@Vash1 wrote:That makes sense thanks. I'll look into seeing if they will upgrade the card to Savor first. I never would have thought of that.
Welcome to My FICO Forums, @Vash1. 
I agree with above advice that it's best to focus on paying down high utilization on all cards and allow FICO to recover before proceeding with any new applications. That will open up the door to some better cards and approvals than you could obtain now.
Newcomer tip: When you reply like you did above, it's not apparent to which post or member you are replying. It gets confusing to anyone reading the thread. There are two ways to take care of that. 
- Do like I did above with your post. Hit the "Reply" button below the post to which you are responding. Then above the message field, you'll see the "Quote" radio button. When you hit that, it inserts the text of that message into the reply.
- The other way is to use the "@" sign followed by the member name, such as @Vash1. When you type the "@" sign, it opens up a dialogue box with recent members who have participated in that thread. If you don't see the name right away in the short list or if it's a member who didn't already participate (such as when @SouthJamaica tagged me), just start typing the member's name and eventually you'll be able to select it from the list.
@SouthJamaica wrote:
@Vash1 wrote:Thank you. I can see now that waiting just a couple of month I would be in the ideal position for collecting rewards. For travel I want the card(s) that'll support two vacations a year with dining perks and what not. I really like Marriot hotel chains.
Well that narrows it down nicely. Our travel card aficionados like @K-in-Boston and @Aim_High will probably be able to elucidate the pros and cons of the Amex and Chase Marriott cards.
Thanks for the tag, @SouthJamaica. With @Vash1's spending focusing on groceries, dining, and gas and with two vacation trips a year, I hesitate to recommend a higher-fee and perk travel card. Unless there is more frequent business or pleasure travel, it might be diffcult to find good value on the premium cards.
Some other questions would be:
- Do you have any business travel or just the two vacations?
- Do you fly or drive on vacation?
- Do you rent cars?
- If you fly, do you (or would you) travel First Class, Business, or Coach?
- If you fly, do you value airport lounges enough to pay extra for the perk?
- If you fly, do you travel alone or with a family/partner? Do you check bags or pay for extra amenities such as seat upgrades?
- Are you okay with paying an annual fee on a card if you get good value in return? How high of a fee would be your liimit?
Based on what I know about profile so far, I'd probably either recommend just sticking with no-AF cash back cards or else aim more for the $49 to $150 AF end of the travel spectrum and on either general purpose travel cards or the lower-priced hotel-specific cards.
- For Marriott hotels, that would probably be the Chase Marriott Bonvoy Boundless Visa Signature. $95 AF. Automatic Marriott Silver Status. Earns a free annual night worth 35K points which easily offsets the $95 AF. Earns points on everyday spending which can earn higher Marriott Gold status if that is desired.
- For the lower AF travel cards, there are several to choose from. For some examples, I'd recommend researching the Navy FCU Flagship Rewards, the AMEX Green Charge Card, the Chase Sapphire Preferred, and the CITI Premier. There are similar cards in this category from other lenders with variations in their perks and rewards. If travel is booked through the linked travel portal however, as opposed to directly with Marriott, OP will not earn loyalty status or receive perks on Marriott stays. On the other hand, the portal would allow booking with other hotel chains based on price, location, or amenities. Also points could be used for other travel spending such as on airfare or rental cars.
- OP already has a pretty good no-AF travel card: The Wells Fargo Autograph. (... earns 3x points or 3% on restaurants-takeout-food delivery, travel, gas, transit, streaming services and phone plans.) The nice thing about having a no-AF card that earns rewards on travel that are easily redeemable for cash is that they are more simple to manage and allow much more flexibility in how those rewards are used.
I'm glad my tips were helpful, @Vash1. Sorry for the delay in replying as I've been traveling and preoccupied the past couple of weeks, so off My FICO. I just had a couple of comments to add.
@Vash1 wrote:
- I definitely love airport lounges and don't mind an annual fee.
- I think you hit the nail on the head with the $150 range af
This one paragraph has a disconnect on airport lounge-annual fee expectations. Airport lounges are generally only available on the higher AF cards (think $400 to $700) versus the $49 to $150 range cards. For example, the AMEX Green in that price range doesn't include the lounges. The AMEX Gold at $250 doesn't even include the lounges. But the AMEX Platinum at $695 does include lounges. Likewise, the Chase Sapphire Preferred at $95 doesn't include lounge access, but the Chase Sapphire Reserve at $550 does include lounge access. Or there are airline-specific cards in that same price-range that include the lounges for THAT particular airline, such as the AMEX Delta Airlines SkyMiles Reserve ($650 AF), the CITI American Airlines AAdvantage Executive WEMC ($595 AF), or the Chase United Airlines Club Visa Infinite ($525 AF.) Also, note that all cards don't include all lounges so you would need to pay attention to which lounges matter most to you based on your travel patterns.
Based on your description of no business travel and limited personal travel, as well as a preference for the lower-end of the travel card market, you might find you're better off either forgoing the lounges or else just paying for access a la carte as needed. Plus, if you are traveling in business/first class, you would likely have lounge access for those segments anyway. If you predominantly fly one airline, you might be better off with one of those airline-specific specialty cards for the lounge access by the time you'd pay a la carte for three or more family members on two-plus trips per year. You could still supplement that card with one or more other travel cards if they provided better overall perks, rewards, or points transfer options.
