How I Earned 392,442 Points And Miles For FREE Travel In 6 Months

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1st Half 2015 Points & Miles Summary.png

Over the past four years, collecting points and miles from credit card sign ups, dining out, and other small tasks I've accumulated nearly 1.5 million points and miles among various travel and credit card programs. In 2014, I earned nearly earned half a million points/miles alone and I hope I can top that figure this year. So far this year I've managed to earn 392,442 points and miles toward FREE travel.

My goal by publishing my points/miles activity and balances is to show people they can earn lots of them for FREE travel.

In 2008, before I was into this hobby, I wanted so bad to travel but I just couldn't manage it in my budget. At the time, I had a mortgage, was saving up for a car, home improvement projects, and made travel;a low priority on my list. Fast forward to today, when I want to travel somewhere, I don't give it too much thought as I've built up a bank of points/miles to redeem from.  

When people say they can't afford travel, they may not realize the opportunity they have by signing up for credit card offers or participating in other travel program promotions. I try and demonstrate that you don't actually have to earn points/miles from paying for hotel stays flights.

In fact, the majority of my points/miles are earned by things other than flights and hotel stays. With less than a couple hours a month, by tracking, reading, and participating in activities to earn points, I am able to generate essentially another form of currency that I can use towards travel.

Let's see how I did for the first half of 2015...

1st Half of 2015 - Points & Miles Summary

LifestyleAccountant.com - YTD 2015 Points & Miles Summary
  • Beginning Balance: 580,351 points/miles
  • Net Earned: 392,442 points/miles
  • Net Used: 310,918 points/miles
  • Ending Balance: 661,875 points/miles
  • Estimated $ Value: ~$7,582

Activity Categories

I break out my earning and burning  of points/miles between various categories for a deeper look at what I do with them. Here are the main categories for my activity:

  • Earned by Flights/Hotel Stays - the majority of my points aren't earned by actual paid stays in hotels or paid airline tickets. I like to show this category because I want to demonstrate that I try and pay very little for travel but focus on earning points through other methods that don't require a lot of time or money.
  • Net Transfers - Transfers include merging of points/miles programs as well as transfers from flexible point programs like Chase Ultimate Rewards into their transfer partner programs.
  • Manufactured Spend - I have this category of it's own to show points/miles earned from manufactured spending. I don't spend a whole lot of time manufacturing spend. That is, generating credit card spending for the sole purpose of earning points/miles.
  • Regular Spend - I put all possible expenses on a credit card. Since my average credit card spending is about $600 per month, this isn't a huge area for earning. I can't remember the last time I used my debit card and I certainly don't carry or use cash very often.
  • Bonuses - Includes credit card sign up bonuses and other bonus activity from program promotions.
  • Redeemed - This represents the points/miles spent on FREE travel.
  • Expired - Points/miles that have expired due to inactivity within a program. 

Valuation

It's one thing to track points and miles balances, but it's another to put a valuation on it. I consider these balances a form of currency; it buys me free hotel nights and flights. I currently use the the point and mile values published by The Points Guy. For June 2015, you can find values here. Based on using his valuation, I currently have $7,582 in points/miles available for travel redemption. Please note: this is just an estimate and the value is really derived from the value of my redemptions. 

Strategy

  • Learning - I keep up to date on the happenings of points and miles news by following various points and miles blogs. By staying up to date on the best credit card offers, sweet redemption opportunities.
  • Tracking - Award Wallet is my primary method for tracking points and miles. Each week, I get an email update about what changes happened in each of my travel programs. 
  • Earning - These accumulated points and miles are solely from my effort alone. For some couples, they are able to get double the credit cards offers and combine their efforts and really stack up the points. 
    • credit card sign up bonuses - I've applied for 27 credit cards to date. I guess you can say that's where the bulk of my rewards come from and the majority of my time is spent on this hobby.
    • dining out - When I dine out at participating restaurants in the Rewards Network, I earn points/miles on my bill. 
    • online shopping portals - If I'm going to make an online purchase, I always check evreward.com to see what online shopping portals pay the most points/miles per dollar so I can earn easy rewards.
    • miscellaneous points - I'll sometimes get various emails or notification about small points/miles earning opportunities. I'll usually weight the effort involved and equivalent cash value of the rewards. Just follow any of the blogs above to stay up to date on the small stuff too.
  • Redeeming - When it comes to redeeming points/miles, I don't try and optimize every redemption to earn the maximum value. I simply redeem for the things I want to do and enjoy the fact it's FREE!!

Airline Miles Programs

I currently have miles balances in five major airline programs. My favorite program by far is Southwest. I previously had the Southwest Companion Pass that allowed a companion to fly with me for FREE. That was a very valuable thing to have, and it saved me even more money on travel. I will admit, I have a lot to learn about flights and the best way to redeem miles for them. I've accumulated enough miles in each program to get me at least 1 round trip flight somewhere. 

