Which Credit Cards for Free Flights to Disney in Orlando

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One of the most common questions that I get asked is about Disney vacations, whether it relates to where to stay, how to get a good deal, or which credit cards to get to make a Disney trip more affordable. In this post, I am going to focus on which credit cards for free flights to Disney in Orlando.

How to Get Free Flights to Orlando for Your Disney Vacation:

The easiest way to get free flights is by signing up for travel rewards credit cards and getting the bonuses for meeting the minimum spending requirements (for more information see here and here). Your ideal airline will not necessarily be the same as mine, as it is based on where you live (which airport you are using). I will give some examples from my home airport (PHL) so that you can go about doing your own research into which airlines may work for you.

Orlando International Airport (MCO) is a quick and generally easy flight for those of us who live near a major East Coast airport. Which is probably why I have lost track of how many times we have been to Orlando. Sometimes the flights are reasonable, and we pay the cash rate. Other times flights are more expensive (or we are miles-rich and cash-poor), and we choose to use Frequent Flyer Miles for our flights. Each individual family situation will be unique, and only you can decide when it is best for you to pay or to use miles.

I picked a random date and did a bit of research for direct flights from my location (PHL or nearby smaller airports).

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As you can see, most of the airlines use a Low, High, Medium kind of a system, and the number of miles you will need can vary in a crazy kind of way. If your dates are flexible, you can look at the award calendar to try to choose lower redemption rates.  Here are some examples from USAirways and American Airlines:

 

USAIRWAYS Award Calendar for PHL-MCO

USAIRWAYS Award Calendar for PHL-MCO

 

American Airlines Award Calendar PHL-MCO

American Airlines Award Calendar PHL-MCO

 

The British Airways Avios “Trick”

But wait, there is yet another option! And it just may be the best one. It may sound complicated, but once you get the hang of it, it’s really not. Check out British Airways Avios (their frequent flyer program).

The difference between BA Avios and, say, American Airlines’ Aadvantage Miles, is that BA is a distance-based program. What that means is that instead of saying, for example, that any ticket within the Continental United States is 25,000 miles…British Airways bases the number of miles needed on the distance between 2 points. You can go to the British Airways Avios calculator to find out how many Avios you need to get from point A to point B. In our PHL-MCO (Orlando) example, you would need 7,500 Avios each way. So for 15,000 miles roundtrip, it’s obviously a bargain.

Now, you may be thinking to yourself…but British Airways doesn’t fly from Philly to Orlando (or most USA domestic flights, for that matter). This is your aha moment. You can use British Airways Avios on their PARTNER airlines’ flights. American Airlines is a British Airways partner. American Airlines is in the midst of a merger with USAirways.

What’s the catch? Well, in order to use your Avios on American Airlines (for example), there has to be SAVER level availability for the AA flight.  In the AA chart above, do you see the green highlighted dates that say 12.5K? Those are the saver dates available (in that example). Those are the dates that you can get using 7,500 Avios instead of 12,500 AA Miles. Yes, for the same exact flight.  This also applies to first and business class tickets, which are obviously more.

I have used this “trick” (it’s not actually a trick, but it sounds more fun that way) a bunch of times now. For West Coast to/from Hawaii for a total of 6 different flights, for flights to Florida, and to Aruba. It’s legit.

So which airline is the winner?

So even after my detailed description of the British Airways program, I would say that Southwest is the  winner in this situation. In fact, on our flight home from Orlando in January 2014, we flew Southwest. If you haven’t flown Southwest before, then you will want to know that it is a bit different than other airlines (like USAirways & American Airlines).

Things to know about Southwest:

  • Seats are not assigned. When you check in online (as close to 24 hours before your flight if you are savvy), you will be given a boarding order number based on a number of factors, such as “first come first served” for the order in which you checked in online
  • The other factors for getting a better boarding number: people who buy the more expensive tickets, you can pay $12.50 per ticket each way for automatic check in, and elite members who fly Southwest a ton
  • To repeat the point: If your flight leaves at 9am, check in online at 9am the day before (if you don’t fit into one of those categories I just listed). The closer to 24 hours you check in, the better your boarding number will be (for example A45 or B33).
  • Southwest will have everyone line up in order (there are sections A, B, C and then numbers 1-30 and 30-60)
  • You then enter the plane in your order & choose your seat
  • They give you snacks (last week we got peanuts and crackers) and soft drinks/water/juice. You can buy alcohol if need be.
  • They tend to release their flights about 8 months out (unlike the 330 days of some other airlines). From their website:
    “We are currently accepting air reservations through January 4, 2015. On July 21, 2014, we will open our schedule for sale through March 6, 2015. This date is subject to change! Please check back frequently.”

We have flown Southwest a bunch of times, and even when I forgot to check in at 24 hours (gasp!),  we were still able to get seats that we were OK with. I’ll be honest, I’m not super picky about where I am resting my butt for 2 hours. As long as the kids are next to one of us parents, it’s all good. The guy who boarded at the end of the C group last week (and got the middle seat right behind me) was not happy though. He obviously did NOT know about Southwest’s seating procedures, and he was pissed that he got a middle seat. You snooze, you lose.

So why Southwest? I’d actually be happy with the British Airways scenario OR the Southwest scenario. I just tend to find it (sometimes) difficult to find the SAVER level availability. Plus I have a Southwest Companion Pass (I’ll write more about that someday), which allows me to bring someone for free when I fly. Until my pass expires, it’s a no-brainer for me.

As you plan your own Disney trip, you have to play around with your dates and your airports to see which strategy works best for you.

How can I get Frequent Flyer Miles?

The quickest and easiest way is through credit card sign up bonuses (after you make sure you are credit worthy, etc). So here are the current best offers (as of June 3, 2014 – these things can change at any time) for the airlines I mentioned (NOTE: I am not affiliated in any way with these & get nothing out of these suggestions). You can click on the links to get to the application page and also to read more about the other benefits of the card:

American Airlines:

Citi Platinum Select Aadvantage World Mastercard = 50,000 Miles after spending $3000 in 3 months ($95 annual fee waived first year)

Citi Executive AAdvantage World Elite Mastercard =  100,000 Miles after spending $10,000 in first 3 months, plus $200 statement credit ($450 annual fee NOT waived the first year)

 

British Airways:

Chase British Airways Visa Signature Card = 50,000 Avios with $2000 in spending in first 3 months ($95 annual fee)

NOTE: I have gotten this card when it was a 100,000 Avios bonus, but that doesn’t come around too often.