@Vash1 wrote:I didn't realize you don't get loyalty points booking through a cc's specific portal. It's either the loyalty points or flexibility of transfer? That's an interesting point I assume I'll need to consider once I can go for some of these cards.
Yes, that's a nuance that many miss when considering these cards. One benefit of cards with both travel portals and transfer capability (such as AMEX Member Rewards points cards like Platinum; Chase Ultimate Rewards points cards like Sapphire Reserve; and the CITI Thank-You points cards like Premier) is that they give you more flexibility in how you earn/redeem points. For example, points with those cards that are transferred into another loyalty program WOULD earn member benefits/status when redeemed. But if you used the points in-travel-portal to purchase airfare or hotels, those are treated like purchasing at a third-party website links like Expedia, Kayak, Orbitz, Priceline, Hotwire, or TripAdvisor where you do NOT earn loyalty points. So, let's say you had Marriott status but no airline affiliation. You could pay directly for Marriott hotel stays while using points in-portal for airfare or hotels stays where Marriott was not available or convenient. That's just one example of how a points strategy could work, regardless of loyalty status considerations.
@Vash1 wrote:No problem and thank you for taking the time to reply. Also, I hoped you enjoyed your travels!
You're advice has definitely been helpful in helping me figure out which card(s) would be best for supplementing my travel endeavors.
Another one or two questions for you if you don't mind. Do you think a three card strategy would be sufficient to achieve a rewards goal thats suited for travel? For example, since I already have a CFU I was thinking on getting a CSP or CSR as the general travel card, and then a specific airline or hotel card. A setup like that captures how I spend mostly on dining/eating out, gas, and entertainment and ramping up traveling. So would that make sense?
I'm leaning to an airline card as the UR points would be used for hotels. In that case I saw the delta reserve American Express card which though it has a high AF, the companion certificate each year is easily worth double that. Plus it also fits my spend pattern. And I'm close to the Delta Headquarters hub. Does that make sense or a different card?
I don't really care which airline I fly on though. I just wasn't sure which card would fit into a chase double team up. I also don't mind having a different brand setup with the same concept.
My apologies if this was a super loaded question. You are clearly the expert on travel cards so I'm wanting to take advantage of your knowledge.
Thanks for the compliment, @Vash1, but I'm not the only My FICO expert on travel. I've learned a lot over the years from some of our true seasoned road warriors.
There are countless ways to construct a travel-card lineup. The one you described would be good, although you followed it with not having an airline preference after selecting Delta. ??? Unless you're frequently flying one airline or staying in a hotel chain where you get lounge access, free night stays, loyalty status, or perks like free checked bags, there may not be a reason to add either a hotel or airline card.
The CSR or CSP plus the Chase Freedom Unlimited gives you a powerful combination for travel redemptions. The 1.5% Cash back on CFU for general uncategorized spending (with no caps) allows travel redemption at 1.25x to 1.50x in-portal on CSP/CSR respectively (1.5 x 1.25 = 1.875% or 1.5 x 1.5 = 2.25%). Moreover, either card would allow you to move the points to travel partners worth up to about 2.0x the value per point, meaning 1.5 x 2.0 = 3.0% is possible. For Chase, some choose to just set up a Chase bi-fecta, tri-fecta, quad-fecta earning UR points since they get enough value from them. Any of the Freedom or INK business cards can transfer their cash back to a Sapphire card and redeemed as a UR point, so adding a Freedom Flex allows the 5% back on rotating categories to be worth 7.5% to 10% in rewards value.
For general spend, the CITI Premier card earns Thank You points very well. Premier has a $95 AF which is completely offset by a $100 annual credit on a single hotel stay of $500 or more. Thank You points are estimated value of up to 1.8 cpp per the Feb 2024 thepointsguy website valuation. Premier earns 3x TY points per dollar on groceries, gas, and dining meaning points could be redeemed for up to 5.4%. There are also enhanced 3x rewards or direct air travel and hotel purchases plus up to 10x rewards when booking hotels and car rentals through the travel portal. CITI now allows TY points to be combined from other CITI cards so the Double Cash 2% card could earn TY points worth more than 1 cpp each. (See >this web article< for examples.) That would accelerate points earned for travel from everyday purchases with no spending caps.
Likewise, if you went with AMEX, the AMEX Gold (4x MR points on uncapped dining and groceries up to $25K cap) is a great card if you can effectively offset the $250 AF with the monthly credits, making the effective AF $10. Just combining that with a Blue Business Plus (no AF) that earns 2x MR per dollar on all purchases up to $50K annual spending) makes for a powerful and fairly inexpensive combo to earn AMEX MRs. If you can justify the fees to offset the high $695 AF and can squeeze enough value from the lounge access, the Platinum card could also be a good value as part of an AMEX travel card lineup. If Gold or Platinum don't suit your needs, the AMEX Green gives you 3x MRs (uncapped) on dining, travel, and transit with a much lower $150 AF. And it's possible to wipe out that fee with the $189 Annual CLEAR membership and the $100 Lounge Buddy credit. When redeemed for travel either in-portal or via transfer to partners, AMEX MRs can be worth 1 to 2 cpp, so Gold could be earning 4% to 8% on dining and groceries less the residual AF and depending on how they are redeemed. (Note: MRs are only worth 0.6 cpp for cash value and not much more for gift cards, so they are an inferior value to URs or TYs when not used for travel. Be careful when making comparisons.)
This is just for the "Big Three" travel points programs. But there are many other alternatives also!
