Author Topic: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000  (Read 3244 times)

steevven1

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40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« on: June 27, 2020, 08:59:50 PM »
Wife and I hit credit card number 40 this year, after 7 years of churning (so, like 1 card every 2 months). Even on a Mustachian budget, we were able to generate well over $20,000 in CC rewards (mostly cash) along the way. Averages out close to $3,000 in "free money" per year. At the beginning of our journey, that would have been like a 10% pay boost for one of us. And an even bigger percent increase in savings rate.

I usually tell people that CC churning is only one tiny piece of the financial puzzle (and it is), but thinking about how much that $20k has grown for us in the stock market along the way too...it probably made a bigger difference than I ever gave it credit for.

We finally did a full write-up and guide for others to follow if you're interested in such things: https://www.tripofalifestyle.com/money/credit-card-churning-guide/

Happy to answer questions about any part of it.

Chris Pascale

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #1 on: June 27, 2020, 10:49:15 PM »
I just did a vacation to Niagara Falls using the JetBlue Business Card, and will be paying it off/disposing of it.

Was thinking of having my daughter and wife get new JetBlue cards and hitting the $1,000 reward threshold by paying for tuition in August.

But first, will give your link a read. Thanks for posting.

Chris Pascale

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #2 on: June 27, 2020, 10:55:26 PM »
Checking out your site just a little, I like it. Your 7 months of travel in the Nissan van sounds like you had an awesome time.

steevven1

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #3 on: June 27, 2020, 11:01:42 PM »
Checking out your site just a little, I like it. Your 7 months of travel in the Nissan van sounds like you had an awesome time.

Unquestionably one of the highlights of our lives so far. Glad you're enjoying the site :-)

Car Jack

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #4 on: June 29, 2020, 09:48:10 AM »
Great start.  Now put those cards to work on a perpetual basis.  First, the profitable one.  See the thread down from yours on tradeline sales?  Go learn about that, send a PM to Joe (arebelspy) and get those cards that qualify in with the old company.  Make yourself a spread sheet and throw $3 every month on the cards you've sold in Amazon gift card reloads.

Next, take all your cards and look up "low balance forgiveness".  You can start with their list or you can put 99 cents on every card that doesn't have a tradeline sale on it.  Of course, set up every card for automatic payment.  After the next bill comes around for each card, see what cards fogive 99 cents.  Hint....Wells Fargo and Discover forgive $1.99 a month.

Being organized helps.  If in doubt on a tradeline, just throw $3 on there.  You don't want a "did not post" note in your listing.  They will occur now and then without any reason you can figure out, but you don't want to miss because you forgot to put a few dollars on it to report to the credit agencies.

steevven1

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #5 on: June 29, 2020, 02:09:12 PM »
Great start.  Now put those cards to work on a perpetual basis.  First, the profitable one.  See the thread down from yours on tradeline sales?  Go learn about that, send a PM to Joe (arebelspy) and get those cards that qualify in with the old company.  Make yourself a spread sheet and throw $3 every month on the cards you've sold in Amazon gift card reloads.

Next, take all your cards and look up "low balance forgiveness".  You can start with their list or you can put 99 cents on every card that doesn't have a tradeline sale on it.  Of course, set up every card for automatic payment.  After the next bill comes around for each card, see what cards fogive 99 cents.  Hint....Wells Fargo and Discover forgive $1.99 a month.

Being organized helps.  If in doubt on a tradeline, just throw $3 on there.  You don't want a "did not post" note in your listing.  They will occur now and then without any reason you can figure out, but you don't want to miss because you forgot to put a few dollars on it to report to the credit agencies.

I know so little about tradelines that it's as though you're speaking a foreign language. But it sounds like something I probably need to learn more about!

charis

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #6 on: June 29, 2020, 02:30:11 PM »
Posting to follow

ducky19

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #7 on: June 30, 2020, 09:58:58 AM »
Great start.  Now put those cards to work on a perpetual basis.  First, the profitable one.  See the thread down from yours on tradeline sales?  Go learn about that, send a PM to Joe (arebelspy) and get those cards that qualify in with the old company.  Make yourself a spread sheet and throw $3 every month on the cards you've sold in Amazon gift card reloads.