 

Frontier Airlines:

Frontier Airlines Mastercard = 40,000 miles with $500 spend in 90 days

 

Southwest Airlines:

Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards® Premier Card = 50,000 bonus points after you spend $2,000 in your first 3 months of opening your account ($99 annual fee not waived)

Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards® Plus Card = 50,000 bonus points after you spend $2,000 in your first 3 months of opening your account ($69 annual fee not waived)

 

USAirways:

USAirways Mastercard = 40,000 miles after first purchase and payment of $89 annual fee

 

And just to make things even more complicated for you…..

There are credit cards that offer different types of miles/points that can be transferred to different airlines

  • Any card that offers Chase Ultimate Rewards points (check out the Sapphire Preferred card for a 40,000 point bonus) – points can be transferred directly to some of your other frequent travel programs (like British Airways)
  • Any card that offers American Express Membership Rewards points (can be transferred, often with a bonus percentage, to British Airways)
  • SPG points can be transferred to many airlines. You can (for most) transfer 20,000 points and get 25,000 airline miles (if you email me at theamericantravelproject@gmail.com, I can send you the link for an offer of 30,000 SPG points that I got to send to people via email)

And if you have a business, you can pretty much double any of the above offers because there are business versions of most of these cards & you can get BOTH! I just blew your mind:0)

So how are you going to get to Disney?

 

 

Spotlight On: Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard

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As I have written about before, applying (and being approved) for rewards credit cards with good sign up bonuses is the golden ticket to free and cheap travel.

One of the cards that I am currently using to earn points for my travels is the Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard. I got the card a few months ago, and completed the minimum spend in order to get my bonus points (40,000 at the time of my application). The current offer can be found in the link I posted. At the time of this writing, this is what the Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard is offering if you apply. NOTE: I have no affiliation with this or any credit card, and do not receive anything from any companies. 

This is the current offer (as of May 7, 2014) for the Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard

This is the current offer (as of May 7, 2014) for the Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard

 

Benefits of the Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard

I am going to break down the (best) benefits you get with this card, and also how to use the points that you are earning:

  • 40,000 bonus miles after you spend $3000 within 90 days. This is equal to $400 when you use it for travel
  • 2x miles on all purchases. For every $1.00 you spend, you will get 2 miles/points
  • These miles/points can be used for any travel, as they will be used for a statement credit (more on that below)
  • 10% miles back when you redeem for travel (which makes your 40,000 bonus worth $440 when you use it for travel)
  • Free subscription to TripIt Pro (worth $49). I have been using this, and it’s pretty cool. There is an app and a website. You link your email addresses to it, and it scans your emails to compile all of your travel plans into one place. Free organizing? Sign me up!
  • No foreign transaction fees

Something that may be obvious here is that you can use your points for things other than travel, but you shouldn’t.  You only get the real value here when you are redeeming your miles for travel.

How to Manage and Use your Arrival Miles

One you have the card and your account, you can manage your credit card statements and your rewards at barclaycardus.com.

This is the step-by-step breakdown:

1. Use your Barclaycard to pay for your travel. You can do this by purchasing your travel the way that you normally would, using this credit card. I used my Barclaycard when I had to pay for taxes and fees on some “free” plane tickets that I got using frequent flyer miles. The fees and taxes were $150.

2. After your purchase posts to your credit card, you can sign in and go to “Manage Rewards” (see the arrow below)

Go to your Barclaycardus.com account page to manage your rewards (and pay your bill!)

Go to your Barclaycardus.com account page to manage your rewards (and pay your bill!)

 

3. This will bring you to the screen below. Click on “Redeem Now”

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4. My account does not currently have any reimbursable purchases, but when it does, there will be a list of “Purchases available for redemption”. It will give the transaction amount, and you can click on it to redeem and confirm to get your statement credit. It can take 1-2 weeks for the statement credit to post. The statement credit is basically just like cancelling out your purchase on your credit card, making it free!

5. Once your redemption has cleared, you can check your Redemption History to see what miles you have used for your travels! This is my credit for the $150 that I spent on the airline taxes & fees. I used 15,000 miles (and then got 10% of those miles back).

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What can Arrival Miles be used for?

These miles can be used for anything that qualifies as a “travel purchase”, which is determined by how the vendor is categorized. Like I showed above, I used some of my miles for the taxes and fees on some award tickets. This made those tickets completely free for us, which is great! I am also planning on using this card for some upcoming car rentals, to make those free as well. You can use them for:

  • Airlines (tickets, taxes, fees, baggage fees)
  • Hotels
  • Cruises
  • Car Rentals
  • Train tickets
  • Travel agencies
  • Online travel agencies (like Priceline, Orbitz, Travelocity, etc)
  • Theme park packages (like Disney hotel/ticket packages)
  • Bed & Breakfasts
  • Resorts

Anything coded as a travel purchase in the credit card category!

How to earn additional Arrival Miles

Obviously getting & using the credit card is the fastest way to earn Arrival Miles. There are also a couple of other ways to earn miles as well.

  • Use the Barclaycard Shopping Portal to earn extra miles for your online purchase. If you are unfamiliar with shopping portals, read here and here. One of the things to keep in mind when you are booking your travel online….don’t forget to check the shopping portals like these. They often offer extra miles for clicking through the portal to sites like car rental agencies, hotels, and more.
  • You can also join the Barclaycard Travel Community – you get participation miles for doing things like making a travel profile & writing travel stories. I have already earned hundreds of extra miles by doing this

One final note, I think that a bonus of $440 is worth a credit pull (that’s why I got this card), but there are many offers out there with a higher dollar value. Make sure you do your homework and shop around to see which cards are best for you and your situation.

How to use Frequent Flyer Miles for Hawaii flights

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using frequent flyer miles to get to hawaii

How to use Frequent Flyer miles for Hawaii flights

I don’t believe in coincidences, so when 3 different friends recently asked me about getting to Hawaii using Miles & Points, I felt like the stars were aligned or the universe was trying to tell me something (or maybe Hawaii is just really popular). I needed to write a post about this. Hawaii is, so far, my favorite place on the planet (specifically Kauai, specifically-er the North Shore). While I am not an expert, I have planned 3 trips to Hawaii where all of the flights were free (so I guess that does make me an expert, right? Not really).

