April 14, 2025 • 38 mins
GO SOMEWHERE - Colin Stroud – Travel expert and advisor on how to best use your
credit card points and airline miles Colin Stroud joins the AMR Team for a highly
informative and entertaining travel related episode. In this episode you will learn more
about why flexible bank cards are a favorite, should you use one credit card or many
cards to earn the most benefits, should you “buy points,” and what are arbitrage
opportunities? Chris and Kristen Boyd dig into these issues and more. You won’t want
to miss this episode if you are looking for money-saving tactics using your miles and
points!
To learn more about Colin Stroud, please visit his website:
https://www.gosomewhere.world/
For more information or to reach TEAM AMR, click the following link:
https://www.wealthenhancement.com/s/advisor-teams/amr
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Welcome to Something More with Chris Boyd.
Chris Boyd is a certified financial planner, practitioner,
and senior vice president and financial advisor at
Wealth Enhancement Group, one of the nation's largest
registered investment advisors.
We call it Something More because we'd like
to talk not only about those important dollar
and cents issues, but also the quality of
life issues that make the money matters matter.
(00:22):
Here he is, your fulfillment facilitator, your partner
in prosperity, advising clients on Cape Cod and
across the country.
Here's your host, Jay Christopher Boyd.
Welcome, everybody.
I'm Chris Boyd.
I'm here with a full team of people.
We're all excited for our next guest.
I'm joined, of course, with Jeff Perry, our
(00:42):
regular co-host here, as well as Ross
Ball is with us, and Kristen Boyd, all
of us from Wealth Enhancement, the AMR team.
Thanks all of you for being here.
Kristen is a rarity on our show, but
she loves to travel, and who doesn't love
to travel?
And that's what our topic is about, go
somewhere, as our guest has coined the phrase.
(01:05):
And so our guest is Colin Strout.
Colin, thank you so much for being with
us.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
I'm super excited to talk travel, everyone's favorite
subject.
Everyone's favorite.
Well, Kristen's especially, which is why I asked
her to join us.
Kristen, start us off talking about why is
this the topic of choice?
Hi, Colin.
(01:26):
Really excited to hear what you have to
say.
When I turned 50, I declared it my
decade of travel.
I am very much interested in going somewhere,
quote your website, so I would love to
hear any tricks and tips that you could
offer to get me to all the places.
And who doesn't love to go?
(01:47):
You're all about Europe.
I do believe Europe is magical for sure,
but I am certainly open.
My life goal is to hit the seven
continents.
So any guidance to get me there at
a lesser cost would be fabulous.
Yeah, let's do it.
So Colin, tell us a little bit about
your services, your website, your tips and tricks.
(02:10):
Yeah, all the tips and tricks.
Yeah, for sure.
Well, just to start, kind of general, I
mean, I got into credit card points the
same way that a lot of people do,
which is like, travel just feels kind of
expensive.
I don't quite know how to afford that.
And I was recently graduated from college, didn't
have much money, new baby.
I was like, oh, this, I don't know
how I'm going to go anywhere.
(02:31):
And so it just kind of went down
that rabbit hole.
And then I realized as I kind of
started optimizing myself, so many people don't get
this at all, or think they get it.
And there's a whole nother level.
There's a whole deeper layer of how this
credit card points and travel rewards stuff works.
And so I just kind of started sharing
about it online on LinkedIn.
And some people liked it.
(02:52):
And, and then I was like, I wonder,
you know, I'm helping people save so much
money here, maybe I could charge them to
help.
And that's kind of how my business GoSomeWhere
started.
And so it's really just an education business.
It's a consulting business.
So people pay my consulting fee to get
on a call with me and for me
to talk to them for me to teach
them how this stuff works, help them build
a credit card strategy.
(03:13):
And then I also do trip planning.
So someone might come to me with 500
,000 American Express points, you'd be shocked how
many people have way more than that.
Just this morning, I had three people message
me with over a million points.
So that may not be any of our
listeners.
But there are people all over the place,
who are just sitting on these points.
They might be business owners, or what I
(03:35):
see a lot there.
They're literally just points hoarders.
They've been had they had the card since
2005.
And they haven't touched it.
And it's kind of funny that people just
don't use them because they don't understand them.
So that's my goal is like, hey, let
me help people understand how this point stuff
works.
It's confusing.
Intentionally, you know, these banks do not do
not make it easy to figure this stuff
(03:57):
out.
But I think for most people, just in
a little bit of time, I can, I
can, I can really make it easy for
them.
And like I said, I do the trip
planning.
So I'll just kind of do all the
work for someone and I'll, they'll get on
a call and I'll say, click this, click
this, click this and, and help them book
something get real easy.
There's a million things we could talk about.
But that's kind of like the general, how
I'm here, why I'm here, how I got
started in this.
(04:17):
And I really, really enjoy I've got some
really unlocked some crazy trips for people, which
is super gratifying for me.
Well, we're financial planners.
And of course, people love to travel as
one of their big life objectives.
So this is I think, right on plan,
you wanted to say something.
I was going to ask, do you recommend
having being dedicated to one particular card, spreading
(04:40):
it around?
Like, for example, we have, you know, our
Amex, which is connected to Delta, we have
a JetBlue card, we have a Hilton card.
And when we go to pay for something,
we go, well, which one should we use?
Well, we haven't used the Hilton in a
while.
And you got that other one.
The Chase one, the Sapphire one.
So do you recommend being loyal to one
card or, or spreading it out?
(05:03):
You know?
Yeah, that's, it's so case by case, that
can be really hard.
Like, what I think I've realized that some
of these programs or cards are just really
not that good.
You kind of have to look into it
and study it to see which ones are.
But what I've noticed is that if you're
trying to hyper optimize any of these programs,
whether it's Hilton, JetBlue, fill in the blank,
you can like, you know, there's, there's an
(05:24):
opportunity with Hilton, for example, when you get
their Aspire card, that really expensive one they
have, you can earn, you can be earning
34 points per dollar at Hilton properties, because
you get this diamond status bonus plus the
14 points per dollar you get, you just
having the card.
So there's all kinds of ways like that's
just a fun example of like, 34 points
per dollar spent is very good for someone
(05:45):
who travels at Hilton a lot.
But for some people like me, I'm not
traveling for business.
So having that card focusing on Hilton is
pretty irrelevant, because I don't have a good
way of earning.
For most people.
And I think this is a, I get
this is a, this is like one of
my biggest messages.
For most people, I think these flexible currency
cards make the most sense.
(06:07):
When I say that, I mean, like you
guys mentioned that Chase Sapphire preferred, you're not
earning Hilton points with that card, you're not
earning JetBlue miles or whatever they call them,
you're earning Chase ultimate rewards points.
Or for example, the Amex gold card, you're
earning Amex membership rewards points or Capital One,
you're earning Capital One venture miles.
(06:27):
These are the proprietary currencies of the banks.
And it sounds like why would I want?
Like, what do I do with the Chase
points that's not tied to the airline or
hotel I want?
Well, there's two ways to use them.
One, there's a travel portal that looks just
like Expedia or hotels.com or any kind
of these any one of these third party
agencies.
And you can book travel through there, the
(06:49):
value is okay.
But where things get really crazy, and if
anyone's, you know, dove into some points and
miles blogs and YouTube videos, and you know,
you see stuff on Instagram or whatever, or
people like me talking about this stuff, the
really crazy unlock is going to be having
a bunch of bank points, like again, flexible
bank points like that Chase card you guys
(07:10):
have, or lots of people have that car
Chase points, and then transferring them to one
of maybe 15 to 18 different airline or
hotel programs they have.
And what happens sometimes not every time is
there's this, there's this arbitrage opportunity, where the
cash price of the product, a flight or
(07:30):
hotel could be, let's say $1,000.
But for whatever reason, the points price could
be 20 or 30,000 points.
So when you hear those numbers, think 200
or 300 bucks worth of points for a
$1,000 product.
I'll just say this, like, there's a lot
of that can get complicated to understand.
But like, all you all people should know
(07:51):
is that is possible.
