By: Revanche

Credit card churning update: March 2018

March 28, 2018

Back in ’15, I decided to slow churn cards on a regular basis, even if we didn’t have a specific trip goal in mind.

Quick notes:

• We still don’t have a specific trip in mind yet but I have my sights set on some kind of an international trip next year. For about 5 seconds I wildly dreamed about hiking through Patagonia but my body reminded where I live. Hahah, no. Dammit.
• For the purposes of figuring out whether we’ve wasted money on a card or not, I’m estimating the total value of our miles or points for each card to make sure that we are earning at least our minimum profit per churned card but we won’t know the true value until we actually redeem them.
• We haven’t been respecting the “no annual fee” rule for the past several cards as long as the miles or points bonuses were at least worth twice as much as the annual fee, if not four times as much.
• We ALWAYS pay the card balances in full. No exceptions.
• We time our churning activity with necessary spending. We never manufacture unnecessary spending for a card bonus. We’ll pass on a card before we do that. I keep a spreadsheet to track expected large expenses for this.

Current totals

AlaskaAir (miles valued at 1.3 cents): 204,001 and $120 in travel credits.
Chase Ultimate rewards: 308,930
Starpoints: 161,620

2017 Card Breakdown

Chase Sapphire Reserve, hers
Cost: $900
Bonus, 2017: 100,000 points (worth $1000 cash or $1250 in travel redemptions)
Global entry pass, 2017: $100
Travel credit, 2017: $300
Lounge pass, 2017: $176 (four adults)
Travel credit, 2018: $300
Travel credit, 2019: $300*
Total credits: $2176
Profit: $1276
Status: Active, cancel before 02/01/2019 after redeeming the travel credit
Worth it? Did not meet ratio at 1.42 but we did profit. Less so than if I had canceled this year before the annual fee but I hadn’t gotten my act together on booking travel for 2018 in time. It’ll improve as long as I grab that $300 credit in Jan 2019 and cancel immediately.

Chase Sapphire Reserve, his
Cost: $450
Bonus, 2017: 100,000 points ($1000)
Global entry pass, 2017: $100
Travel credit, 2017: $300
Travel credit, 2018: $300
Total credits: $1700
Profit: $1250
Status: Cancelled
Worth it? Yes, by a hair (2.77 ratio).

Alaska Air, his
Cost: $75
Bonus, 2017: 35,000 or $455 value
Companion fare offer redeemed, 2017: $389.84
Free checked bags: $50
Total credits: $894.84
Profit: $819.84
Status: Active, cancel before 9/30/2018
Worth it? Yes, 10.93 ratio

Alaska Air, hers
Cost: $75
Bonus, 2017: 30,000 or $390 value
Companion fare offer still good until 08-13-2018
Profit: TBD, $315 so far
Status: Active, cancel before 07/31/2018
Worth it? Yes, 4.2 ratio

2017 Summary

Total costs: $1500
Total benefit value: $4635.84
Total profits: $3135.84

Last year’s mix of cards was worth it but the profits on the Chase Sapphire Reserve weren’t as fantastic solely because I let my card go for a second year and didn’t need to use many of its other benefits. I’ve ignored the regular earnings on spending because all my cards are rewards cards. We earn points on all spending regardless of the card.

I might consider changing it to a Chase Sapphire or I might just cancel outright and churn a new Chase Sapphire for PiC instead to keep the travel benefit. Thoughts?

2018 cards

Since all my credit reports are frozen, future churning will only be under PiC’s name for the foreseeable future.

We will keep on churning the Alaska Air cards because they have fantastic ROI overall between the bonus, companion pass, and the free checked bags for cardholders. Other than that, I’m on the hunt for great new card bonuses.

We are partial to collecting the points we already have (SPG and Chase Ultimate Rewards) since they’re flexible and more is better, but we’re also open to the other brands we might need in locations that don’t have SPG.

I’m considering a couple HawaiianAir cards with the following benefits:

– 35,000 bonus HawaiianMiles for $1,000 spend in first 90 days.
– 1-time 50% off discount toward one published roundtrip coach fare for a Companion. One-time 50% off discount is valid for 13 months from account open date.
– Complimentary First Checked Bag
Annual fee: $89

If we did this one later in the year, twice, we could earn enough miles to pay for two of our tickets and pay 50% for JB’s, for a trip to Hawaii sometime in 2019, assuming they let us purchase a Companion ticket with money if the Cardmember’s flight was an miles redemption. I’ll find out.

IF THEY DO: Pricing for flights are available through Feb and a week in Hawaii in Feb 2019 would run around $550. Two annual fees ($89*2)+ on 50% off flight (~$275) = ~ $500 for 3 tickets. Or we could churn 3 cards and get it for 3 annual fees = $267. That’s a much better price for 3 flights to Hawaii!

:: Do you have your eye on any great card bonuses this year? I’m open to less location specific cards.

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