I will start by explaining how we have planned our Hawaii trips, and then will add some other options as well. For all 3 of these trips, we are originating from the East Coast, but wanted to break up the trip by flying to/from the West Coast and avoiding a super-long flight. We (and my in-laws) have family to visit on the West Coast and places we wanted to go before/after Hawaii, so this is how I chose to book our trips.

How we used miles for our next Hawaii vacation flights (#1)

1. Used British Airways Avios (their frequent flyer mile program) on Alaskan Airlines metal (this means the actual plane you will be flying on) to get from (OAK) Oakland, CA to (KOA) Kona Airport on the Big Island.

  • I knew we wanted a direct flight from the West Coast to the Big Island, so I looked here to see which airlines fly from which airports to get to KOA
  • British Airways uses a distance-based award chart, which makes it “cheaper” in miles to get from the West Coast to Hawaii than it would with any other Frequent Flyer program (it is 12,500 Avios per person instead of the more typical 20,000 miles in other programs)
  • Because BA is in the Oneworld alliance, you can “purchase” a flight on one of their partner airlines using Avios & use the Avios award chart (which is more generous for the short-haul flights)

TOTAL = 50,000 British Airways Avios for 4 people from Oakland-Kona

How can you get British Airways Avios?
  • By getting a Chase British Airways credit card (at the time of this writing, the bonus is 50,000 miles after spending $2000 within 3 months)
  • By transferring Chase Ultimate Rewards point 1:1 for Avios (you can get UR points by getting a Chase Sapphire Preferred or Chase Ink Bold or Ink Plus Business Card)
  • By transferring American Express Membership Rewards point to British Airways (you can get Amex points from various Amex cards). Many times there are transfer bonuses of 20%-50% when you transfer Membership Rewards point to British Airways Avios
  • By transferring SPG points to British Airways (you will get 25,000 miles for transferring 20,000 SPG points). You can get SPG points by staying in their hotels or you can get an SPG personal and/or business card with a 25,000 point bonus
  • Shopping at the British Airways shopping portal

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2. Used Southwest Rapid Rewards miles to get us from Philadelphia to Oakland

(We will stay a couple of days before our flight to Kona)

  • Southwest reward tickets are based on the cost of the actual ticket (70 points per dollar, just recently raised from 60 points per dollar), so the lower fares will have lower miles “cost”
  • Southwest offers Companion Passes (maybe my favorite thing ever) – if you earn 110,000 miles in a calendar year, you get a pass where you can bring a companion on your paid OR reward flights & just pay the taxes (like, $2.50). So if you get 2 credit card sign-up bonuses at 50K bonus miles each, you just have to get an extra 6K miles (after the minimum spend requirements) to get a Companion Pass

TOTAL = It was about 20,000 miles total for all 4 of us

How can you get Southwest Rapid Rewards points?
  • Chase has 4 different Southwest credit cards (2 personal, 2 business) and they often offer 50,000 bonus miles for signing up and meeting the minimum spend requirement
  • Transfer from Chase Ultimate Rewards (same as above)
  • Shop using the Southwest shopping portal
  • Transfer hotel points to Southwest
  • Earn Southwest points when renting cars
  • Rapid Rewards Dining  (see here for more information about earning miles & points for dining out)

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3. Used United Airlines miles for inter-island flights on Hawaiian Airlines – from the Big Island to Kauai (via Honolulu)

  • Each flight cost 5,000 United Miles (flown on Hawaiian Airlines) and $5.00

TOTAL = 20,000 miles for the 4 of us

How can you get United miles?
  • Chase offers United Airlines credit cards. When we got them a while back, the bonus was much higher at 65,000 miles per card (and we each got one)
  • Transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points (as above)
  • United’s Dining and Entertainment partners
  • United shopping portal

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4. Used British Airways Avios to fly from LIH (Kauai) to SEA (Seattle) on Alaskan Airlines

  • Same as above. 12,500 British Airways Avios each to get from Hawaii to the West Coast

TOTAL = 50,000 British Airways Avios for 4 people

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5. Used United miles to fly from Seattle to Philadelphia

  • We were able to get first class saver tickets for 25,000 miles per ticket, which was the best option for the flights and dates that we wanted and needed

TOTAL = 100,000 United miles for 4 first class one-way tickets

So the total for 4 people is 240,000 miles for this Hawaiian vacation! 5 different flights.  And we only paid the taxes/fees!

This is how it breaks down for that trip in Credit Card sign-ups:

  1. British Airways Chase card (we got it when the bonus was 100,000 miles), but if you have 2 people you could each get it with a 50,00 mile bonus
  2. Southwest Chase card x 2 (we each got 2 Southwest cards – we booked tons of trips with these miles plus Companion Pass)
  3. United Airlines card (we each got one when bonus was 65,000 miles)

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PicMonkey Photo2

How my in-laws are getting to Hawaii (#2)

This is similar to what we did, with less credit card sign-ups and only 2 people.  They are only going to one island, so did not need the interisland flight.

  1. They got a British Airways Visa with the 50,000 mile sign up bonus.  This is enough for the 2 of them to get roundtrip from the West Coast to Hawaii
  2. They got a Southwest Visa with a 50,000 mile bonus.  This was enough to book the 2 of them to and from the West Coast

So, for 2 credit card sign-ups, they were able to get 2 people from the East Coast to Hawaii only paying for the taxes and fees.

 

How we traveled to Hawaii in 2012 (#3)

We pretty much followed similar steps as in #1.   We used British Airways Avios (that we had gotten from a 100,000 mile sign-up bonus) to book the 4 of us roundtrip to Hawaii from the West Coast on American Airlines (because of the partner alliance). We used American Airlines to get us to the West Coast so that we could spend some time at Disneyland before Hawaii and visiting family near Los Angeles after our Hawaii trip.

PicMonkey Photo3

 

Using other Frequent Flyer programs to get to Hawaii

In addition to what I have written about our experiences, you can also fly airlines such as American, United, USAirways, Delta, Alaskan, and Hawiian airlines to Hawaii from the Mainland.  Generally flights are 40,000 miles roundtrip.  They can be harder to book, and you may have various connections and layovers. There are also some direct East Coast to Honolulu flights as well, but these have not been practical for our family and our travel plans.

Here are the things to consider:

  • It can take time to apply for the card (and wait for a good bonus), get it in the mail, meet the minimum spend, have the miles post to your account, and then book the flights.
  • You may have to be flexible with dates, flights, airports (both on the Mainland and in Hawaii)
  • I have booked our 2 trips exactly on the date that the flights became available (11 months out), and my in-laws’ trip about 8 months out (they weren’t able to get the exact dates that would have been ideal, but it worked out)

What do you do if you don’t have much time to wait?

