of cards, and their customer service is very good. They would be good lender to get in with whether you get the AFCU card or not.
I'm not sure if you could PC any of your AMEX cards to no AF cards, but they offer some good cash back cards as well. If your grocery spend is $6K or more, the 6% (its 6% on streaming services too) cash back on the Blue Cash Preferred is worth the $95 AF. It comes with a $300, making it even more worthwhile. I earned $707 in cash back and SUB on that card this first year. If your cards can't be PC'd, it might be worth looking into that one.
@Kforce wrote:Getting any rewards card is always dependent on where you spend your money.
For my spend the open/general spend is my largest by a great amount. The AOD or USAlliant's fits my spend better. However you might value the No FTF, buy a lot of gas, and eat out three days a week.
The fine print has caps on all the categories 3% up.
They however look to be generous and would not be a issue for many
It looks like a nice card for the right spend.
That might be a great card for you.
I have read about the AOD offer and even though it is attractive, the internet's hug of death spells doom for 3% for everything I would think. That opinion seems to float around here a lot from my reading so temporary gains isn't my cup of tea. I really want to try to find a long term solution that fits without too much micromanagement.
The Aerospace card fits our spend greatly because we eat out a lot, and fill up on gas at least once a week at Sam's Club, soon to be Costco (hoping it is coded as gas.) The travel percentage is kind of moot for us as we don't stay at hotels, use tolls, parking, or fly all too often, if at all the spend is very minimal for our lifestyle currently. I guess it's just really nice to have if we need it. The 2% is uncapped and makes it attractive on top of all the other categories above.
We also shop at Amazon an awful lot and I got the Chase Amazon Card like five years ago so that 5% there is already covered.
@JNA1 wrote:Welcome to the board! I think most of us would pull the trigger on that AFCU card if we were eligible.
To get a better handle on your actual FICO 8 Score, your Discover card will offer that on your app or online portal.
NFCU offers a solid lineup of cards, and their customer service is very good. They would be good lender to get in with whether you get the AFCU card or not.
I'm not sure if you could PC any of your AMEX cards to no AF cards, but they offer some good cash back cards as well. If your grocery spend is $6K or more, the 6% (its 6% on streaming services too) cash back on the Blue Cash Preferred is worth the $95 AF. It comes with a $300, making it even more worthwhile. I earned $707 in cash back and SUB on that card this first year. If your cards can't be PC'd, it might be worth looking into that one.
Thank you! Yes, I feel kinda giddy because I saw a post about "The Best 2% Cards" and saw someone mention Aerospace FCU and I thought to myself... I work for them, I feel special now and can totally get it!
As for the Discover app, totally forgot it offered that. Looks like back in June it was 800. Currently it is sitting at 770. Looks like the mortgage inquiry knocked it down a bit, which is to be expected.
I would like to sign up for one of NFCU's cards but it makes me wonder, if I go for the AFCU, which would compliment the card so spend can be utilized on both for a gain?
Also yeah, the AMEX charge cards cant be PC'd to a no fee card, they are all to be cancelled and that's it. I suppose its okay to cancel them after the AF hits and then i'll be clear to keep my Points since I can keep the BBP open with no fee. Suprisingly enough, our grocery spend is spend at Sam's Club, and soon to be Costco once the membership on Sam's is done here in a few months since we moved. Also Walmart is right down the road and my wife and I just seem to prefer to go to the closest and cheapest thing. Supermarkets here in NoVA just can't beat Walmart prices. We do of course go to the Asian Supermarkets for my wife occasionally but it does not even come close to $6k. I did get a mailer for the BCP just the other day and it's offering to waive the AF for the first year. Wonder if it's worth it? It'll be a soft pull and my relationship with AMEX is solid and i started it back in 2015.
@ZehTy wrote:
@Kforce wrote:Getting any rewards card is always dependent on where you spend your money.
For my spend the open/general spend is my largest by a great amount. The AOD or USAlliant's fits my spend better. However you might value the No FTF, buy a lot of gas, and eat out three days a week.
The fine print has caps on all the categories 3% up.
They however look to be generous and would not be a issue for many
It looks like a nice card for the right spend.
That might be a great card for you.
I have read about the AOD offer and even though it is attractive, the internet's hug of death spells doom for 3% for everything I would think. That opinion seems to float around here a lot from my reading so temporary gains isn't my cup of tea. I really want to try to find a long term solution that fits without too much micromanagement.
The Aerospace card fits our spend greatly because we eat out a lot, and fill up on gas at least once a week at Sam's Club, soon to be Costco (hoping it is coded as gas.) The travel percentage is kind of moot for us as we don't stay at hotels, use tolls, parking, or fly all too often, if at all the spend is very minimal for our lifestyle currently. I guess it's just really nice to have if we need it. The 2% is uncapped and makes it attractive on top of all the other categories above.
We also shop at Amazon an awful lot and I got the Chase Amazon Card like five years ago so that 5% there is already covered.
Welcome to the community, and kudos to you for doing a lot of reading before your first post.
Gas at Sam's Club or Costco may not code as gasoline. You could put a test purchase on one of your Visa cards to see what the MCC code is on the Visa network.