Next, take all your cards and look up "low balance forgiveness".  You can start with their list or you can put 99 cents on every card that doesn't have a tradeline sale on it.  Of course, set up every card for automatic payment.  After the next bill comes around for each card, see what cards fogive 99 cents.  Hint....Wells Fargo and Discover forgive $1.99 a month.

Being organized helps.  If in doubt on a tradeline, just throw $3 on there.  You don't want a "did not post" note in your listing.  They will occur now and then without any reason you can figure out, but you don't want to miss because you forgot to put a few dollars on it to report to the credit agencies.

I know so little about tradelines that it's as though you're speaking a foreign language. But it sounds like something I probably need to learn more about!

Like a fool, I didn't track the rewards that I've earned over time since starting cc churning, but I would guess that I'm right there with you in the $20-30k range - I couldn't tell you the last time we actually paid for a flight or hotel room! But yes, you really need to start putting those cards to work in tradeline sales - I've made over $15k in the past three years selling tradelines, and it takes so little time / effort.

charis

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #8 on: June 30, 2020, 12:03:41 PM »
We went hard for about 5 years, but then started getting shut out of good bonuses by having too many new accounts in recent years and gave up chasing rewards.

Chris Pascale

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #9 on: July 05, 2020, 12:08:39 PM »
We went hard for about 5 years, but then started getting shut out of good bonuses by having too many new accounts in recent years and gave up chasing rewards.

Do you have any advice from your experience, or do you think it's good to just lay low for a year or two?

Do you mind sharing your results? Roughly speaking, of course.

charis

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #10 on: July 05, 2020, 03:45:32 PM »
We went hard for about 5 years, but then started getting shut out of good bonuses by having too many new accounts in recent years and gave up chasing rewards.

Do you have any advice from your experience, or do you think it's good to just lay low for a year or two?

Do you mind sharing your results? Roughly speaking, of course.

I can't give any advice.  We are currently shut out of the best bonus due to number of new accounts.  I don't know whether lying low for a couple of years will help, but I can let you know in 1.5 years.

MasterStache

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #11 on: July 09, 2020, 11:13:51 AM »
We went hard for about 5 years, but then started getting shut out of good bonuses by having too many new accounts in recent years and gave up chasing rewards.

Do you have any advice from your experience, or do you think it's good to just lay low for a year or two?

Do you mind sharing your results? Roughly speaking, of course.

I can't give any advice.  We are currently shut out of the best bonus due to number of new accounts.  I don't know whether lying low for a couple of years will help, but I can let you know in 1.5 years.

Credit is getting even tougher to come by with the pandemic. We went pretty hard for a few years when we first started. The last 1.5-2 years we've opened cards sporadically and mostly business cards since they don't count against your personal report. We got back under 5/24 and went crazy with Chase cards right before the shut down. Laying low again for a few months before we try to open some more. 

Chris Pascale

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #12 on: July 13, 2020, 10:59:54 PM »
We went hard for about 5 years, but then started getting shut out of good bonuses by having too many new accounts in recent years and gave up chasing rewards.

Do you have any advice from your experience, or do you think it's good to just lay low for a year or two?

Do you mind sharing your results? Roughly speaking, of course.

I can't give any advice.  We are currently shut out of the best bonus due to number of new accounts.  I don't know whether lying low for a couple of years will help, but I can let you know in 1.5 years.

Credit is getting even tougher to come by with the pandemic. We went pretty hard for a few years when we first started. The last 1.5-2 years we've opened cards sporadically and mostly business cards since they don't count against your personal report. We got back under 5/24 and went crazy with Chase cards right before the shut down. Laying low again for a few months before we try to open some more.

Saw this recently. I cancelled my old JetBlue Business card and then applied for another. They said they'd give it to me if I'd swap over $10k of the limit on a JetBlue regular card with a limit of $35k.

Valley of Plenty

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Re: 40 Credit Cards; $20,000
« Reply #13 on: July 14, 2020, 12:02:58 AM »
Following to keep an eye on this discussion. I only recently learned about the usefulness of credit cards for earning rewards. I know a little bit about travel hacking (opened the Sapphire Preferred and got the bonus a few months ago), but I'm largely unfamiliar with how to effectively "churn" for rewards.

Tradelines sound intriguing tool; I hadn't even heard of that term before now.