If you are looking to book a Hawaii flight, but don’t have much time to wait for the above considerations, consider getting a credit card that offers cash back for travel.  That way you can purchase your tickets and get a refund (statement credit) for your travel purchase.  I recently got the Barclaycard Arrival World MasterCard. This would be a great option for any travel that you have to pay for, especially if 2 spouses could each get a card.  With the current bonus, you would each get $440 worth of free travel. You could use this bonus to offset the cost of your flights. The 40,000 bonus points for this offer equal $440 worth of travel.

Here is the information for the Barclaycard:

barclaycard

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Universal Studios Orlando For Free!

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Universal Studios Orlando For Free!

Family Theme Park Vacation. For Free. During Holiday Break. Yes, we did it!

We generally like to travel around Christmas/New Years break because the schools are closed and it’s the perfect time for us to get away.  The time leading up to Christmas is the busiest of the year for me at work, and I am so in need of a vacation once Christmas is over!  Unfortunately, the rest of the world (at least those with kids or who work in schools) also seems to have the same idea! That leaves us with three chioces 1) plan ahead in order to use our miles & points for our vacation 2) be extremely flexible with where we are going to go or 3) pay top dollar.  Number 3 is not an option for us.

We really wanted to visit Universal Studios in Orlando, Florida.  We have been to Disney World about a million times, but had never been to Universal.  Or, as they say on the Disboards, the “dark side” (I’m not joking, that’s really what they call it). Because we have been traveling so much in the past couple of years, we like to avoid paying for anything travel related, if at all possible.  So I sought out a way to get our flight home from Orlando (we had flown into Fort Myers to go to Marco Island), our Universal hotel for 4 nights, and Universal Studios tickets for the 4 of us.

This is what I did.  It worked out perfectly for us, YMMV (your miles may vary), literally.

1. Loews Royal Pacific Hotel

This is one of the 3 onsite Universal Orlando hotels.  There are major advantages to staying Onsite, especially if you happen to be a Harry Potter fan.  The main advantages that were important to us:

  • Get in an hour early (before parks open) to the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.  This perk enabled my HP-obsessed daughter to go on Harry Potter the Forbidden Journey seven times….yes 7 times in 2 days
  • “SKIP THE REGULAR LINES with Universal ExpressSM Unlimited ride access in both theme parks – a FREE benefit worth up to $89 per person, per day^ (valid theme park admission required). It’s the fastest way to ride – enjoy unparalleled access all day long, as often as you’d like!”
  • Proximity to the parks – we didn’t use our rental car for the entire time we were there.  We made the short walk or took the water taxi to the parks

How did we stay for free? We used our American Airlines AAdvantage miles to book hotels, which you can do here.  Make sure that you sign in to your account, because they somehow show much higher point amounts when you are not signed in.  We have also booked Disney hotels using this method & you can read about that here.  For our 4 nights (during a holiday, high-season period) we “paid” 21,000 – 23,000 points per night.  When I priced it out at the time, it would have been $1800.  It was so worth it for us.

This is an example of a search that I did for the Loews Royal Pacific using AA miles

This is an example of a search that I did for the Loews Royal Pacific using AA miles

 

2. Universal Studios Theme Park Tickets

Another major expense of any theme park vacation is the park tickets, especially when you have a family to pay for!  We were able to get our tickets for free using our American Express Membership Rewards points.  The price (in points) of the tickets can fluctuate, and sometimes they do run out.  When we got ours, we were able to get 2 adults passes and 2 children’s passes for 3 day park tickets.  I think it was about 12,000 points for the kids and 15,000 for the adults.  At the time, it was a buy 2 days get one free promotion at the parks.  There have also been times when you could get these tickets for just 5,000 MR points.

The current offerings on the Amex site for Universal Studios tickets

The current offerings on the Amex site for Universal Studios tickets

 

3. Flights from Orlando to Philadelphia

We were able to use our Southwest points to get from Orlando to Philadelphia.  My husband and I both have Southwest Companion Passes, which I will write about another time.  The basic gist of it is, if you get 110,000 Southwest points in a calendar year, you get to bring a companion on any of your flights (paid or points) for free.  It’s the best thing since sliced bread (which, apparently, is younger than Betty White, but I digress).  We only had to use about 18,000 Southwest points total to get all 4 of us home.

So, that is how we went to Universal Studios for free at one of the busiest times of year! And we had an amazing time & may even be considering going over to the Dark Side for good.

Hogwarts...Forbidden Journey...best ride ever

Hogwarts…Forbidden Journey…best ride ever

Some cool props from comics that the kids have never heard of...this SHOULD be Spongebob World

Some cool props from comics that the kids have never heard of…this SHOULD be Spongebob World

 

Is it a bad parenting to have your daughter's pic taken with the Duff Beer Guy, Duffman?

Is it bad parenting to have your daughter’s pic taken with the Duff Beer Guy, Duffman?

Pretty much my life motto, for real

Pretty much my life motto, for real. Thanks Dr. Seuss

 

What is Manufactured Spending? Hint: It’s Not as Crazy as it Sounds

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What is Manufactured Spending?

In the Miles & Points world, there is this thing called “Manufactured Spending” that sounds really crazy and complicated, but it’s neither of those things when you really get to the heart of the matter.  Don’t get me wrong, lots of people go beyond the norm with their ManSpend efforts, but the average travel hacker can do this pretty easily as well. I have a job, kids, and a busy life.  Therefore, I can’t and don’t take it to the extreme.  I do participate in ManSpend to the Level 1.5 degree, I would say.  So what exactly *is* Manufactured Spending?

ManSpend** (as I like to call it when I’m feeling lazy) is essentially buying a form of “cash” with a credit card in order to get points/miles/rewards for said purchase. Normally we would attempt to get as many points/miles/rewards for the purchases we make everyday.  Like using online shopping portals for buying things, and using our credit cards where they get category bonuses.  What if you could purchase money, get your points for that purchase, and then use the money to pay off your credit card bill?  What if you could pay bills that don’t normally take credit cards (like mortgage payments) with your rewards-earning credit cards? That is the essence of ManSpend.

What are some easy ways to Manufacture Spend?

In this post,  I will go into detail about the methods that I personally use.  These are not top secret.  I have not been let in on any secret ManSpend societies (yet), and I pretty much stick with the basics because I am a wimp busy.

