Page 7 of 12 FirstFirst ... 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 LastLast
Results 151 to 175 of 283
  1. #151
    Join Date
    Sep 2005
    Location
    Not in the PRB
    Posts
    32,782
    I think 2% cash back is the best "all categories" card you can get.
    "fuck off you asshat gaper shit for brains fucktard wanker." - Jesus Christ
    "She was tossing her bean salad with the vigor of a Drunken Pop princess so I walked out of the corner and said.... "need a hand?"" - Odin
    "everybody's got their hooks into you, fuck em....forge on motherfuckers, drag all those bitches across the goal line with you." - (not so) ill-advised strategy

  2. #152
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
    Location
    Shadynasty's Jazz Club
    Posts
    10,248
    Best is multiple cards that take advantage of higher, bonus, and rotating spending categories to maximize points. Otherwise, I like the Fidelity Rewards Visa. 2% on everything, cash paid monthly into a free brokerage account.
    Remind me. We'll send him a red cap and a Speedo.

  3. #153
    Join Date
    Apr 2006
    Location
    Movin' On
    Posts
    3,716
    Alliant Credit Union has a 2.5% cash back card for the first $10k per billing cycle (month). I think after that it drops to 2%.

    I have a Pended 2% back credit card and a State Department Federal Credit Union 2% cash back card that I use. Both have no foreign transaction fee.

    At $400k per year you might want to consider an Amex Platinum. I think at that level the Amex rewards might start to make sense over straight cash back but I'm not sure because I've never spent that much.

  4. #154
    Join Date
    Dec 2020
    Posts
    679
    Quote Originally Posted by UTpowder View Post
    Anybody have a card they like right now? Been using the REI card from US Bank, but since they are going to Capital One and away from cash back to REI credit only, I think I'm going to look else where. I use the card primarily for business. Don't travel much so airline miles aren't of much benefit to me, but extra bag benefits can be nice when I do travel. I currently put around $400,000 on the card yearly and pay it off each month. Would like a cashback card. Looks like US Bank has a 1.5% cash back card anything better out there they like?
    If you can use a personal card, and aren't opposed to Bank of America, they'll give you 2.625% cash back on all purchases on their Premium Rewards credit card. The caveat is that you need to maintain a $100k+ balance in your BoA/Merrill Lynch accounts.

    If it has to be a business card, Capital One is the best option at 2% flat cash back.

  5. #155
    Join Date
    Jan 2008
    Location
    livin the dream
    Posts
    5,761
    The Chase Sapphire is the consistently rated the best generic travel card; I’d check out their cash back card Chase ?Freedom?


    Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums
    Best Skier on the Mountain
    Self-Certified
    1992 - 2012
    Squaw Valley, USA

  6. #156
    Join Date
    Mar 2008
    Location
    Aloft
    Posts
    4,074
    Chase Sapphire Reserve is hands down the best travel card. Capital One Venture X is a close second

  7. #157
    Join Date
    Oct 2007
    Posts
    12,609
    Amex for cash back, chase for travel, capital one for low fee but still good rewards.

  8. #158
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Posts
    1,685
    Bump, anyone using the airlines or hotel cards and are you getting any benefits?

    Finally have my wife convinced that chasing card benefits can be worth it. Recently retired and traveling. Currently have Wells 2% cashback card and the Costco card (nice for no foreign transaction fees, underwhelmed by actual cashback earned). I usually chase Hilton points (past work travel) but unsure about their card. Air miles are tempting but not if they are a hassle to use. Airline club access or priority would be nice but aren't airlines making that harder to use now?

    Are the high annual fee cards worth the benefits? Can't remember which ones, but seem to remember $4-500 annual. I'm frugal so the benefit better be good with good chance of actually using.

    Sent from my SM-T580 using Tapatalk

  9. #159
    Join Date
    Mar 2012
    Posts
    68
    Quote Originally Posted by Iowagriz View Post
    Bump, anyone using the airlines or hotel cards and are you getting any benefits?

    Finally have my wife convinced that chasing card benefits can be worth it. Recently retired and traveling. Currently have Wells 2% cashback card and the Costco card (nice for no foreign transaction fees, underwhelmed by actual cashback earned). I usually chase Hilton points (past work travel) but unsure about their card. Air miles are tempting but not if they are a hassle to use. Airline club access or priority would be nice but aren't airlines making that harder to use now?

    Are the high annual fee cards worth the benefits? Can't remember which ones, but seem to remember $4-500 annual. I'm frugal so the benefit better be good with good chance of actually using.

    Sent from my SM-T580 using Tapatalk
    Chase sapphire reserve but 550 fee upfront may deter you. You get 300 back pretty easy from restaurants and travel, then all the other goodies you have to kinda work it.