And people like me and my clients are
getting deals like that every single day.
So that's possible, then we really would not
want to settle for, let's say, Delta SkyMiles,
where you'll never get something like that with
Delta SkyMiles, unless there's kind of a, I
guess you shouldn't say never there's there's chances,
but very rarely, with Delta, for example, you'll
(08:12):
get that.
Why?
Because the points, Delta SkyMiles are dynamically priced.
So as the cash price goes up, the
points price goes up.
We want to try and find opportunities, programs,
things where the cash price can go all
over the place up down, but the points
price might stay the same.
For example, programs that price based on distance,
(08:33):
not on the cash price.
So if we if we find stuff like
that, there's these arbitrage opportunities where the points
priced, I mean, the cash price can be
way, way crazy high, like $5,000 for
a business class flight.
But the points price, I'm not kidding, could
be 70,000.700 bucks worth of points
for a $5,000 flight.
(08:54):
That is 100% a real thing that
people get.
And I think when I realized I was
like, Oh my gosh, this is crazy.
So the easiest way to unlock all that
is going to be is going to be
to start building up flexible bank points.
It works great.
Amex, Capital One, Chase would probably be my
favorite.
Citi and Wells Fargo also have programs.
I just don't find them as compelling.
(09:16):
But yeah, I mean, you can, you know,
you can go spend hours talking about like,
okay, which car, you know, Amex has these,
Chase has these, which one makes more sense
for me, you'd have to kind of, you
know, assess what are your travel interests?
How do you spend your money?
Do you spend a bunch of money on
dining?
No, you don't spend any money on dining.
Do you have seven kids and spend a
bunch of money on groceries, other cards might,
(09:36):
you know, make sense for different things.
That's something to look into.
And I can share with you guys to
put in the show notes.
I do have a choosing a travel credit
card free guide that I kind of have
seven questions to ask before choosing your next
travel credit card.
So hopefully that can help.
Hopefully that answers the question there.
It's a, there's a lot there, but it's,
it's really hard to go wrong earning these
(09:58):
flexible points.
Cause if you're stuck with JetBlue and JetBlue
is awesome, but like, that's all you have.
That's not ideal.
Chase transfers at a one-to-one ratio
to JetBlue.
So why would I only get JetBlue miles?
If I could earn chase points, maybe I
could literally be earning more points per dollar
spent with my chase car than with JetBlue.
(10:19):
And if I want to fly JetBlue, I'll
just send it over to JetBlue, but I
can also send those points to United.
I can also send them to Southwest.
I can also send them to Marriott and
IHG and Hyatt and all these different brands.
It's really, really nice to have those flexible
currency.
Very interesting.
How do you suggest maxing?
You talk about people having million, a million
points.
(10:39):
How do you suggest maximizing?
I mean, I, I, I pay my credit
cards every month, but I do, I have
started just charging everything, you know, putting everything
through my chase card, my groceries, my clothing,
whatever I buy.
So how else could I maximize my points?
On the earning side, you're saying?
(11:00):
Yes.
Yeah.
So there's, well, I guess I could say
two things.
There's the maximizing on the earning side and
on the redemption side.
For normal people, I'll say normal, all normal
people, but I'd say non-normal people are
people who spend $200,000 a month on
their business credit card.
I'm now trying to talk to those people.
That's part of my business model is kind
(11:20):
of going after those people, but also part
of my business model is just helping the
masses learn.
And so that's, so I won't talk to
the people who spend $200,000 a month.
If that's you, we should talk individually.
You're in a whole different category and world
there.
For a normal person, let's say you have
a monthly credit card budget and you spend
on the credit card, maybe four to 8
,000 a month.
You're just kind of a normal middle-class
(11:41):
person.
So with, with that, there's going to be
a bunch of things you can do.
So one, if you want to get, to
get a little complicated, you can get a
bunch of different credit cards for different things.
For example, your Chase card earns three points
per dollar on dining.
Awesome.
But it earns one point per dollar on
pretty much everything else.
(12:02):
So if you picked up, for example, the
Amex gold card, that earns 4X on groceries.
So you just seriously, you know, four times
how much you're earning on groceries, because if
you're spending that Chase card, you're getting one
point per dollar.
So you can do that game and have
like five credit cards for the different categories
you're spending.
I'll say for a lot of people, that
just becomes too much in their head and
(12:23):
they don't like it.
But if you want to hyper optimize, then
yes, that would be a way to do
it.
There's other things that a lot of people
aren't aware of inside of your bank.
So if you log into Chase right now
and look at your bank, there's these different
offers in their shopping portals.
So sometimes you'll see stuff like, excuse me,
earn 7X points per dollar at Home Depot.
(12:47):
And it just shows up in the shopping
portal.
And you guys are about to go buy
a new fridge and dishwasher for your kitchen.
So instead of earning one point per dollar,
because you activated the shopping portal code or
whatever it is, you might earn seven points
per dollar on those $2,000 or maybe
more.
I don't even know how much fridge and
dishwasher costs, but you might earn more, like
(13:08):
seven times more points by using those shopping
portals.
So that's really popular.
Rakuten is a very, very popular shopping portal
that actually allows you to earn Amex points
instead of cash back.
It doesn't work with Chase or any of
the other banks, but Rakuten, if you want
to Google something, look up earning Amex points
with Rakuten.
There's a whole world there that you can
(13:29):
earn a ton of points because you basically
just get these spending multipliers on stuff you're
already buying, like your new dishwasher or whatever.
So there's a lot there.
Another great thing to earn more points would
be referrals.
So Chase lets you earn about, I think
100,000 points per year in referral bonuses
to your friends and family.
(13:50):
So if you are taking cool trips, it's
really easy to say, hey, you guys, you
should get this card like me and do
this.
And so I've earned a lot of points
that way.
But I'll say for a lot of people,
if you're just a normal person spending, I'll
just say $70,000 a year, there is
a limit.
It's not you can earn.
You can't earn a million points a year
doing that.
(14:10):
I'm not going to sugar coat it and
say you can.
So where the real magic comes is on
the redemption side, not the earning side.
By redemption side, I mean, how do I
use these points?
Most of the time, your points have a
fixed value of one penny, one cent per
point.
So if you earn 100,000 points a
year, awesome.
That's $1,000 in travel.
(14:31):
Great.
There are ways, though, to get $5,000
in travel from those 100,000 points.
Most people are not getting that.
So that's really the gap between you doing
that is simply a little bit of education.
And that's really what I try to help
people with.
And so what it is, is understanding how
to transfer points to partners and finding these
(14:52):
deals where you might get $5,000 worth
of travel from 100,000 points.
Again, most people are getting $1,000 of
travel from 100,000 points.
That's the potential.
And it's out there.
So just to give you one practical example,
so people's heads aren't spending too much.
I just went to the Hyatt Regency Coconut
(15:13):
Point.
It's a really beautiful hotel right outside of
in Bonita Springs, Florida.
It's not on the beach, but they've got
a little private boat that takes you there,
which is kind of awesome.
So that hotel, because it was spring break,
I just got back like two weeks ago,
was priced at $1,200 per night.
Very expensive.
Is that actually worth that much money?
(15:34):
I don't know.
People were paying it because it was sold
out.
So it's priced really high.
I think typically it's priced more like $700,
$900, $600.
Anyway, but whatever the case, very nice hotel.
I can't afford $700 a night anyway.
A lot of people cannot.
The points price with World of Hyatt for
that $1,200 a night hotel was 21
(15:55):
,000 points per night.
Okay?
So when you hear that number, think $210
worth of points for a $1,200 night
hotel.
So if you stay five nights there, the
math is really, really good.
That's the spread.
That's the arbitrage we're looking for.
That was a little bit of an outlandish
example, but it's one I've booked.
I've got receipts.
I've posted multiple things, like showing my exact
(16:16):
receipts of this.
It's a hundred percent real.
I know people doing stuff like this and
more every day.
And so that's what we want.
Okay.
The question to a lot of people is,
well, how did you earn World of Hyatt
points?
Do I have to have the World of
Hyatt credit card?