       1. Reload Cards

***UPDATE*** You can no longer buy Vanilla Reload cards at CVS with a credit card 

These are plastic cards that look kind of like gift cards and are on the gift card racks at places like CVS and Walgreens.  I like to think of them as the middleman, a place to ‘hold’ your money until you can get it into a usable form.  You purchase the Reload card (with your rewards-earning credit card), and then you have to move on to the next step before you can use your money.

My go-to reload card is called the Vanilla Reload, and I buy them at the local drugstore that starts with a C.  You are allowed to purchase $5,000 worth per day at that store, but I am never that desperate (not that there’s anything wrong with you if you are…or, on second thought…). I purchase them for one of 3 reasons: 1) I want to earn extra rewards on a certain card OR 2) I need to spend X amount of money in X amount of days to get a sign-up bonus 3) I want to pay a bill with a credit card & they don’t take credit cards.  The fee for buying this card is $3.95 no matter how much money you put on it, so it makes sense to ‘load’ the card with the maximum amount allowed ($500 per card).

So I bought my Vanilla Reload card at the store that let me use my credit card (a challenge for some to find stores like this)…now what do I do?

        2.  American Express Bluebird

Ok, so this should really be step one, I suppose. In order to access your credit card company’s money, you need to somehow get it away from the middleman (Vanilla Reload) and into your own grubby little hands (or to your mortgage company).  For this, I have an American Express Bluebird card.  There are 3 ways that you can get your very own Bluebird card (and you should if you are serious about this hobby):

  • You can purchase a Bluebird Account Kit at Walmart
  • You can order one online here (this is what I did)
  • Register through the Bluebird mobile app

You will be asked things like name, address, social security number, birthdate, email, user name, password, etc. Once you do the registration, you will get your card in the mail in about a week.  You then have to go online to activate it.  Note: you can only have one Bluebird account per person, but you and your spouse, parent, etc can each get one.

Once you have both your Amex Bluebird and your Reload Card (that you bought with your rewards-earning credit card), you “load” the money from the Reload onto the Bluebird by going to this website.  There is a scratch off silvery strip on the back of the Vanilla Reload (pretend you are playing the lottery!) with the code underneath it.  Put that and your Amex Bluebird number into that website and, viola! your money is available for you to use.

What can I do with my Amex Bluebird?

  • You can do online Billpay
  • You can send the money to your bank account
  • You can use it at an ATM to get cash (small fee)
  • You can use it as a credit card (why?)
  • You can use the money to pay off the credit card that you bought the money with

I usually withdraw it to my bank account and then pay bills with it (either the credit card or something like a mortgage or car payment).  You can load $1000 per day (up to $5000 per month) onto each Bluebird card, so it is limited.

       3. Amazon Payments

Are you familiar with PayPal? Amazon Payments is a similar concept.  You can send money to other people for goods & services. You can go here to sign up and learn more.  You will need the same information as for the Bluebird (name, address, social security number, date of birth, etc).  You can then set up your account with your banking information (for receiving your payments). You can pay another person using your rewards-earning credit card (up to $1000 per month).

 

          4. Buy and Sell Stuff

This method is definitely not for everyone, and I have only tried it minimally myself.  If you can find a really good deal on some items that you think you can sell for a higher price or break even (after fees), you can try re-selling those items on Ebay, Amazon, or Craigslist.  You can buy those items with your rewards-earning credit card, sell them & pay off the credit card with that money.  This can be somewhat risky because you may not be able to sell the items or make enough money to make it worthwhile.  I am planning to think about this a bit more when I have time, as I have sold thousands of things on Ebay (not re-sell things, but used) and have gotten pretty good at it.  I think I can use this method for some ManSpend when I have the time (wait, when will that be?!?!?!).

 

There are other ManSpend methods out there, and I will write more about them at a future date.  For now, I only wanted to write about my own personal experiences and not just things I have read about.

 

**Most in the Miles & Points world call it MS, but the real MS (Multiple Sclerosis) hits too close to home in my family for me to refer to ManSpend that way, so I just do my own thing, as usual.

How to Travel For Free with Credit Cards (Part 2) – Sign-Up Bonuses

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Free Travel Basics Painting

 How to Travel for Free – Getting Miles & Points from Credit Card Sign-up Bonuses

The truth is, for a person (like me!) who needs to earn miles & points without actually paying for flights or paying to stay in hotels, credit card sign-up bonuses are the way to go. You can read the first installment to learn the basics about travel rewards cards (How to Travel for Free – Credit Cards - Part 1).  Once you understand the basic concept of what a travel rewards credit card is & how it benefits the person applying, you can decide how to go about building up your own stash of miles & points to use for planning your cheap trip.  In this second installment, I will discuss how I go about deciding which credit cards to apply for at any given time.

Step One : Analyzing My Current Credit Situation

Is my credit score good enough to support some credit card applications?  See my information here about understanding and checking your credit score and credit report.  I generally want to make sure that my score is over 750, knowing that it will dip a bit temporarily when I sign up for some new cards.

One thing that many people who follow this hobby tend to do with credit card applications is an app-o-rama (or AOR).  An AOR is essentially the practice of applying for multiple credit cards all on the same day.  The reason for this has to do with the fact that a new credit application gets reported to the credit agencies.  You can get turned away (even with a stellar credit score) for having “too many inquiries” recently.  If you apply for a bunch of cards on the same day, each of the credit card companies does not see the information about your other inquiries for that day.  I use this strategy, and it works for me.  Some in the hobby have a set schedule of when they will apply for new cards (something like every 90 days for a new AOR).  I don’t generally do it that regularly, but enough to have the miles & points in my accounts that I want to use.  Which brings me to….

Step Two : Knowing my Travel Goals

I like to keep a running list of places we want to go and dates when we can travel.  See here to read about how I plan our travel, in general.  Planning ahead really helps me to narrow my focus about what types of miles & points I need to work on accumulating.  For example, I knew that I wanted to plan a trip to Hawaii, and I was able to research and find out that British Airways miles would get me there.  I then applied for a British Airways Chase Visa Card, which had a 100,000 mile bonus at the time of my sign up (not right now, but these things change all the time).  That one application was enough to get all 4 of us to and from Hawaii from the West Coast.  I also applied for some hotel cards after researching which hotels we wanted to stay in once we were in Hawaii (here is one example).

Step Three : What are the best Credit Card offers at the time of my application(s)?

