Episode 06: The Travel Credit Cards I Applied for My 2016 Round the World Trip

In this episode I wanted to touch upon the airline credit cards and the generic travel credit cards that I actually personally applied to in order to achieve my around the world trip. Hopefully when you see my examples, it might help you in planning your own around the world trip or simply your dream trip to wherever in the world. The credit cards that I have used, I have received all bonus points that I eventually used to redeem points with respective airlines for coach, business, and first class tickets. 

One of the first cards that I had applied when I first started travel hacking is the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card and this card is still amazing and great. Usually they always offer the 50,000 bonus points but back in the day the minimum spend wasn’t that high. Last I checked as of 2016, the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card usually now has a minimum spend of $4,000 in three months. Again, it’s relative, for some people, $4,000 spend can be as quick as one month. For others, it’s simply out of budget, but remember to go back to Episode 05 to get ideas on how to reach your minimum spend requirement using your everyday “bills”.

If you're looking to get a card with a consistent amount being able to apply for a high amount of points at 50,000 bonus points then the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is great. And it's one of those cards that doesn't have an introductory annual fee. So the first year is zero dollars and then the second year it will charge a $95 annual fee. 

And that's another thing that I wanted to touch upon, a lot of these credit cards will have an annual fee during their first year but like this card as an example they waive the fee the first year. So keep in mind and read the fine print to see if the waive the credit card annual fee or not. But there are some cards that don’t waive the first year fee, however it's still worth getting the points anyways. Don't be deterred if you see an annual fee in the card. The Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is one of the cards that I recommend that’s a generic bank travel card!

Another card that I have frequently applied to on multiple occasions is the Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select MasterCard. Back in early 2015, there was many opportunities to get their higher level bonus points of anywhere from 50,000 to 60,000 American Airline points after making $3,000 in purchases in 90 days. As of the summer of 2016 I frequently have only seen them offer the AAdvantage Platinum Select at 30,000 American Airline bonus points at $1,000 minimum spend within first three months. And again this card does have an annual fee $95, but luckily, it’s waived the first year. 

Other cards I’ve enjoyed applying to for lucrative airline bonus points:

United Mileage Plus Card which is also part of the Chase bank card, 

British Airways Avios Card, also part of the Chase bank card. 

Hawaiian Airlines MasterCard, part of Barclays bank card. That one I apply to because I live in Hawaii. So it's just makes sense for me to grab that card but for all you guys out there especially those that are living in the West Coast or in the mainland in the US who always dream always loved to go to Hawaii. It's definitely a card to get especially if you live in cities where Hawaii flies direct New York City, L.A., the Bay Area, Portland, Seattle, San Diego all are places where Hawaiian Airlines flies into.

And then lastly the gold Delta Sky Miles Credit Card. I've gotten that card once. There's a rule where with any of the American Express cards that once you apply for the card and get the bonus points, you can only get those points one time for the lifetime. And that's just the rule for now. So who knows if AMEX changes that down the line but that's something to keep in mind. 

In a later episode, I’ll kind of go over each of the different banks specific rules in terms of how many times you can get the bonus points. The time frame that you might have to wait before you get the points again or in American Express’s case you can only get the points once even if you apply to the card again, they will not give you the points again. So that's really important to know and it's also like I said one of the strategies used to travel hack. So I hope this episode was helpful and you figure out which cards that you would apply in terms of airline credit cards or generic bank travel credit cards that help you achieve the travel goal you wish to have!

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Which travel credit card do you have and what perks do you like about that card?

Just comment and let me know if you guys have any questions that you want me to address. 

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If you missed, Episode 05: How to Maximize Your Personal Spending to Achieve Travel Credit Card Spend Minimum

Next,  Episode 07: For Business Owners, Don’t Forget to Apply for Business Travel Credit Cards

Follow me @hustletoparadise to stay up to date on future episodes of Travel Hacking with Hustle to Paradise.

(Introduction photo courtesy of Himesh Kumar Behera found on Unsplash)