No, no, no, no.
I have Chase points and Chase transfers in
a one-to-one ratio to World of
Hyatt.
So had I tried to book that to
(16:37):
the Chase travel portal, because it's $1,200
a night, it would be a hundred thousand
points per night.
But I transferred the points over to World
of Hyatt.
And World of Hyatt just has a really,
really good program.
There are many good programs.
World of Hyatt's one of my favorite.
And they just happened for that night to
be charging 21,000 points per night.
(16:58):
So that's what the potential is.
And that's where for the normal people, the
money's going to be made on the redemption.
The earning has diminishing returns because it takes
a lot of time and it's confusing and
it's annoying.
You can optimize, but for most people, they're
going to win easier on the redemption side.
(17:19):
Hope that makes sense.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Very interesting.
So for my Hilton card, every once in
a while, I get an offer to buy
points.
Oh yeah.
Is that worth doing?
That's a great question.
That's super common.
Yeah.
The thing I tell, always tell people is
you would only want to buy points when
you have a redemption in mind and you
(17:41):
can make a spread.
So it's all about the math.
So I mentioned cents per point.
If anyone is confused about that, go ahead
and Google right now as you're listening, cents
per point calculator.
What that is, there's all these online calculators.
It's a way to measure the value of
your points.
So if I spend a hundred thousand points
on a $1,000 flight, I'm getting one
(18:03):
cent per point.
Hopefully that makes sense.
If I spend 50,000 points on a
$1,000 flight, I'm getting two cents per
point.
That's what we want is two cents or
better or something like that.
So let's say for Hilton, Hilton is running
a promotion right now.
You can buy points for about 0.5
cents per point.
It's not exactly that.
(18:24):
I think it's about that.
So that's awesome.
So you're buying at 0.5 cents per
point.
So the question is, is you get that
email, should I buy points?
Well, can I redeem my points for more
than that?
If I can't, then it would be crazy
to buy points because I could just pay
cash and get a better deal.
But here's an example, Los Cabos.
So the Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos, they say
(18:46):
it's one of the best resorts in Mexico.
I haven't personally been.
I know a ton of people who have.
A cool thing about that resort is every
single room, even the standard rooms have like
a plunge pool, like one of those little
private pools in your room.
So this is a very expensive place.
You can easily though get about 1.5
cents per point from your Hilton points at
that hotel.
(19:07):
So if that's the case and I got
one tab that has buy points for 0
.5 cents per point on my computer, the
other tab, it's the Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos
where I can do the math and clearly
see I'd be getting 1.5 cents per
point.
It's a no brainer.
Of course, you should buy points and then
use them at that hotel because that math
(19:28):
is really, really good.
There's a huge gap there.
Other times though, you might buy points at
0.5 cents per point and then redeem
them for, I don't know, the Hilton Garden
Inn in Boston or whatever for 0.6
cents per point.
That's not that good.
You're not getting a spread.
So it's not really worth you spending that
(19:48):
money.
And I'd probably just pay cash for the
hotel.
So yeah.
So the key there is only buy points
with a redemption in mind.
You should have the redemption pulled up on
a tab, like looking at it, doing the
math, making sure the math all works because
otherwise you're probably making a mistake buying points
and you're just giving them too much money.
And that's probably more common.
When they send that offer along, it's like,
(20:09):
should I be doing that?
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I think there is a limit on
how many you can buy a year.
I actually can't remember off the top of
my head, but that's something else to keep
in mind.
You can't just buy 10 million points or
something if you have the money for that.
So there are limits.
What about, I have a quick question.
What about tracking the different points that you
get?
I don't get a lot of points from
(20:30):
all the different airlines I have memberships with
or even hotels, but do you, like, I
assume if you have multiple credit cards, it's
like a lot to track everything and what
do I exchange?
How do I manage that?
Do you have any tools that you use
to keep track or you kind of keep
it streamlined on one or two credit cards?
Yeah, I try and keep my stuff pretty
(20:51):
simple.
But yeah, I know there are people out
there, other people kind of like me who
sell and or share like free tracking, like
Excel sheets.
Honestly, for me, I've just kept it kind
of on in my head and in my
different accounts.
I keep things pretty simple.
I focus on Chase Points, Capital One Miles
and American Airlines.
I could explain that more if you guys
wanted to, but I always know exactly how
(21:13):
many I have because I also think about
this every day.
So I know I have it all in
my head and I don't have that many
credit cards.
But for a lot of people, it would
make a lot of sense.
If you're above maybe four credit cards and
you're starting to make this your hobby, get
more complex here.
Yes, you should have a spreadsheet.
In fact, I should really do this.
You should have a spreadsheet, you know, Google
Sheets, keep it simple.
It's just like what card, how many points,
(21:35):
you know, when is the monthly payment due?
You should have it on auto pay, but
just to make sure.
What's the annual fee?
All of that.
There are services.
There's a website called Award Wallet, and it
actually tracks all of that for you.
But I have to say I'm a little
disappointed with software.
It doesn't work with every card super well,
and I saw some glitches.
(21:55):
So I actually stopped using that, but there
are services out there or different websites that
kind of track it for you.
And then remembering kind of, maybe this is
a separate question.
I thought you asked this, but like how
do you use those points?
What are the best deals with them?
There's really not a great way to necessarily
write that down or track, and it's more
(22:17):
just the knowledge and education of, okay, chase
points go to Hyatt.
That's a really good deal.
I should look at Hyatt stuff.
American Airlines has great deals to get to
the Caribbean.
You know, I can remember that.
You know, there's not necessarily a resource that
has all of that written down in one
place because there's just so much information.
But really, you know, if you Google just
(22:38):
best uses of chase points or best uses
of American Airlines miles, there are a ton
of blogs.
There's so many things right there that can
jumpstart you on, okay, here's the points I
have.
What are even good uses of them?
So I hope that kind of answers your
question.
Yeah, definitely.
Thank you.
And I think it kind of speaks to
one of the concerns that as a financial
planner I have is that we don't necessarily
(23:00):
want to encourage people to have all these
multitude of credit cards that sometimes can create
debt, you know, create a challenge.
And as you were talking about that, the
difficulties of, you know, keep a track of
when ones do, and then if you don't
pay it on time, your interest rate changes,
and it can really create some challenges.
(23:21):
So would you elaborate on why you picked
those cards that you mentioned?
You said we wanted to elaborate on why
American Airlines or whatever it was, I'd be
interested to hear.
Yeah, I live in Fort Wayne, Indiana, which
is kind of a, I wish I lived
in like New York City and had access
to those airports, but I also don't want
to live in New York City.
It's a give and take.
(23:41):
But so I'm kind of, you know, I
can drive to Chicago, I can drive to
Detroit.
But as I looked at my travel, so
this is what I did.
And this is what I help clients do.
I looked at my travel interests.
And I look at my spending and I
see what makes sense.
So my travel interests are Europe and the
Caribbean, and maybe some cool domestic stuff.
I'm not trying to be fancy, I've got
two little kids, I just I'm not going
(24:02):
to go to Asia, it's too far.
South America, I just don't know very much
about and don't I know it's not super
comfortable, because I just don't know much about
it.
So like, those are my things.
I want to go to the Caribbean, I
want to go to Europe.
So I optimize for that completely.
Specifically, I want to take premium cabin flights,
so either premium economy or business class to
Europe, because it's a long way.
So when I look at that, and I
(24:23):
say, Okay, what do I want the best?
You know, how can I earn as many
points as possible, it's going to get me
to those places.
So I've got three strategies.
Capital One is what I put all my
personal spending on.
Why?
Because it's the only points and miles card
out there that earns two points per dollar
on every single purchase.
It's got all the transfer partners I need
(24:45):
to get really good deals to Europe.
Specifically, I'm not that far from Detroit, there's
a direct flight on Air France from Detroit
to Paris that you can connect anywhere else
in Europe, you can get that for about
80,000 points round trip, excuse me, yeah,
80 to 90,000 points round trip and
premium economy, that can easily be, you know,
(25:06):
a $3,000 flight.