It helps to know what the current credit card offers are, and for this I always go to Flyertalk and/or Milepoint for my research.   Those people on the forums know everything there is to know about reward travel.  I like to read this specific Flyertalk thread to learn about the different sign-up bonuses that are being offered.  I also try to jump on any really spectacular bonuses that come along, as many of them are very limited as to how long the applications are available.  For example, last year I was able to get in on a 100,000 point bonus for the American Express Platinum card that was only available for about a day, which was a great deal for us!

Some tips:

  • My husband and I generally both apply for the same offers if they are really good, so we end up getting double the bonus points in many cases
  • We keep a spreadsheet with all of our application dates, how much the bonus is, how much we need to spend to get the bonus, annual fee (usually waived the first year, but I like to know what it is), and when the bonus points post
  • I continually evaluate and reevaluate which cards I have, which ones I’m keeping, and which need to be cancelled before the annual fee hits
  • You can often get the fee waived or an offer for a retention bonus when you call to cancel your card (more on that later)
  • If you are denied, you can call the reconsideration line to plead your case & this works for us 99% of time (more on that later too)

 

Just like we do, you can put your credit to work for you and save thousands of dollars in the process.  Free travel with credit card sign-up bonuses has become a way of life for us at this point!

 

 

 

Free Disney Hotels : How to Use Miles and Points

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Free hotels at Disney using Miles & Points - it's possible!

Free hotels at Disney using Miles & Points – it’s possible!

Free Disney Hotels

We have been crazy lucky enough to visit Walt Disney World in Orlando about a million times.  One year in the not so distant past, we even had annual passes (and we live in Pennsylvania, so that’s some pretty hardcore Disney devotion).  One of the ways that we have made this work for us is by staying for free in our Disney hotels using our Miles & Points.  Many of the hotels have been off-property, and we are totally fine with that, often preferring to trade proximity to the parks for lots of extra space.  That is a whole debate in itself though.  I will show you how to  use Miles & Points for both on-property and off-property Disney hotels to make them free.  The following are places we have stayed & points we have used.  

Disney Hotels where we have used our Miles and Points to make them FREE -

Christmas in July at the Swan & Dolphin

Christmas in July at the Swan & Dolphin

1. The Swan & Dolphin

The Swan & Dolphin are 2 adjacent hotels that are located right in the heart of Walt Disney World, but they are operated by Starwood and not Disney.  This is great for you because it means you can use your SPG points  to stay at this hotel for almost free (you usually still have to pay a resort fee).  At the time of this writing, The Swan and The Dolphin are each 10,000 points per night, with the additional benefit of the 5th night free when using points.  40,000 SPG points for 5 nights at a Disney “on-property” hotel is a fabulous deal.  You can even call the reservations department to ask if they have any suites or larger rooms available.  If so, they will often let you use extra points (like 11,500 vs 10,000) to book one of the larger rooms.  We have stayed at both of these hotels a couple of times, and will be reviewing them in another post (But a little hint: Thumbs Up!).

Walking around the grounds at the Sheraton Vistana Villages in Orlando

Walking around the grounds at the Sheraton Vistana Villages in Orlando

2. Sheraton Vistana Villages

This is another great hotel near Disney World (and also near Universal Orlando) that you can get for free using your SPG points.  It is also 10,000 points per night or 40,000 points for 5 nights.  Although not on-property, you will get lots of space plus a kitchen.  You will need a car, as it is about 10 miles from both The Magic Kingdom (some of the other Disney parks are a bit closer), and 10 miles from Universal.

One of the pools at the Sheraton Vistana Villages in Orlando

One of the pools at the Sheraton Vistana Villages in Orlando

When we stayed at the Sheraton Vistana Village, it was a better deal for us to use American Airlines miles to “pay” for our hotel.  We had tons of AAdvantage Miles that we were not planning on using for flights, and the value was much better than using our SPG points at the time.   We were also able to choose a room type, since AAdvantage uses your miles to book through a travel agency.  The miles correlate to the price of the room, so you can sometimes just use more miles for a larger room type.  We were able to use our miles to get a huge 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom condo with a full kitchen and washer/dryer.

Liki Tiki Resort in Orlando, FL

Liki Tiki Resort in Orlando, FL

One of the pool areas at Liki Tiki in Orlando

One of the pool areas at Liki Tiki in Orlando

3. Liki Tiki Village

Similar to the Sheraton Vistana Village, we were able to book this timeshare resort hotel using our AAdvantage Miles.  It ended up being a very, very low amount of miles per night for the room that we booked (something like 6,000 miles).  We had a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom unit with a full kitchen, washer/dryer, living room, and lanai.  It was about 15-20 minutes by car from the Main Gate to Disney.  Not a bad drive at all.

The Pirate Pool at the Marriott Harbour Lakes in Orlando

The Pirate Pool at the Marriott Harbour Lakes in Orlando

4. Marriott’s Harbour Lake

Marriott has several properties in the Orlando area, and this is consistently ranked as one of the best.  Once again, we were able to score a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom unit with full kitchen, washer/dryer, living room, lanai.  It was one of our favorite places we have ever stayed, and we have friends who just got back and loved it as well. It is close to Sea World and Aquatica (so fun), and an easy drive to Disney and Universal as well. While you will need a significant amount of points to stay at this Category 7 property, you can often get 70,000 points just by signing up for the Chase Marriott card and completing the spend requirements, which is enough for 2 nights on a regular reward (or 4 if your significant other or travel companion gets the card too).

Nights Stay Points Needed
 Point Savers* 
One night 35,000 30,000
Two nights 70,000 60,000
Three nights 105,000 90,000
Four nights 140,000 120,000
Five nights 140,000 120,000

* Some locations offer these limited-time, reduced-point offers.

Using Miles to Book Disney Properties

You can also book some on-site, Disney-owned properties using your American Airlines miles.  This is something we almost did last time we visited Orlando, but we decided to (gasp!) go to Universal Orlando for the first time instead.  More on that later.  Here are some tips for using miles to book Disney Properties:

Assuming you have AAdvantage Miles in your account, you should make sure you log in to get the best prices.  For some reason, the price (in miles) always goes down once I log in (and I have no status of any kind on AA, as I haven’t paid for an airline flight in 10 years).  For example, when I go to the website (without logging in) and put in June 7, 2014 for Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort, it gave me the cost of 27,467 miles per night.  After I log in, the cost is 16,500 miles per night…huge difference!