British Airways - 55,374 miles

  • no activity

Southwest - 62,340 miles

  • Earned 1,000 bonus pts from TurboTax filing promotion (for my girlfriend's tax return)

American - 132,179 miles

  • Transferred in 50,029 miles from US Airways account due to program merger
  • Earned 1,000 miles for AAdvantage eShopping Mall portal bonus
  • Earned 750 miles from manufactured spending
  • Earned 4,675 miles from regular credit card spending
  • Earned 3,500 miles from 10% points back promo on American Airlines redemptions with the Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select MasterCard 
  • Redeemed 35,000 miles for 2 one-way tickets to Puerto Vallarta, Mexico (+$300 value; taxes excluded)
  • Earned 50,000 miles from the Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select MasterCard credit card sign up

US Airways - 0 miles

  • Earned 29 miles from regular spend
  • Earned 50,000 miles from credit card sign up bonus from US Airways® Premier World MasterCard (no longer available)
  • Transferred out 50,029 miles to AAdvantage account due to program merger

United - 51,858 miles

  • Earned 1,528 miles from dining out from MileagePlus Dining. As a VIP Member, I earn 5 miles per $1 spent since I elect to receive email communication from MileagePlus Dining AND have 12 or more qualified dining transactions in a calendar year.

Delta - 23,648

  • No activity. Not planning on earning any miles and I rarely fly Delta as it is.

Hotel Point Programs

I'm all over the place when it comes to hotel loyalty. I am in five major hotel brand programs and my favorite so far is Hyatt. I have the Hyatt Credit Card from Chase that gives me one free night at any Category 1-4 property every year after my card anniversary. Since I've received the card, I've stayed at three Hyatt properties and have always been impressed with the service and amenities. Plus, at two of the Hyatt properties, we were greeted at checkin with champagne. One of my largest points balances is within Club Carlson. There aren't many properties in the US I plan on staying at but there are some aspirational award redemptions abroad that I wouldn't mind spending time at. 

Best Western - 2,638 points

  • No activity. Not planning on earning any more points as BW is not one of my favorite programs.

Club Carlson (Personal & Business Accounts) - 282,345 points

  • Earned 1,000 bonus points from Twitter promo (Personal Account)
  • Earned 1,000 bonus points from Twitter promo (Business Account)
  • Earned 80,000 anniversary bonus points for Club Carlson personal and business credit cards
  • Redeemed 50,000 points for 2 nights at Radisson Hotel Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco, CA (~$500 value)
  • Earned 25,000 points as adjustment for management complaint about stay

Hilton - 4,193 points

  • Earned 1,000 bonus points for password change
  • Redeemed 20,000 points for one night stay at the Hampton Inn Rancho Cordova ($135 value)

Hyatt - 20,638 points

IHG - 15,599 points

Starwood - 0 points

  • Expired 877 points due to no activity in account for one year.

Flexible Point Programs

My favorite points programs of all aren't even restricted to one travel program. I like the Chase Ultimate Rewards program the best because of the wide variety of options I have for using the points. They have several hotel and airline transfer partners that I can move points to and use.  

Capital One Rewards - 159 points

  • Earned 2,070 points from regular spending
  • Redeemed 1,251 points for travel reimbursements ($12.51 in travel credits)

Chase Ultimate Rewards - 10,904 points/miles

  • Transferred out 99,000 points to Hyatt for hotel stays
  • Earned 4,578 points from regular spend
  • Earned 41,000 points from Chase Sapphire Preferred credit card sign-up bonus and other bonuses
  • Earned 210 points from Chase Ultimate Rewards shopping portal

Barclaycard Arrival - 0 points/miles

Credit Card Activity

Here's what happened with the various credit cards that I applied for, cancelled, and renewed during the first half of the year: 

Credit Score

Even with three credit card applications and one account closure, I managed to keep an excellent credit score according to CreditKarma.com:

 

TOTAL ESTIMATED CASH VALUE of REDEMPTIONS

It's not so much about HOW many points/miles you earn but WHAT you use them for. This is what redeeming 309,237 points/miles got me:

  • 11 FREE nights in hotels: a ~$2,595 value
  • 2 FREE one-way flights (excluding airline taxes) a $300 value
  • $142.37 worth of flexible points travel credits
  • Total Estimated Cash Value redeemed: OVER $3,000 in value

The Bottom Line

During the first half of 2015, I earned 392k points/miles primarily due to four credit card sign up bonuses post to my accounts and was able to capitalize on some other bonus activity on top of my regular credit card spending. I redeemed 311k points/miles for several hotel nights and flights. This is truly an amazing hobby to follow and benefit from. I'm looking forward to the next half of the year not only in rewards earning opportunities but using them toward even more free travel. 

Readers: Did you have any significant points earning opportunities? Did you make any redemptions for FREE travel?

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Jeff Maddux, CPA

WHAT I DO: I help millennials save money, get financially fit, and create an awesome lifestyle.

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MY BACKGROUND: Personal Finance, Daily Money Management, public accounting, corporate accounting, governmental accounting, bookkeeping and individual tax return preparation. I've taken three mini-retirements by the age of 31 and I'm currently on my fourth mini-retirement (see experience section below for details).

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