So that's a good deal for premium economy,
which is like larger recliner seats, not first
class beds.
And so that's what I'm optimizing, I'm spending
capital one mile just I just just to
get premium cabin flights to Europe.
Then I'm earning chase points to for Hyatt
hotels, I can use chase points for other
stuff.
But I find Hyatt so compelling, that that's
(25:28):
really all I use chase points for.
I'm not spending any money though, on chase
cards.
Oh, go ahead.
Yeah, I was gonna say, what do you
spend on that?
Because you said you put everything personal expenses
to the other.
So with chase, my example is not the
most relatable to people.
But I've got 17,000 followers on LinkedIn,
and I have a lot of people reach
out.
So I send people my referral links.
(25:48):
So I've got a chase business card for
me, a personal card for me, a chase
business card for my wife.
So with those I have the potential to
earn three to 400,000 referral bonuses, and
referral points per year.
And I certainly have already like I earned
200,000 points in the last two months
doing that because again, I have an audience.
(26:08):
Does everyone else have an audience on LinkedIn
that they can get a bunch of referral
links to?
No.
So that's an unrelatable thing.
But I would say another thing people can
do, and I would never, I would never
publicly super advocate for credit card churning.
But there is a healthy level of kind
of, if you want to do this, if
you want to make it your hobby, if
you're going to be responsible, if you're going
to pay it off weekly, if you're going
(26:29):
to track it well, you can very easily
get one, you know, one new chase business
or personal card a year and earn a
lot of points, like 90,000 points from
an intro bonus doing that.
Again, that's not for most people.
If you want to make it your hobby,
if you want to be responsible, there are
lots of people who do that.
I would call it maybe light credit card
churning, which is totally allowed, totally good with
(26:52):
the banks, because again, one new credit card
a year is good with the banks.
Getting nine credit cards a year, which certain
people do, is not cool with the banks,
and people are finding ways to go around
them and be savvy.
I do not recommend it.
Now there's got to be some consequence on
your credit.
You probably have some annual fees to be
thinking about.
There's some things to figure out.
It gets very wild.
(27:13):
So if you just do about one per
year, I find that to be very manageable,
very reasonable, and it's not a big deal.
Again, for me, this is something I've spent
time on.
But yes, that's my strategy though, is earn
chase points any way I can for Hyatt
Hotels, earn Capital One miles to get these
great deals, premium cabin flights to Europe, and
then earn American Airlines miles, because they have
(27:34):
by far the best pricing to get from
specifically the Midwest, but really anywhere in America
to the Caribbean.
Actually, the Northeast has some good deals to
the Caribbean, so if you're there, but for
someone in the Midwest, the best way to
get to the Caribbean, no question, is going
to be American Airlines miles.
I can get to St. Kitts, which is
like a very small island that just went
(27:56):
there in January or February, 20,000 American
Airlines miles round trip.
Awesome.
Now, if you remember from the beginning of
the episode, I said, focus on flexible points.
Why would I be earning JetBlue miles from
my JetBlue credit card when I can just
transfer from chase?
That's what I said, right?
So if you think I'm contradicting myself here,
(28:16):
American Airlines happens to be the big asterisk
in all this, is no bank transfers to
American Airlines.
So the only way to earn American Airlines
miles is with either flying, on American, obviously,
or American Airlines credit cards.
So that's been a premium for me, is
trying to find ways to earn American miles,
because they're so valuable, especially to get from
(28:37):
the Midwest to the Caribbean.
And that would extend to the South, like
most of America, the South.
West Coast, it gets a little different, because
the times, the itineraries of the Caribbean are
so bad from like California, because it is
a long way.
Well, it sounds like to your point, it's
tailored to your preferences and interests, where you
want to go and so forth.
(28:58):
So tell a little bit more about some
of your services.
I know you have a Substack articles you
post, you have your website, gosomewhere.world, interesting
dot there, dot world.
They didn't have dot com available, and I
saw that, and I was like, that's actually
kind of topical.
I like that, yes.
I'm going to do that.
(29:19):
It fits, yeah.
And so, you know, and some of these
things, and you're, some of the items you
were mentioning, you have some resources.
So maybe just share a little bit, and
then perhaps how you work with people when
you do a one-on-one.
Sure, yeah, thanks.
I love, yeah, I can happily share that.
So yeah, and for any listeners, you know,
I think this stuff can sound a little
complicated, can give you a little bit of
(29:40):
a headache.
I think the one thing to take away
from what I'm saying here is, there are
ways to probably get two to 10x more
value from your points than you're currently getting.
The gap between you doing that is, where
you are now and you're doing that, is
a little bit of education.
All that information is available for free online
(30:01):
somewhere.
You can certainly find it, I certainly did.
I did not pay anyone to learn the
amount of things I know about points and
miles.
So I'll be the first to say, it's
all free, it's all out there, but it's
a lot of information.
Yeah, exactly.
So that's why I started this business though,
really, is that I like to take it
(30:22):
from 30 hours of random research on deep
Reddit threads to a 60-minute call with
me, where I can tell you not how
to get to Sri Lanka in first class.
That's probably not relevant to most people listening,
but to do exactly what you want to
do.
Most people, they have like three places.
For me, Europe, Caribbean, cool hotels in America.
Great, we can talk about that.
Maybe your thing, I just talked to a
(30:43):
guy, he's got family in Norway.
That's the only place they want to go.
They live in Atlanta, they want to go
to Norway.
Awesome.
So let's figure out a strategy all about
Norway.
What are the airlines to go there?
So that's what I'll do in my calls.
So my two main products, if anyone's interested,
would be my one-on-one consultations.
What we do is we get on, so
like you guys, we might get on and
say, okay, you got Hilton, you got JetBlue,
(31:04):
you got Chase.
Why do you have these?
How can we optimize?
Should we switch credit cards?
How can we get higher Hilton status?
How can we get status with JetBlue if
that's an airline that's important to you?
Okay.
We've found a strategy that makes sense.
That's simple.
That's repeatable.
Now we've earned a bunch of points.
Let's talk about ways we can optimize the
redemption of those points.
(31:26):
Where do you guys want to go?
You want to go to Florida.
Okay.
Here's the best times to go.
Here's the best hotels.
We'll get you the best deals in Florida,
all that.
So we talk through all that specific to
you.
On the trip planning side, it's very simple.
If you have about 250 to 300,000
points or more, you're probably a fit.
And what I do is you just reach
(31:46):
out via a form.
You pay a $40 deposit to me.
And you say, okay, I've got 500,000
points.
I want to go to Hawaii.
I've got four people in my family.
I don't want to figure this out.
So you give me all your information in
the form.
And then if I can help, which I
can't always help, I can help probably 80
% of the time, but sometimes stuff comes
up where there's just no deals and it's
(32:07):
just not possible.
Then I'll tell you how I can help.
And then you pay the rest of my
fee, which right now is $310.
So it's a $350 total fee for the
trip planning.
And the goal would be I would save
you minimum $1,000, but it's typically a
lot more.
Just yesterday, me and my, I've got a
guy working for me that helps me with
(32:28):
this.
We just helped someone book like a $25
,000 trip to the Maldives to one of
those overwater bungalows.
So he didn't do any work.
He filled out our form.
We used a bunch of points.
It was like 800,000 points he had,
but we got him this ridiculous trip.
He's flying Qatar business class there.
(32:49):
He's staying in the Hilton Conrad overwater bungalows.
So whether that's the kind of trip you
want to do or something simpler, I just
helped a family of three, you know, get
a nice Caribbean vacation.
They only did about 250,000 points out
of pocket, you know, $0 out of pocket
for cash, which is awesome.
And they're staying at this nice hotel in
St. Kitts, flying there direct from Florida.
(33:10):
So it doesn't have to be something crazy.
And both of these people, they're saving, you
know, it was over $3,000 for one
guy was like 20 plus.
So those are my two offerings there, the
trip planning services, and then the one-on
-one consultations.
That's really how I can help people.
I also do have an online course that's
helpful that I sell.