  10. #160
    Join Date
    Mar 2006
    Posts
    19,814
    Marriott card with the bonus points and free night annually. If you have some immediate expenses you get 3 nights bonus.

    https://creditcards.chase.com/a1/mar...E&gclsrc=aw.ds

    If you decide to use the Marriott card throw me a bone for the referral.

  11. #161
    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Location
    Aspen
    Posts
    3,058
    Quote Originally Posted by Iowagriz View Post
    Bump, anyone using the airlines or hotel cards and are you getting any benefits?

    Finally have my wife convinced that chasing card benefits can be worth it. Recently retired and traveling. Currently have Wells 2% cashback card and the Costco card (nice for no foreign transaction fees, underwhelmed by actual cashback earned). I usually chase Hilton points (past work travel) but unsure about their card. Air miles are tempting but not if they are a hassle to use. Airline club access or priority would be nice but aren't airlines making that harder to use now?

    Are the high annual fee cards worth the benefits? Can't remember which ones, but seem to remember $4-500 annual. I'm frugal so the benefit better be good with good chance of actually using.

    Sent from my SM-T580 using Tapatalk
    Yes, that's our lifestyle. Fly around the globe for next to free. We had 6-7 Sapphire Preffereds over the years, but never went for the Reserve since we already had PreCheck and the PriortyPass wasn't a big benefit to us. Even if we maxxed the $300 travel/dining, that's still a $200/yr card. If you're dining out, buying hotels/flights/rental cars for dollars a lot, the 10x points can start to add up nicely, but it depends if buying those through the UR portal is actually the best price.

    Sapphire Preffered is solid, but not an amazing value. 65,000 pts after $4000 spend in 3mo for $95 is decent

    Ink Business Preferred is a better card and you don't need an actual business - 100k after spending $15k in 3mo is a great card; $95 annual fee.

    Free money from current offers:

    • United Explorer is 50,000mi after spending $3000 in 3mo. Free first year, then $95. Great free miles card if you can use United miles.
    • Amex Delta Skymiles - 70,000mi after spending $2000 in 6mo. Free first year, then $95. Great free miles card if you can use Delta miles.
    • Citi American AAdvantage Platinum Select World Elite Mastercard is 50,000mi after spending $2500 in 3mo. Free first year, then $95. Great free miles card if you can use American miles.
    • CitiBusiness American AAdvantage Platinum Select World Elite Mastercard is 65,000mi after spending $4,000 in 3mo. Free first year, then $95. Better free miles card if you can use American miles.
    • Amex Blue Cash Preffered - $250 after spending $3000 in 6mo. 5x cashback on a few categories. Free first year, then $95. I used it for a year and came away with ~$800 in my pocket from the $250+cashback
    • Alaska card - 70,000mi after $3000 spent in 90 days, plus the companion fare deal for $95 is worth it if you're on the West coast or have AK or HI travel plans is good




    In general Chase UR and AMEX MR points have the highest value at $.02/pt. American and Alaska are worth ~$.0175 and Delta/United $.012-.015 depending.

  12. #162
    Join Date
    Sep 2004
    Location
    LV-426
    Posts
    21,126
    A lot of "which card" depends on your personal usage and location - for example, if you fly often and your home airport is a hub for a certain airline, that card is probably more valuable to you. If you fly from or through DFW often, the Capital One Venture X card gets you that Cap One lounge, and it's really nice. Supposedly expanding to DEN soon too.

    The Amex Platinum card became less useful just recently, when they eliminated bringing a guest into the Centurion Lounge (unless your annual spend is $75K on the card).

    IHG has a strong sign up bonus (SUB) right now for their cards. Potentially quite valuable outside the US. In the US, less so, more like a lot of Holiday Inns and Crown Plaza hotels.

    I still think the Southwest Airlines companion pass via SUBs is one of the best deals out there, especially if you time it to get the SUB points awarded early in the calendar year (effectively nearly two years of free companion travel). YMMV - if your home airport isn't useful for Southwest, this isn't valuable to you.

    Alaska Airlines card comes with a single companion ticket per year. If you're in the PNW, Alaska is going to be useful for your flights.
    Quote Originally Posted by powder11 View Post
    if you have to resort to taking advice from the nitwits on this forum, then you're doomed.

  13. #163
    Join Date
    Jun 2009
    Location
    Portland, OR
    Posts
    563
    Not credit card related but I’ve enjoyed stacking points using Expedia. You can plug in your Hilton/Marriott/airline plan numbers and get Expedia points on top of those other plans. I usually accrue a free night or two with Expedia points alone

  14. #164
    Join Date
    Apr 2008
    Location
    Treading Water
    Posts
    6,683

    What's the best credit card deal today?