Here are some examples of some more of Disney’s own hotels that show up on the AAdvantage site, searching the random date of June 7, 2014.  (TIP: since there are hundreds of hotels in the area, type “Disney’s” in the search box, and the Disney-owned hotels will pop up like this):

Disney's Hotels on www.useaamiles.com

Disney’s Hotels on www.useaamiles.com

As you can see, the miles for each of Disney’s hotels vary widely, but so does the cost in dollars.  You have to make your comparisons for your dates based on many factors.  As an example, I checked the same date on the Disney reservations website for Port Orleans Riverside.  The price was $205 (which included a promotion discount).  The cost in miles would be about 19,000.  It’s not a stellar points redemption value, but maybe you have millions of AAdvantage miles that you earned on your company’s dime? Sometimes we are points-rich and cash-poor and we just would much rather use our miles.  We tend to save more money by using miles/points to stay offsite (and even more when there is a kitchen to help cut down on food costs).  We have paid to stay in many on-property Disney hotels though (Wilderness Lodge, Animal Kingdom Lodge, Port Orleans French Quarter, Boardwalk, Grand Floridian).  There are so many factors that go in to making the choice that is best suited to the family’s needs at the time, so it is helpful to evaluate all of your options.

The Wilderness Lodge - probably our favorite on-site Disney hotel

The Wilderness Lodge – probably our favorite on-site Disney hotel

There are also many, many more options for free Disney hotels using miles and points, and I will explore this further in a future post.

Have you ever used your miles and points for a free Disney hotel?

 

 

 

 

Miles for Dining : Free Travel Basics

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Free Travel Basics Painting

Miles & Points for Dining

There is another easy way to earn Miles & Points – The Rewards Network Dining Program.  Similar to the Shopping Portals, you can earn Miles & Points for doing something that you would normally be doing anyway…eating!  In order to earn miles from this program, you sign up and register the credit card(s) you will use to pay for your restaurant bill.   You dine at one of the participating restaurants, and you earn the miles per dollar listed on their website.  You can also often get bonuses from time to time for signing up for the individual programs.

This is how it works:

Join a Rewards Network program

1.  Join.  The Rewards Network has many different frequent travel programs as partners.:

- Alaskan Airlines

- American Airlines

- Delta Airlines

- Hilton Hotels

- IHG Hotels

- Southwest Airlines

- Spirit Airlines

- United Airlines

- USAirways

Decide which of these you want to earn (hint: you can sign up for more than one, but see more info about that below).  Sign up here.  You will want to make sure that you already have a frequent traveler number for the program(s) you want to use (more on that here).  You will sign up by giving your information (name, address, etc).  You will also have to give the information for the debit and/or credit card(s) you plan to use to pay for your dining.

Here is one important part: Only register any of your cards for ONE program.  For example, you can’t use your SPG Amex for BOTH the Southwest Dining and the USAirways Dining.  You can sign up for both Southwest Dining and USAirways Dining, just make sure that you use 2 different credit cards when you join.

Eat at one of the Network Restaurants

2.  Dine.  You can search for participating restaurants by zip code, city, state.  I have found that there are generally lots of choices in my area and also in places where I am traveling.  I have also been surprised by points showing up in one of my frequent flyer accounts after dining at a participating restaurant without even knowing it was in the network.  All of the restaurants within the Rewards Network will be the same, no matter which frequent travel program you sign up with.  Some are available for points earning every day & some black out the weekends or other days.

 Earn Miles & Points

3. Earn.  After you dine and pay with the linked credit card (don’t forget that part, it’s important), you will get your points…up to 5 points per dollar.   I usually get an email right after the payment processes saying “thank you for dining at xyz” and asking me to leave a review.

At different times, the programs will have sign-up bonuses as well, so don’t sign up for every program right away.  For example, at the time of this writing, Southwest has a 300 mile bonus for signing up for their program and completing the dining requirements.

How to Travel for Free – Credit Cards (Part 1)

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Free Travel Basics Painting

How to Travel For Free – Credit Cards 101

This is the #1 question that people ask us.  How do you afford to take so many trips each year?  How do you travel so cheaply? Can I do it too?  Yes, you probably can.  It does take some time and effort to learn the basics, but once you start it can be hard to stop!  In this post I am going to talk this through for you newbies out there in the most step-by-step way that I can.  It will take more than one post to go over everything related to travel credit cards, so I will keep writing installments until I have bombarded you with too much information.  Please feel free to ask any questions & I will answer if I can.

What are travel credit cards?

First things first…what are we even talking about here?  What are these travel credit cards you are talking about all the time?  There are tons of different banks that issue credit cards (ie Chase, Citibank, US Bank, Barclays, and more).  They partner with different companies to offer many different types of rewards.  Do you ever go to a store & the cashier asks “would you like to save 10% on your purchase today by opening our credit card?”  Same idea, except instead of getting $30 off of your $300 TV, you can often get a thousand bucks worth of free travel for each card you get.

As an example, Chase Bank has airline cards from Southwest, United, and British Airways (yes, I have each of these cards at one point or another).  They also have hotel cards from Hyatt, Fairmont, IHG, Marriott, Ritz Carlton and Disney.  One of my favorite types of points to earn are the Chase Ultimate Rewards points & they have cards that earn these as well (Sapphire, Ink, Freedom).  All of these banks have relationships with the various airlines and hotels, plus there are other kinds of ways to redeem for travel as well (I will cover that in another post).

How do I get one of these rewards credit cards?

Finance is not my area of expertise, so I am not going to claim to know exactly how one person gets approved for a credit card and another doesn’t.  Obviously things like your credit score, income, and debts are calculated in some kind of super actuarial formula & you are either jumping up and down for your potential vacation or you are doing the credit card walk of shame.  Luckily we have been on the free vacation end of things.  What we do is pay our bills and have incomes.

Here are the things I should probably say:  pay all of your credit card bills in full, don’t jump in too quickly and apply for fifty million credit cards all at once, check your credit score before you apply, realize that an application drops your score by a few points temporarily; therefore, be mindful if you have something credit-y coming up soon like a refinance, new mortgage, or loan application.

You can find the different online applications for these cards all over the internet.  The important thing to keep up with would be the current bonuses for each of the cards that you are interested in.  They change often, and there are also different links to the same credit cards floating around at times.  For example, there may be a link (the thing you click on to get to the credit card application page) for an 80,000 bonus point IHG credit card.  There may also be a link for a 60,000 bonus point IHG card.  You will get the bonus points for whichever of the links you click on in order to do the application.  Obviously you would want the higher one.  There are some cases when you may want a lower bonus (if there is a lower minimum spending requirement, for example).  This will all be dependent on your individual situation.