Again, that's on my website, gosomewhere.world. And
(33:34):
then I would have some free resources that
I can share in the show notes.
The one is called how to 2-10x
the value per point.
So it's really a much deeper breakdown of
what I've shared here.
I've shared, you can get 2-10x more
value for your points.
That guide would be, here's some ways to
do it.
Again, there's hundreds of ways to do it.
So you can't, everything can't be covered, but
(33:57):
that guide shows you some of that.
And then I also have one about choosing
a travel credit card.
So yeah, those are all the ways I
can help.
And again, if you never want to talk
to me or pay me a dollar, there
really is so many great resources out there.
I can't recommend enough the Daily Drop.
They're a really large company.
They've got a newsletter, they've got a YouTube
channel.
(34:17):
Everything is free.
You will never pay them for anything.
I love their stuff.
I've learned so much from them.
So again, the Daily Drop.
Highly recommend you subscribe to them and support
their stuff.
I've met a few people from there and
they're really good.
So that's probably everything I can think to
share.
That is great.
That is chock full of great information for
everybody.
Were you going to say something, Kristen?
No, I was just going to say, before
(34:37):
you go, what favorite trip that you've been
on?
That's a good question.
I think just in February, I went to
the Park Hyatt and St. Kitts.
St. Kitts is, I didn't even know it
was an island two years ago.
It's this beautiful island in the Caribbean.
(34:58):
Actually, it's St. Kitts and Nevis.
And Nevis is actually where Alexander Hamilton was
born.
So any fans of the musical, the line
is like, dropped in the middle of forgotten
spot in the Caribbean.
Well, we were on a beach looking at
that forgotten spot in the Caribbean, his little
island.
And they have tours of his family's house
and stuff like that.
So that's for any musical nerds out there,
(35:18):
people like the show.
That trip was amazing because the hotel was
$1,500 a night for the base room
and we even got upgraded.
And so I was sitting there just like,
it really was so mind blowing because I'm
like, I in a million years would have
not been able to afford this and would
never have paid for this.
And because I figured out how this point
stuff works, I got my flights covered to
the Caribbean.
(35:38):
This again, this is my two little kids
as well and my wife.
I've got my flights covered.
I'm at this ridiculous resort that I have
no business being here.
I'm 25 years old.
Everyone else there was at least 55 years
old.
Like there was no young people, probably because
no one could afford it.
You know what I mean?
And people didn't know about the points thing.
And so I just was felt so blessed
(35:59):
and so like amazed that this stuff is
possible.
So yeah, that was a fun trip.
Now I've been other places that are maybe
more adventurous or cool, but I think it
was like the level of luxury that I
experienced there.
I was just so mind blown.
Like this stuff is possible when you understand
points.
So I just felt I'm still kind of
in shock.
That was possible.
So that was an awesome trip and many
(36:21):
more to come.
I went crazy and I was able to
find business class flights to Switzerland for the
summer for me.
And I'm going to have a three-year
-old and a six-month-old in a
business class seat.
So that'll be some funny pictures that hopefully
go viral.
So I'll have to share this with you
guys and that's coming up here in August.
So that might become the favorite trip once
(36:41):
we get there.
Well, I love that you're sharing all this
great insight for our listeners and thank you
so much for being with us today and
all the great tips.
We're going to add some great content from
you in the show notes.
Check out gosomewhere.world. In addition, share our
(37:02):
episode with people you care about who you'll
want to be able to travel with you
perhaps along the way.
So Colin, thanks for being with us today.
Sure.
Thank you so much for having me.
I really appreciated it.
All right, everybody.
Until next time, keep striving for something more.
Thank you for listening to Something More with
(37:23):
Chris Boyd.
Call us for help, whether it's for financial
planning or portfolio management, insurance concerns, or those
quality of life issues that make the money
matters matter.
Whatever's on your mind, visit us at somethingmorewithchrisboyd
.com or call us toll free at 866
-771-8901 or send us your questions to
(37:45):
amr-info at wealthenhancement.com.
You're listening to Something More with Chris Boyd
Financial Talk Show.
Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services and Jay Christopher Boyd
provide investment advice on an individual basis to
clients only.
Proper advice depends on a complete analysis of
all facts and circumstances.
The information given on this program is general
financial comments and cannot be relied upon as
pertaining to your specific situation.
(38:07):
Wealth Enhancement Group cannot guarantee that using the
information from this show will generate profits or
ensure freedom from loss.
Listeners should consult their own financial advisors or
conduct their own due diligence before making any
financial decisions.
Welcome to Something More with Chris Boyd.
Chris Boyd is a certified financial planner, practitioner,
and senior vice president and financial advisor at
Wealth Enhancement Group, one of the nation's largest
registered investment advisors.
We call it Something More because we'd like
to talk not only about those important dollar
and cents issues, but also the quality of
life issues that make the money matters matter.
(00:22):
Here he is, your fulfillment facilitator, your partner
in prosperity, advising clients on Cape Cod and
across the country.
Here's your host, Jay Christopher Boyd.
Welcome, everybody.
I'm Chris Boyd.
I'm here with a full team of people.
We're all excited for our next guest.
I'm joined, of course, with Jeff Perry, our
(00:42):
regular co-host here, as well as Ross
Ball is with us, and Kristen Boyd, all
of us from Wealth Enhancement, the AMR team.
Thanks all of you for being here.
Kristen is a rarity on our show, but
she loves to travel, and who doesn't love
to travel?
And that's what our topic is about, go
somewhere, as our guest has coined the phrase.
(01:05):
And so our guest is Colin Strout.
Colin, thank you so much for being with
us.
Yeah, thanks for having me.
I'm super excited to talk travel, everyone's favorite
subject.
Everyone's favorite.
Well, Kristen's especially, which is why I asked
her to join us.
Kristen, start us off talking about why is
this the topic of choice?
Hi, Colin.
(01:26):
Really excited to hear what you have to
say.
When I turned 50, I declared it my
decade of travel.
I am very much interested in going somewhere,
quote your website, so I would love to
hear any tricks and tips that you could
offer to get me to all the places.
And who doesn't love to go?
(01:47):
You're all about Europe.
I do believe Europe is magical for sure,
but I am certainly open.
My life goal is to hit the seven
continents.
So any guidance to get me there at
a lesser cost would be fabulous.
Yeah, let's do it.
So Colin, tell us a little bit about
your services, your website, your tips and tricks.
(02:10):
Yeah, all the tips and tricks.
Yeah, for sure.
Well, just to start, kind of general, I
mean, I got into credit card points the
same way that a lot of people do,
which is like, travel just feels kind of
expensive.
I don't quite know how to afford that.
And I was recently graduated from college, didn't
have much money, new baby.
I was like, oh, this, I don't know
how I'm going to go anywhere.
(02:31):
And so it just kind of went down
that rabbit hole.
And then I realized as I kind of
started optimizing myself, so many people don't get
this at all, or think they get it.
And there's a whole nother level.
There's a whole deeper layer of how this
credit card points and travel rewards stuff works.
And so I just kind of started sharing
about it online on LinkedIn.
And some people liked it.
(02:52):
And, and then I was like, I wonder,
you know, I'm helping people save so much
money here, maybe I could charge them to
help.
And that's kind of how my business GoSomeWhere
started.
And so it's really just an education business.
It's a consulting business.
So people pay my consulting fee to get
on a call with me and for me
to talk to them for me to teach
them how this stuff works, help them build
a credit card strategy.
(03:13):
And then I also do trip planning.
So someone might come to me with 500
,000 American Express points, you'd be shocked how
many people have way more than that.
Just this morning, I had three people message
me with over a million points.
So that may not be any of our
listeners.
But there are people all over the place,
who are just sitting on these points.
They might be business owners, or what I
(03:35):
see a lot there.
They're literally just points hoarders.
They've been had they had the card since
2005.
And they haven't touched it.
And it's kind of funny that people just
don't use them because they don't understand them.
So that's my goal is like, hey, let
me help people understand how this point stuff
works.
It's confusing.
Intentionally, you know, these banks do not do
not make it easy to figure this stuff
(03:57):
out.