    I’ve spent a good bit of time looking at this recently. I got really excited thinking I was going to really capitalize on smart CC use, but the math ends up looking much less dramatic.
    Currently have a USAA card daily driver with 1.5%. I think about switching to a 2% card, but at the end of the day 0.05% doesn’t outweigh how much I like USAA. Safe, reliable, great app and website.
    Currently using Costco card for gas even though there’s no Costco locally. It’s still the best gas deal at 4% and I buy a couple things online through the year. Looks like they’re changing reward so I won’t have to go to a store to cash out. At the end of the day, it’s an underwhelming reward because 4% of $4000 annually is only $160 bucks.
    I looked at the Amex Blue card for 6% supermarkets, but a ton of my groceries are at BJs and there’s no cash back at warehouse stores. I’d actually do better getting a BJs card.
    I looked at the Amazon CC which is a no brainer for 5%. BUT, I’m piggybacking off a family member for Prime. At $4000/yr, it would break even for me to pay for my own Prime account. And I don’t even have a local Whole Foods.
    At the end of the day, I’d need to spend thousands more a year on travel or restaurants for any of the above mentioned cards to make sense. Even the bonus cash sign on rewards make way less sense when you remember it’s taking away from your other card while you spend $3k on the new card.


    Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums
    However many are in a shit ton.

  15. #165
    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Location
    Aspen
    Posts
    3,058
    Quote Originally Posted by jm2e View Post
    I’ve spent a good bit of time looking at this recently. I got really excited thinking I was going to really capitalize on smart CC use, but the math ends up looking much less dramatic.
    Currently have a USAA card daily driver with 1.5%. I think about switching to a 2% card, but at the end of the day 0.05% doesn’t outweigh how much I like USAA. Safe, reliable, great app and website.
    Currently using Costco card for gas even though there’s no Costco locally. It’s still the best gas deal at 4% and I buy a couple things online through the year. Looks like they’re changing reward so I won’t have to go to a store to cash out. At the end of the day, it’s an underwhelming reward because 4% of $4000 annually is only $160 bucks.
    I looked at the Amex Blue card for 6% supermarkets, but a ton of my groceries are at BJs and there’s no cash back at warehouse stores. I’d actually do better getting a BJs card.
    I looked at the Amazon CC which is a no brainer for 5%. BUT, I’m piggybacking off a family member for Prime. At $4000/yr, it would break even for me to pay for my own Prime account. And I don’t even have a local Whole Foods.
    At the end of the day, I’d need to spend thousands more a year on travel or restaurants for any of the above mentioned cards to make sense. Even the bonus cash sign on rewards make way less sense when you remember it’s taking away from your other card while you spend $3k on the new card.


    Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums
    We use the Amazon card for Whole Foods and Amazon orders, free money. Used to use Blue Cash preferred for other grocery, free money. Airline cards for everything else, usually in the goal of meeting a minimum spend.

    Big picture: The upside to reward cards is not in their actual cashback/rewards, but the signup bonuses that are usually worth $500-2000 in free/close-to-free miles/points. Your discipline in churning cards and rotating spends to continuously accumulate the bonuses is the money in your pocket for a limited amount of effort and little effect on the long-term credit health (some people's boogeyman in playing this game).

  16. #166
    Join Date
    Dec 2009
    Posts
    1,685
    Thank you all for the updated information. I'll have to hit some of those card sites and research.

    We are in Missoula, so not at a hub and limited seats in/out for flights. Delta and United are the majors with the majority of flights and seats. Alaska has several flights to Seattle for travel up and down the west coast and probably best connections west from there.

    Sent from my SM-S908U using Tapatalk

  17. #167
    Join Date
    Nov 2011
    Location
    Missoula
    Posts
    408
    Hard to beat AMEX gold combined with a Delta Sky Miles account. AMEX points transfer to Delta really well. Gold card has 4% on groceries and restaurants which are our two biggest categories. Currently running a 60k bonus on signup.

    For my other spending I second the Fidelity 2% into your brokerage.

  18. #168
    Join Date
    Oct 2002
    Location
    Shadynasty's Jazz Club
    Posts
    10,248
    Hard to beat Chase Preferred (or Reserve if ya nasty) if you travel a lot. I don’t travel enough to make it worth keeping beyond the promotional first year, but it’s a great card, especially combined with Chase Freedom. The CS/consierge service is next level.
    Remind me. We'll send him a red cap and a Speedo.

  19. #169
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    Last Best City in the Last Best Place
    Posts
    7,270
    Quote Originally Posted by Iowagriz View Post
    Thank you all for the updated information. I'll have to hit some of those card sites and research.

    We are in Missoula, so not at a hub and limited seats in/out for flights. Delta and United are the majors with the majority of flights and seats. Alaska has several flights to Seattle for travel up and down the west coast and probably best connections west from there.

