Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All depends on what your goals are. We juggle many, many cards, depending on our goals. Also do a bit of "manufactured spend" (where you "spend" money without really spending money) to up our rewards. We take a few trips per year (Europe, Disney World, Hawaii, skiing, visiting parents, etc) with the rewards. We're not quite as aggressive as some, but more so than most, I'd imagine. So figure out what your goals are (travel or cash back?) and go from there.

Can you explain what manufactured spend is? I've never heard of it. Being able to take those trips with rewards is great!

I follow frequent miler and a bunch of other blogs. I opened serve accounts for me and my husband. Anything else you do locally? I don't think our walmarts have those money center kiosks. At least not in DC proper. Any other ways you're earning points that are easy to do locally?

Walmart is old news! Get the red card - much easier! FMer talks all about red bird.

For the other poster, Serve is an online account thru Amex.

I've read all about the red card and want to get it but can't believe it will be able to continue as is (up to $5k). Worried about the hassle of closing our serve accounts to sign up for Red and then the benefit going away or greatly diminished.

We have Chase Freedom and Chase Sapphire, both good. I'm not sure whether we'll keep the Sapphire once we have to pay an annual fee.

Love our Chase Freedom card. Last month we got $90 cash back because Amazon was one of the 5% cash back categories and that's where we bought all of our Christmas gifts. This quarter is 5% back on groceries, they also usually do 5% back on gas during the summer which is great for summer road trips. I've been very happy with Chase customer service and their online service is very easy to use.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All depends on what your goals are. We juggle many, many cards, depending on our goals. Also do a bit of "manufactured spend" (where you "spend" money without really spending money) to up our rewards. We take a few trips per year (Europe, Disney World, Hawaii, skiing, visiting parents, etc) with the rewards. We're not quite as aggressive as some, but more so than most, I'd imagine. So figure out what your goals are (travel or cash back?) and go from there.

Can you explain what manufactured spend is? I've never heard of it. Being able to take those trips with rewards is great!

I follow frequent miler and a bunch of other blogs. I opened serve accounts for me and my husband. Anything else you do locally? I don't think our walmarts have those money center kiosks. At least not in DC proper. Any other ways you're earning points that are easy to do locally?

Walmart is old news! Get the red card - much easier! FMer talks all about red bird.

For the other poster, Serve is an online account thru Amex.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All depends on what your goals are. We juggle many, many cards, depending on our goals. Also do a bit of "manufactured spend" (where you "spend" money without really spending money) to up our rewards. We take a few trips per year (Europe, Disney World, Hawaii, skiing, visiting parents, etc) with the rewards. We're not quite as aggressive as some, but more so than most, I'd imagine. So figure out what your goals are (travel or cash back?) and go from there.

Can you explain what manufactured spend is? I've never heard of it. Being able to take those trips with rewards is great!

I follow frequent miler and a bunch of other blogs. I opened serve accounts for me and my husband. Anything else you do locally? I don't think our walmarts have those money center kiosks. At least not in DC proper. Any other ways you're earning points that are easy to do locally?

Can you provide links for the blogs and what are serve accounts?

I have two that I like - BOA Cash Rewards and Chase United. The United one is only worth the fee if you travel enough to use the rewards/benefits.

My delta amex sucks. Huge annual fee.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:All depends on what your goals are. We juggle many, many cards, depending on our goals. Also do a bit of "manufactured spend" (where you "spend" money without really spending money) to up our rewards. We take a few trips per year (Europe, Disney World, Hawaii, skiing, visiting parents, etc) with the rewards. We're not quite as aggressive as some, but more so than most, I'd imagine. So figure out what your goals are (travel or cash back?) and go from there.

Can you explain what manufactured spend is? I've never heard of it. Being able to take those trips with rewards is great!

I follow frequent miler and a bunch of other blogs. I opened serve accounts for me and my husband. Anything else you do locally? I don't think our walmarts have those money center kiosks. At least not in DC proper. Any other ways you're earning points that are easy to do locally?

Anonymous wrote:AMEX Blue Cash Preferred. There is a $75 annual fee, but if you use your card a lot and pay off the balance in full every month, you will cover that within the first month or so. I don't like points, so I focused on getting a card with cashback. If you spend a lot of money on gas, groceries, or general shopping/eating out, it gives you the most bang for your buck.

We have this card and it is awesome. 6% back on groceries for the first $6,000 you spend (1% cash back after that), 3% back on gas and department store purchases, and 1% back on everything else. No signups each quarter, no hassle, and you can just apply the cashback to your balance, which is nice (we have a Citibank Dividends Mastercard World Elite for all the places that don't take Amex and for its superb benefits, but that card makes you take a check each quarter instead of just knocking down your bill).

I use both my BOA platinum rewards visa and Chase freedom for their cash back and usually get close to $1000 cash back at the end of each year. Plus BOA gives you an extra 10% bonus if you deposit cash rewards into a BOA checking account. I put just about everything on my cards and pay in full each month. I always wait to cash out the points til year end and use it for holiday shopping.

IF you look at nerdwallet the highest rewards card is the barclays card. 2.1% return.

Fidelity Amex. Two percent back on all spending if you deposit into a Fidelity account.

Anonymous wrote:I never thought I'd like a credit card but I really like my Chase Sapphire. We use the points for travel, particularly for free flights. I found it by reading a number of blogs on credit cards.

This. I loved it while I had one. The 30,000 point signup bonus is very nice and I got free roundtrip tickets to Asia using points. You earn 2 points for dining and 1 point for everything else. Their customer service was very nice. Never had to wait on hold or do the annoying "enter your credit card number using keypad" thing.

There are lots of ways to "spend": buying gift cards that can be liquidated online to pay your cc back is one easy one. There are several people (at least a dozen, likely many more) who make their living blogging about how to do it. Google "frequent miler". He doesn't focus on beginners as much as others - there are others who specialize in that - but he's one of my favorites.

It is nice. I also travel a bit for work, which helps, but it's nice to know we can take our kids anywhere we want for very little outlay.

Anonymous wrote:All depends on what your goals are. We juggle many, many cards, depending on our goals. Also do a bit of "manufactured spend" (where you "spend" money without really spending money) to up our rewards. We take a few trips per year (Europe, Disney World, Hawaii, skiing, visiting parents, etc) with the rewards. We're not quite as aggressive as some, but more so than most, I'd imagine. So figure out what your goals are (travel or cash back?) and go from there.

Can you explain what manufactured spend is? I've never heard of it. Being able to take those trips with rewards is great!