But I think for most people, just in
a little bit of time, I can, I
can, I can really make it easy for
them.
And like I said, I do the trip
planning.
So I'll just kind of do all the
work for someone and I'll, they'll get on
a call and I'll say, click this, click
this, click this and, and help them book
something get real easy.
There's a million things we could talk about.
But that's kind of like the general, how
I'm here, why I'm here, how I got
started in this.
(04:17):
And I really, really enjoy I've got some
really unlocked some crazy trips for people, which
is super gratifying for me.
Well, we're financial planners.
And of course, people love to travel as
one of their big life objectives.
So this is I think, right on plan,
you wanted to say something.
I was going to ask, do you recommend
having being dedicated to one particular card, spreading
(04:40):
it around?
Like, for example, we have, you know, our
Amex, which is connected to Delta, we have
a JetBlue card, we have a Hilton card.
And when we go to pay for something,
we go, well, which one should we use?
Well, we haven't used the Hilton in a
while.
And you got that other one.
The Chase one, the Sapphire one.
So do you recommend being loyal to one
card or, or spreading it out?
(05:03):
You know?
Yeah, that's, it's so case by case, that
can be really hard.
Like, what I think I've realized that some
of these programs or cards are just really
not that good.
You kind of have to look into it
and study it to see which ones are.
But what I've noticed is that if you're
trying to hyper optimize any of these programs,
whether it's Hilton, JetBlue, fill in the blank,
you can like, you know, there's, there's an
(05:24):
opportunity with Hilton, for example, when you get
their Aspire card, that really expensive one they
have, you can earn, you can be earning
34 points per dollar at Hilton properties, because
you get this diamond status bonus plus the
14 points per dollar you get, you just
having the card.
So there's all kinds of ways like that's
just a fun example of like, 34 points
per dollar spent is very good for someone
(05:45):
who travels at Hilton a lot.
But for some people like me, I'm not
traveling for business.
So having that card focusing on Hilton is
pretty irrelevant, because I don't have a good
way of earning.
For most people.
And I think this is a, I get
this is a, this is like one of
my biggest messages.
For most people, I think these flexible currency
cards make the most sense.
(06:07):
When I say that, I mean, like you
guys mentioned that Chase Sapphire preferred, you're not
earning Hilton points with that card, you're not
earning JetBlue miles or whatever they call them,
you're earning Chase ultimate rewards points.
Or for example, the Amex gold card, you're
earning Amex membership rewards points or Capital One,
you're earning Capital One venture miles.
(06:27):
These are the proprietary currencies of the banks.
And it sounds like why would I want?
Like, what do I do with the Chase
points that's not tied to the airline or
hotel I want?
Well, there's two ways to use them.
One, there's a travel portal that looks just
like Expedia or hotels.com or any kind
of these any one of these third party
agencies.
And you can book travel through there, the
(06:49):
value is okay.
But where things get really crazy, and if
anyone's, you know, dove into some points and
miles blogs and YouTube videos, and you know,
you see stuff on Instagram or whatever, or
people like me talking about this stuff, the
really crazy unlock is going to be having
a bunch of bank points, like again, flexible
bank points like that Chase card you guys
(07:10):
have, or lots of people have that car
Chase points, and then transferring them to one
of maybe 15 to 18 different airline or
hotel programs they have.
And what happens sometimes not every time is
there's this, there's this arbitrage opportunity, where the
cash price of the product, a flight or
(07:30):
hotel could be, let's say $1,000.
But for whatever reason, the points price could
be 20 or 30,000 points.
So when you hear those numbers, think 200
or 300 bucks worth of points for a
$1,000 product.
I'll just say this, like, there's a lot
of that can get complicated to understand.
But like, all you all people should know
(07:51):
is that is possible.
And people like me and my clients are
getting deals like that every single day.
So that's possible, then we really would not
want to settle for, let's say, Delta SkyMiles,
where you'll never get something like that with
Delta SkyMiles, unless there's kind of a, I
guess you shouldn't say never there's there's chances,
but very rarely, with Delta, for example, you'll
(08:12):
get that.
Why?
Because the points, Delta SkyMiles are dynamically priced.
So as the cash price goes up, the
points price goes up.
We want to try and find opportunities, programs,
things where the cash price can go all
over the place up down, but the points
price might stay the same.
For example, programs that price based on distance,
(08:33):
not on the cash price.
So if we if we find stuff like
that, there's these arbitrage opportunities where the points
priced, I mean, the cash price can be
way, way crazy high, like $5,000 for
a business class flight.
But the points price, I'm not kidding, could
be 70,000.700 bucks worth of points
for a $5,000 flight.
(08:54):
That is 100% a real thing that
people get.
And I think when I realized I was
like, Oh my gosh, this is crazy.
So the easiest way to unlock all that
is going to be is going to be
to start building up flexible bank points.
It works great.
Amex, Capital One, Chase would probably be my
favorite.
Citi and Wells Fargo also have programs.
I just don't find them as compelling.
(09:16):
But yeah, I mean, you can, you know,
you can go spend hours talking about like,
okay, which car, you know, Amex has these,
Chase has these, which one makes more sense
for me, you'd have to kind of, you
know, assess what are your travel interests?
How do you spend your money?
Do you spend a bunch of money on
dining?
No, you don't spend any money on dining.
Do you have seven kids and spend a
bunch of money on groceries, other cards might,
(09:36):
you know, make sense for different things.
That's something to look into.
And I can share with you guys to
put in the show notes.
I do have a choosing a travel credit
card free guide that I kind of have
seven questions to ask before choosing your next
travel credit card.
So hopefully that can help.
Hopefully that answers the question there.
It's a, there's a lot there, but it's,
it's really hard to go wrong earning these
(09:58):
flexible points.
Cause if you're stuck with JetBlue and JetBlue
is awesome, but like, that's all you have.
That's not ideal.
Chase transfers at a one-to-one ratio
to JetBlue.
So why would I only get JetBlue miles?
If I could earn chase points, maybe I
could literally be earning more points per dollar
spent with my chase car than with JetBlue.
(10:19):
And if I want to fly JetBlue, I'll
just send it over to JetBlue, but I
can also send those points to United.
I can also send them to Southwest.
I can also send them to Marriott and
IHG and Hyatt and all these different brands.
It's really, really nice to have those flexible
currency.
Very interesting.
How do you suggest maxing?
You talk about people having million, a million
points.
(10:39):
How do you suggest maximizing?
I mean, I, I, I pay my credit
cards every month, but I do, I have
started just charging everything, you know, putting everything
through my chase card, my groceries, my clothing,
whatever I buy.
So how else could I maximize my points?
On the earning side, you're saying?
(11:00):
Yes.
Yeah.
So there's, well, I guess I could say
two things.
There's the maximizing on the earning side and
on the redemption side.
For normal people, I'll say normal, all normal
people, but I'd say non-normal people are
people who spend $200,000 a month on
their business credit card.
I'm now trying to talk to those people.
That's part of my business model is kind
(11:20):
of going after those people, but also part
of my business model is just helping the
masses learn.
And so that's, so I won't talk to
the people who spend $200,000 a month.
If that's you, we should talk individually.
You're in a whole different category and world
there.
For a normal person, let's say you have
a monthly credit card budget and you spend
on the credit card, maybe four to 8
,000 a month.
You're just kind of a normal middle-class
(11:41):
person.
So with, with that, there's going to be
a bunch of things you can do.
So one, if you want to get, to
get a little complicated, you can get a
bunch of different credit cards for different things.
For example, your Chase card earns three points
per dollar on dining.
Awesome.
But it earns one point per dollar on
pretty much everything else.
(12:02):
So if you picked up, for example, the
Amex gold card, that earns 4X on groceries.
So you just seriously, you know, four times
how much you're earning on groceries, because if
you're spending that Chase card, you're getting one
point per dollar.
So you can do that game and have
like five credit cards for the different categories
you're spending.
I'll say for a lot of people, that
just becomes too much in their head and
(12:23):
they don't like it.