    Sent from my SM-S908U using Tapatalk
    The Alaska card has been great for us since our daughter started college in Seattle. Already got two free plane tickets with the initial bonus, and will also be able to get a $95 companion ticket which we are going to use for Hawaii. The direct flight from Helena to Seattle makes it really convenient to fly Alaska. Plus they have without question the best customer service in the airline industry.

  20. #170
    Join Date
    Dec 2010
    Location
    Last Best City in the Last Best Place
    Posts
    7,270
    Quote Originally Posted by 4matic View Post
    Marriott card with the bonus points and free night annually. If you have some immediate expenses you get 3 nights bonus.

    https://creditcards.chase.com/a1/mar...E&gclsrc=aw.ds

    If you decide to use the Marriott card throw me a bone for the referral.
    I'm considering this because there is a Marriot Residence Inn at Big Sky. I would stay there all the time but it is too expensive. If you want referral points pm me your info.

  21. #171
    Join Date
    Apr 2008
    Location
    Treading Water
    Posts
    6,683
    Can someone please tell me again what a point gets you? Are all points the same? Is "3 points per dollar spent" just another way of saying "$0.03 in store credit per dollar spent"?
    Always seemed to me like the sign on bonus is better with points cards, but the ongoing rewards just give the perception of being better because 1000 points sounds a lot more awesome than $10.00.
    However many are in a shit ton.

  22. #172
    Join Date
    Sep 2004
    Location
    LV-426
    Posts
    21,126
    Points are not equivalent across hotel brands or airlines. And the number of points you may need for X redemption may vary quite a lot.

    Example: a perfectly nice Hyatt room might be 10-12K points, but an equivalent Hilton might be 30-40K.

    A flight from the US to Europe, round trip, might be 60K American Airlines points, but it might be 100K Delta - - or 40K Delta if on a sale.

    If you are willing to put up with the hassle, you can also do positioning flights to get from home to destination, and get cheaper fares that way. Example: when we went to Japan, we flew Southwest to LA ($11 each, companion pass, and some tiny amount of points - 12K?). Then took Singapore Air to Tokyo on a fare sale, something like $500 RT.
    Quote Originally Posted by powder11 View Post
    if you have to resort to taking advice from the nitwits on this forum, then you're doomed.

  23. #173
    Join Date
    Jan 2017
    Location
    on the banks of Fish Creek
    Posts
    7,513
    United explorer just gave me a free japan trip from nyc. was looking at about $1500 or so otherwise. not bad for tanking up on gas for work that I had to buy anyway.

  24. #174
    Join Date
    Nov 2004
    Location
    Ewgene, Orygun
    Posts
    41
    Don't forget you can use your Chase UR points on revenue airline purchases on their travel portal and still earn airline qualifying and redeemable miles. I always check with Google Flights and see if the fares are the same.

    The Reserve card gives a slightly higher redemption value per point over the other Chase UR cards.

    I only do this on close in flights. That way I don't have to deal with airline schedule changes thru Chase when booked far out.

  25. #175
    Join Date
    Oct 2011
    Location
    Aspen
    Posts
    3,058
    Quote Originally Posted by jm2e View Post
    Can someone please tell me again what a point gets you? Are all points the same? Is "3 points per dollar spent" just another way of saying "$0.03 in store credit per dollar spent"?
    Always seemed to me like the sign on bonus is better with points cards, but the ongoing rewards just give the perception of being better because 1000 points sounds a lot more awesome than $10.00.
    Points just give you a wider array of transfer/use options: you can redeem them as statement credit on your cc (usually the lowest value for their use), redeem for gift cards or use to buy stuff through a shopping portal (value varies, but usually low) or transfer to hotel or airline partners (potential for the highest value). At face value, Chase UR and AmEx MR points are valued higher than most airline points, but it all comes down to what you redeem the points to and then how you leverage the redemption. Hotel and airline redemptions give you the potential for a non-fixed dollar amount redemption; the other options are relatively fixed in the dollar per point redemption you choose.

    If you’re transferring 30,000 UR points to United for a domestic round trip flight on miles - that would cost you $300-400 cash: not great value.

    If you’re transferring those 30,000 points to United for a one-way Europe flight that would cost you $600-800: good value. 40,000 for a South America flight that would cost $2000+: great value.

    We don’t use a lot of hotel points (we have the IHG card that gives us free nights each year), but the game and luck (see below) is similar.

    The potential leverage and upside of banking and redeeming points takes timing, planning and some luck (in regards to at-that-moment airline ticket prices and/or mileage award costs) to get the most value.

    If that’s too much headache - every year or two: rotate through free airline cards and bank the nice signup bonus. Cancel the card after a year but you have the miles for a free flight or two. Then have a sapphire and freedom type combo for everyday spending and treat yourself to something each year when you have a nice pile or UR points.

Posting Permissions

  • You may not post new threads
  • You may not post replies
  • You may not post attachments
  • You may not edit your posts
  •