I am currently typing this post from the State Library Victoria in lovely Melbourne, Australia. Over the past couple of years I noticed several bloggers and people that I knew in “real life” successfully using credit card rewards to travel all over the world.
I Wanted A Piece of That Action
One of my longtime loves is international travel. There is a lovely quote by St. Augustine who said “The world is a book, and those who do not travel read only one page.” I absolutely believe this and have found that my travel has also been a great opportunity to grow on a personal and intellectual level.
As I meet new people, talk about politics, food, how to raise a family, my belief systems are challenged and I am forced to think outside the box about my beliefs.
As you know I am currently in Australia for a two month visit that wouldn’t have been possible if my friends hadn’t let me stay at their home for so long.
But, in preparing for self-employment I made the conscious decision to rock my mileage points and in 2014 and then use the points for travel in 2015.
How Did I Do This?
I wanted to get as many mileage points as possible for 2015. So, I decided to do the following:
- I opened up appropriate mileage cards that were connected to airlines that flew out of Denver (and that I trusted) and that flew to larger hubs that I could purchase cheaper tickets to overseas destinations. If you’re intrigued by this idea you can view additional airline and frequent flyer credit card offers here.
- I researched the upcoming trips that I knew I wanted to go on: Mommy/Daughter 2015 trip, Two Destination Weddings, seeing Grandma, and FinCon15 (ummm…where is it LOL???!!) I estimated the amount of miles and budget that I wanted to spend for each trip.
- I broke up my trip to Australia into 3 flying segments that also offered opportunities to meet the spending minimum in order to earn the miles for each card connected to each part of my trip. I should also mention that by breaking up my trip to Australia I saved at least $1500 even with staying in Hawaii for a week.
- No Overseas Fees-I looked for cards that didn’t charge overseas fees as that had hurt me before when I was traveling abroad.
What To Watch Out For
- Emotional Spending! I had a hard month in October and overspent my original budget. As I result of this I will be paying more than I intended on a couple of my cards
- Your Ability To Self-Manage Credit-Again refer to the above. At this point I don’t need anything and don’t want to shop so I am feeling pretty good moving forward.
What I Won’t Be Doing in 2015
- Opening New Cards-I already have the mileage that I need for a number of trips. As soon as I find out about FinCon15 I can start working on the logistics for my 2015 travel. The priority trips will be to see my Grandma, go on my Mommy/Daughter trip, then the weddings, and FinCon15.
Where Will I Be Going?
- Hawaii!! I will be taking my mom to Hawaii as a result of the miles that I earned. In fact, I have enough extra miles to completely cover both tickets. I also hope to have a number of AirBnB credits* to cut down on my accommodation expenses. (affiliate link for AirBnB)
- Grandma’s House-She lives in the middle of nowhere! But, I love her and want to spend as much time as possible with her.
- New York City-Destination Wedding #1 My little sister lives in NYC and is getting married (she’s my fake little sister) I really would like to be there for her special day. It’s very easy for me to rock deals in NYC since it’s America, and I’ve visited before and know what I’m doing when I’m there. Will probably stay at the Jane Hotel which I’ve stayed at before. It’s a quirky property in the Meatpacking District.
- Australia-Destination Wedding #2-Umm, yep, my friend who I am staying with now is getting married. I will be able to stay with other friends for free or rock AirBnB so accommodation is pretty much set. I will be combining the Mommy/Daughter trip with the Australia trip. And will only need to pay for the Hawaii to Australia leg of the trip.
- FinCon15….uhhh…I don’t know where it is, but I’m pretty sure it’s in America! So, I will use mileage points to go there as well.
There are a couple of important points to take away from this post. First, always be respectful of the fact that credit cards are a financial tool to be used wisely! I’m an adult and I was aware that I had to really be careful about how I used my cards.
Pay off all card balances ASAP. I do have a few balances that are my number one priority. I switching to a almost entirely cash based budget so I think I will be ok for 2015. Also, know when to stop.
Do you use mileage programs for travel? Any tips that you would like to share? What trips have you gone on? Are you planning trips for 2015?
**Please note that there are affiliate links in this post and that I might receive compensation if you sign up for one of those items. All opinions are my own. **
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I would like to travel more so I’ve started a sorto of shopping ban and every single cent saved will be divided into emergy fund for car and travel fund!!!:D
That is a fantastic plan and I think you’re going to have some amazing trips soon! Keep me posted.
I do a combination of planned (so, automated) mileage earning via travel CCs and opportunistic earning (keeping an eye out for anything that can superpower my usual earnings) and I love how it almost exponentially increases our travel power. We don’t travel in style normally, but we can go more frequently without busting our cash flow.
For the first, we use the Starwood card for all everyday purchases. These points get us at least 2 free hotel stays a year with plenty of points banked for any unexpected travel.
For the second, I did this with my work travel: applied for a new CC at the time of purchasing a ticket to get the bonus, the points/miles per dollar spent, and got reimbursed for the ticket cost. I only used that card for reimbursable costs and paid two annual fees in exchange for racking up over 100k miles. Overall cost: ~ $170 for a cross country first class ticket. Not too shabby!
I could do better, though, for a recent international trip I was only able to redeem for hotel stays, our tickets had to be out of pocket cash.
Since 2015 is the year of newcomer to the household (Little Bean), we have put a moratorium on most travel for at least the first 6 months of the year… But we may attempt to put Hawaii on the calendar! If so, I should start looking now at the best ways to get there and then plan mileage around it 🙂
I love the phrase “opportunistic earning!!” That’s a blog post for sure. I don’t really travel in style either but occasionally it’s nice to splash out. Travels with Little Bean will be interesting to read about! If you go to Hawaii skip Honolulu….that’s a post I will be writing soon.
Great job on your hacking~ In the last 12 months, we have gone to Jamaica, Florida, Las Vegas, Mexico, Denver, England, Paris, and St. Maarten, almost entirely paid for with CC rewards. It takes some planning…but it works!
It worked out pretty well. I just have to work on the accommodation side of all my trips to really make sure that I’m getting more bang for my buck. You guys totally rocked your travel last year. Can’t wait to see what happens in 2015.
That’s great you are able to get SO many trips this year due to rewards! So you go back to Australia later in the year right? I do have one trip planned now. I have a two-night stay voucher at the mom grand in vegas so I’m going at the end of march with Melanie from dear debt. I wasn’t going to use my sw points but I think I will and my plan is to have one super fab meal, and maybe a spa treatment. Everything else will be super budget friendly. And we’re thinking we might want to open it up to see if any other bloggers want to join us in vegas!
The Vegas trip sounds awesome specifically because you get to hang out with Melanie!! You do have to have one nom nom meal plus a spa treatment. What’s the point of travel if you don’t do a few of the things you truly enjoy?
Nice job! I’ve been getting better at using mileage points and finding cards that work better for travel. Sad thing is, rewards cards SUCK in Canada. There’s only a few that are worthwhile. So far I’m only heading to Hawaii. I was planning on going to the UK in the fall but I’m thinking of postponing it a year to get more debt paid down instead (and accumulate enough points!)
If I can’t redeem a large number of mileage points for a ticket then I won’t be going 🙂 I’m getting hardcore over here! I just want to keep things simple in 2015 and pay my debts off. So when I planned for 2015 I just thought about all of the things that I enjoy and prepped for that so that I wouldn’t focus on what I couldn’t do as I focus on work stuff.