But if you want to hyper optimize, then
yes, that would be a way to do
it.
There's other things that a lot of people
aren't aware of inside of your bank.
So if you log into Chase right now
and look at your bank, there's these different
offers in their shopping portals.
So sometimes you'll see stuff like, excuse me,
earn 7X points per dollar at Home Depot.
(12:47):
And it just shows up in the shopping
portal.
And you guys are about to go buy
a new fridge and dishwasher for your kitchen.
So instead of earning one point per dollar,
because you activated the shopping portal code or
whatever it is, you might earn seven points
per dollar on those $2,000 or maybe
more.
I don't even know how much fridge and
dishwasher costs, but you might earn more, like
(13:08):
seven times more points by using those shopping
portals.
So that's really popular.
Rakuten is a very, very popular shopping portal
that actually allows you to earn Amex points
instead of cash back.
It doesn't work with Chase or any of
the other banks, but Rakuten, if you want
to Google something, look up earning Amex points
with Rakuten.
There's a whole world there that you can
(13:29):
earn a ton of points because you basically
just get these spending multipliers on stuff you're
already buying, like your new dishwasher or whatever.
So there's a lot there.
Another great thing to earn more points would
be referrals.
So Chase lets you earn about, I think
100,000 points per year in referral bonuses
to your friends and family.
(13:50):
So if you are taking cool trips, it's
really easy to say, hey, you guys, you
should get this card like me and do
this.
And so I've earned a lot of points
that way.
But I'll say for a lot of people,
if you're just a normal person spending, I'll
just say $70,000 a year, there is
a limit.
It's not you can earn.
You can't earn a million points a year
doing that.
(14:10):
I'm not going to sugar coat it and
say you can.
So where the real magic comes is on
the redemption side, not the earning side.
By redemption side, I mean, how do I
use these points?
Most of the time, your points have a
fixed value of one penny, one cent per
point.
So if you earn 100,000 points a
year, awesome.
That's $1,000 in travel.
(14:31):
Great.
There are ways, though, to get $5,000
in travel from those 100,000 points.
Most people are not getting that.
So that's really the gap between you doing
that is simply a little bit of education.
And that's really what I try to help
people with.
And so what it is, is understanding how
to transfer points to partners and finding these
(14:52):
deals where you might get $5,000 worth
of travel from 100,000 points.
Again, most people are getting $1,000 of
travel from 100,000 points.
That's the potential.
And it's out there.
So just to give you one practical example,
so people's heads aren't spending too much.
I just went to the Hyatt Regency Coconut
(15:13):
Point.
It's a really beautiful hotel right outside of
in Bonita Springs, Florida.
It's not on the beach, but they've got
a little private boat that takes you there,
which is kind of awesome.
So that hotel, because it was spring break,
I just got back like two weeks ago,
was priced at $1,200 per night.
Very expensive.
Is that actually worth that much money?
(15:34):
I don't know.
People were paying it because it was sold
out.
So it's priced really high.
I think typically it's priced more like $700,
$900, $600.
Anyway, but whatever the case, very nice hotel.
I can't afford $700 a night anyway.
A lot of people cannot.
The points price with World of Hyatt for
that $1,200 a night hotel was 21
(15:55):
,000 points per night.
Okay?
So when you hear that number, think $210
worth of points for a $1,200 night
hotel.
So if you stay five nights there, the
math is really, really good.
That's the spread.
That's the arbitrage we're looking for.
That was a little bit of an outlandish
example, but it's one I've booked.
I've got receipts.
I've posted multiple things, like showing my exact
(16:16):
receipts of this.
It's a hundred percent real.
I know people doing stuff like this and
more every day.
And so that's what we want.
Okay.
The question to a lot of people is,
well, how did you earn World of Hyatt
points?
Do I have to have the World of
Hyatt credit card?
No, no, no, no.
I have Chase points and Chase transfers in
a one-to-one ratio to World of
Hyatt.
So had I tried to book that to
(16:37):
the Chase travel portal, because it's $1,200
a night, it would be a hundred thousand
points per night.
But I transferred the points over to World
of Hyatt.
And World of Hyatt just has a really,
really good program.
There are many good programs.
World of Hyatt's one of my favorite.
And they just happened for that night to
be charging 21,000 points per night.
(16:58):
So that's what the potential is.
And that's where for the normal people, the
money's going to be made on the redemption.
The earning has diminishing returns because it takes
a lot of time and it's confusing and
it's annoying.
You can optimize, but for most people, they're
going to win easier on the redemption side.
(17:19):
Hope that makes sense.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Very interesting.
So for my Hilton card, every once in
a while, I get an offer to buy
points.
Oh yeah.
Is that worth doing?
That's a great question.
That's super common.
Yeah.
The thing I tell, always tell people is
you would only want to buy points when
you have a redemption in mind and you
(17:41):
can make a spread.
So it's all about the math.
So I mentioned cents per point.
If anyone is confused about that, go ahead
and Google right now as you're listening, cents
per point calculator.
What that is, there's all these online calculators.
It's a way to measure the value of
your points.
So if I spend a hundred thousand points
on a $1,000 flight, I'm getting one
(18:03):
cent per point.
Hopefully that makes sense.
If I spend 50,000 points on a
$1,000 flight, I'm getting two cents per
point.
That's what we want is two cents or
better or something like that.
So let's say for Hilton, Hilton is running
a promotion right now.
You can buy points for about 0.5
cents per point.
It's not exactly that.
(18:24):
I think it's about that.
So that's awesome.
So you're buying at 0.5 cents per
point.
So the question is, is you get that
email, should I buy points?
Well, can I redeem my points for more
than that?
If I can't, then it would be crazy
to buy points because I could just pay
cash and get a better deal.
But here's an example, Los Cabos.
So the Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos, they say
(18:46):
it's one of the best resorts in Mexico.
I haven't personally been.
I know a ton of people who have.
A cool thing about that resort is every
single room, even the standard rooms have like
a plunge pool, like one of those little
private pools in your room.
So this is a very expensive place.
You can easily though get about 1.5
cents per point from your Hilton points at
that hotel.
(19:07):
So if that's the case and I got
one tab that has buy points for 0
.5 cents per point on my computer, the
other tab, it's the Waldorf Astoria Los Cabos
where I can do the math and clearly
see I'd be getting 1.5 cents per
point.
It's a no brainer.
Of course, you should buy points and then
use them at that hotel because that math
(19:28):
is really, really good.
There's a huge gap there.
Other times though, you might buy points at
0.5 cents per point and then redeem
them for, I don't know, the Hilton Garden
Inn in Boston or whatever for 0.6
cents per point.
That's not that good.
You're not getting a spread.
So it's not really worth you spending that
(19:48):
money.
And I'd probably just pay cash for the
hotel.
So yeah.
So the key there is only buy points
with a redemption in mind.
You should have the redemption pulled up on
a tab, like looking at it, doing the
math, making sure the math all works because
otherwise you're probably making a mistake buying points
and you're just giving them too much money.
And that's probably more common.
When they send that offer along, it's like,
(20:09):
should I be doing that?
Yeah.
Yeah.
And I think there is a limit on
how many you can buy a year.
I actually can't remember off the top of
my head, but that's something else to keep
in mind.
You can't just buy 10 million points or
something if you have the money for that.
So there are limits.
What about, I have a quick question.
What about tracking the different points that you
get?
I don't get a lot of points from
(20:30):
all the different airlines I have memberships with
or even hotels, but do you, like, I
assume if you have multiple credit cards, it's
like a lot to track everything and what
do I exchange?
How do I manage that?
Do you have any tools that you use
to keep track or you kind of keep
it streamlined on one or two credit cards?
Yeah, I try and keep my stuff pretty
(20:51):
simple.
But yeah, I know there are people out
there, other people kind of like me who
sell and or share like free tracking, like
Excel sheets.
Honestly, for me, I've just kept it kind
of on in my head and in my
different accounts.
I keep things pretty simple.
I focus on Chase Points, Capital One Miles
and American Airlines.