What do I have to do to get the Points & Miles?

Sell your first born child?  Not quite.  All of the cards will have some kind of requirement you need to meet in order to get your big bonus.  Some are very easy (like getting your bonus miles after your first purchase of any $ amount).  Others are more difficult if you are not a big spender (like spending $5,000 within the first 3 months).  You have to make the judgement about whether or not you can fulfill the spending requirement, especially if you are applying for more than one card at a time.

Once you complete your spending, the bonus points will appear in the Frequent Flier/Hotel Loyalty account you created and added to your credit card application (see here about doing that) at some point – these can be posted at different points within your billing cycle for different cards.

In addition to your bonus points for signing up, you also get points per dollar spent.  Some cards have a set amount (like 1 point per $1 or 5 points per $1), and others have special categories (like 2 points per $1 for gas, groceries, etc).  Most will also give you lots of extra points for using their card for their own products (for example, my Club Carlson card gives me 10 points per $1 spent at their hotels).

Is this too good to be true? A scam?

We have been doing this as a hobby for over 10 years now, probably closer to 15 years.  While things have changed a lot (bonuses go up and down, minimum spends change), this has been working for my family for ages.  It is a real, legit thing.  The credit card companies are giving you all of these points and miles because they really want certain people to sign up for their cards.  That’s really the bottom line.

This is an example of some of the bonuses we have gotten over the years:

100,000 British Airways miles (redeemed to go to Hawaii)

100, 000 American Express Membership Rewards points

$1100 in free travel from Capitol One

50,000 Southwest Miles (times a few)

75,000 American Airlines miles (times a lot)

2 free nights at any Hyatt

2 free nights at any Hilton

2 free nights at any Fairmont

80,000 IHG points plus a free night every year

and so much more……

Please continue to follow, as I will add more posts to this series with more free travel tips!

 

 

Marco Island : How to Travel for Free

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Marco Island Florida How to Travel for Free

If we can do it, you can do it too!

How we went to Marco Island for FREE

Right after Christmas of 2013 we were able to to escape the cold and spend 4 nights in beautiful Marco Island, Florida.  It was our first time there, and it will not be our last.   We enjoyed the trip so much.  It was totally free (for flight and hotel and hotel breakfast), which made it even better!  How did we go to Marco Island for free, you ask?  I will let you in on the secret (it’s not a secret at all, everyone and their brother is doing it).   We saved about $5000.  Five. Thousand. Dollars.  We would not have actually SPENT 5 grand on this trip, as that is approaching our travel budget for a whole year & we can usually get 50 hotels nights out of that.  Because it was Christmas time,  the hotel and flights would have been particularly expensive if we had purchased them.

 

Hilton Marco Island Resort from the beach at the crack of dawn

Hilton Marco Island Resort from the beach at the crack of dawn

Hilton Marco Island Beach Resort and Spa

We chose this hotel because it was free, but I would stay here again in a heartbeat.   It was right on the beach.  We could walk out of our room and be on the beach within one minute.  Perfect.  There is a great pool that the kids loved.  They made tons of friends over our four days at the hotel, as this is a very family-friendly hotel.  There is a pool bar serving food and drinks.  There are plenty of pool and beach chairs to use.  I wish I was there right now.

Our room was large, with a king sized bed and a queen sized pull-out sofa.  The kids are still young enough that this works for us.  We know we are nearing the time when we will have to spring for 2 rooms, so we are taking advantage of this while we can.  The hotel was completely booked, so they did not have a 2 bed room available for our whole stay.  We could have switched rooms, but ended up being happy with the room we had, so we stayed put.

The pool at the Hilton Marco Island Resort

The pool at the Hilton Marco Island Resort

Hilton Marco Island Beach

I love love love seashells, and this beach did not disappoint.  In fact, we had gone to Sanibel Island for a visit on this trip as well.  It is supposed to be the shelling capitol of the universe, and I’m sure it usually is, but on this trip our Marco Island hotel beach proved to have even more shells (although Keewaydin Island had the mother-lode).  I loved being able to wake up, stumble out of bed at the crack of dawn (my kids are NOT the sleep-in types), and be on the beach searching for shells within minutes.

Early morning shelling on Marco Island

Early morning shelling on Marco Island

Funny story: my son thought it would be a fun idea to bring a bag of goldfish crackers to eat on the beach.  He was promptly attacked by seagulls.  Even after he threw the bag and ran for his life down the beach, they still kept chasing him.  I missed the whole thing because I was looking for shells.   He said “I wish you were videotaping that so I could win the grand prize on America’s Funniest Videos”. True Story.

Free Hotel Nights

The  top secret way that we got these free hotel nights is through applying for a couple of credit cards, meeting the minimum spend, getting the nights posted to our accounts, and then using them to book this hotel.

For 2 of the nights we used this card:

Citi Hilton Reserve Credit Card:

Earn 2 weekend night certificates each good for 1 weekend night (standard room, double occupancy) at select hotels and resorts within the Hilton HHonors portfolio after $2,500 in eligible purchases within the first 4 months of cardmembership

10 HHonors Bonus Pointsper $1 spent on hotel stays within the Hilton HHonors portfolio

5 HHonors Bonus Pointsper $1 spent on airline and car rental purchases

3 HHonors Bonus Pointsper $1 spent on all other eligible purchases

Enjoy the benefits of HHonors Gold status as long as you are a cardmember

This is also how we got free breakfast each day (the hotel gave it to us for having Gold status)

 

For the other 2 nights we used HHonors Points that we had accumulated from credit card spending, some hotel stay bonus points, and some other credit cards.

 

Free Flight to Fort Myers

We were able to fly from Trenton, NJ direct to Fort Myers, FL on Frontier Airlines using miles that we got from this credit card:

Frontier Airlines Mastercard -

Earn up to 50,000 bonus miles — starting with 40,000 bonus miles after spending $500 in the first 90 days.

That is enough for two roundtrip award tickets (plus fees/taxes from $10).

 

If you have an American Express card that earn Membership Rewards points you can also transfer those points to Frontier Miles if the value is better than using your points to “purchase” the tickets outright from Amex Travel.   It is often a better deal to transfer the miles, but each situation is different.