I could explain that more if you guys
wanted to, but I always know exactly how
(21:13):
many I have because I also think about
this every day.
So I know I have it all in
my head and I don't have that many
credit cards.
But for a lot of people, it would
make a lot of sense.
If you're above maybe four credit cards and
you're starting to make this your hobby, get
more complex here.
Yes, you should have a spreadsheet.
In fact, I should really do this.
You should have a spreadsheet, you know, Google
Sheets, keep it simple.
It's just like what card, how many points,
(21:35):
you know, when is the monthly payment due?
You should have it on auto pay, but
just to make sure.
What's the annual fee?
All of that.
There are services.
There's a website called Award Wallet, and it
actually tracks all of that for you.
But I have to say I'm a little
disappointed with software.
It doesn't work with every card super well,
and I saw some glitches.
(21:55):
So I actually stopped using that, but there
are services out there or different websites that
kind of track it for you.
And then remembering kind of, maybe this is
a separate question.
I thought you asked this, but like how
do you use those points?
What are the best deals with them?
There's really not a great way to necessarily
write that down or track, and it's more
(22:17):
just the knowledge and education of, okay, chase
points go to Hyatt.
That's a really good deal.
I should look at Hyatt stuff.
American Airlines has great deals to get to
the Caribbean.
You know, I can remember that.
You know, there's not necessarily a resource that
has all of that written down in one
place because there's just so much information.
But really, you know, if you Google just
(22:38):
best uses of chase points or best uses
of American Airlines miles, there are a ton
of blogs.
There's so many things right there that can
jumpstart you on, okay, here's the points I
have.
What are even good uses of them?
So I hope that kind of answers your
question.
Yeah, definitely.
Thank you.
And I think it kind of speaks to
one of the concerns that as a financial
planner I have is that we don't necessarily
(23:00):
want to encourage people to have all these
multitude of credit cards that sometimes can create
debt, you know, create a challenge.
And as you were talking about that, the
difficulties of, you know, keep a track of
when ones do, and then if you don't
pay it on time, your interest rate changes,
and it can really create some challenges.
(23:21):
So would you elaborate on why you picked
those cards that you mentioned?
You said we wanted to elaborate on why
American Airlines or whatever it was, I'd be
interested to hear.
Yeah, I live in Fort Wayne, Indiana, which
is kind of a, I wish I lived
in like New York City and had access
to those airports, but I also don't want
to live in New York City.
It's a give and take.
(23:41):
But so I'm kind of, you know, I
can drive to Chicago, I can drive to
Detroit.
But as I looked at my travel, so
this is what I did.
And this is what I help clients do.
I looked at my travel interests.
And I look at my spending and I
see what makes sense.
So my travel interests are Europe and the
Caribbean, and maybe some cool domestic stuff.
I'm not trying to be fancy, I've got
two little kids, I just I'm not going
(24:02):
to go to Asia, it's too far.
South America, I just don't know very much
about and don't I know it's not super
comfortable, because I just don't know much about
it.
So like, those are my things.
I want to go to the Caribbean, I
want to go to Europe.
So I optimize for that completely.
Specifically, I want to take premium cabin flights,
so either premium economy or business class to
Europe, because it's a long way.
So when I look at that, and I
(24:23):
say, Okay, what do I want the best?
You know, how can I earn as many
points as possible, it's going to get me
to those places.
So I've got three strategies.
Capital One is what I put all my
personal spending on.
Why?
Because it's the only points and miles card
out there that earns two points per dollar
on every single purchase.
It's got all the transfer partners I need
(24:45):
to get really good deals to Europe.
Specifically, I'm not that far from Detroit, there's
a direct flight on Air France from Detroit
to Paris that you can connect anywhere else
in Europe, you can get that for about
80,000 points round trip, excuse me, yeah,
80 to 90,000 points round trip and
premium economy, that can easily be, you know,
(25:06):
a $3,000 flight.
So that's a good deal for premium economy,
which is like larger recliner seats, not first
class beds.
And so that's what I'm optimizing, I'm spending
capital one mile just I just just to
get premium cabin flights to Europe.
Then I'm earning chase points to for Hyatt
hotels, I can use chase points for other
stuff.
But I find Hyatt so compelling, that that's
(25:28):
really all I use chase points for.
I'm not spending any money though, on chase
cards.
Oh, go ahead.
Yeah, I was gonna say, what do you
spend on that?
Because you said you put everything personal expenses
to the other.
So with chase, my example is not the
most relatable to people.
But I've got 17,000 followers on LinkedIn,
and I have a lot of people reach
out.
So I send people my referral links.
(25:48):
So I've got a chase business card for
me, a personal card for me, a chase
business card for my wife.
So with those I have the potential to
earn three to 400,000 referral bonuses, and
referral points per year.
And I certainly have already like I earned
200,000 points in the last two months
doing that because again, I have an audience.
(26:08):
Does everyone else have an audience on LinkedIn
that they can get a bunch of referral
links to?
No.
So that's an unrelatable thing.
But I would say another thing people can
do, and I would never, I would never
publicly super advocate for credit card churning.
But there is a healthy level of kind
of, if you want to do this, if
you want to make it your hobby, if
you're going to be responsible, if you're going
to pay it off weekly, if you're going
(26:29):
to track it well, you can very easily
get one, you know, one new chase business
or personal card a year and earn a
lot of points, like 90,000 points from
an intro bonus doing that.
Again, that's not for most people.
If you want to make it your hobby,
if you want to be responsible, there are
lots of people who do that.
I would call it maybe light credit card
churning, which is totally allowed, totally good with
(26:52):
the banks, because again, one new credit card
a year is good with the banks.
Getting nine credit cards a year, which certain
people do, is not cool with the banks,
and people are finding ways to go around
them and be savvy.
I do not recommend it.
Now there's got to be some consequence on
your credit.
You probably have some annual fees to be
thinking about.
There's some things to figure out.
It gets very wild.
(27:13):
So if you just do about one per
year, I find that to be very manageable,
very reasonable, and it's not a big deal.
Again, for me, this is something I've spent
time on.
But yes, that's my strategy though, is earn
chase points any way I can for Hyatt
Hotels, earn Capital One miles to get these
great deals, premium cabin flights to Europe, and
then earn American Airlines miles, because they have
(27:34):
by far the best pricing to get from
specifically the Midwest, but really anywhere in America
to the Caribbean.
Actually, the Northeast has some good deals to
the Caribbean, so if you're there, but for
someone in the Midwest, the best way to
get to the Caribbean, no question, is going
to be American Airlines miles.
I can get to St. Kitts, which is
like a very small island that just went
(27:56):
there in January or February, 20,000 American
Airlines miles round trip.
Awesome.
Now, if you remember from the beginning of
the episode, I said, focus on flexible points.
Why would I be earning JetBlue miles from
my JetBlue credit card when I can just
transfer from chase?
That's what I said, right?
So if you think I'm contradicting myself here,
(28:16):
American Airlines happens to be the big asterisk
in all this, is no bank transfers to
American Airlines.
So the only way to earn American Airlines
miles is with either flying, on American, obviously,
or American Airlines credit cards.
So that's been a premium for me, is
trying to find ways to earn American miles,
because they're so valuable, especially to get from
(28:37):
the Midwest to the Caribbean.
And that would extend to the South, like
most of America, the South.
West Coast, it gets a little different, because
the times, the itineraries of the Caribbean are
so bad from like California, because it is
a long way.
Well, it sounds like to your point, it's
tailored to your preferences and interests, where you
want to go and so forth.
(28:58):
So tell a little bit more about some
of your services.
I know you have a Substack articles you
post, you have your website, gosomewhere.world, interesting
dot there, dot world.
They didn't have dot com available, and I
saw that, and I was like, that's actually
kind of topical.
I like that, yes.
I'm going to do that.
(29:19):
It fits, yeah.
And so, you know, and some of these
things, and you're, some of the items you
were mentioning, you have some resources.
So maybe just share a little bit, and
then perhaps how you work with people when
you do a one-on-one.
Sure, yeah, thanks.
I love, yeah, I can happily share that.
So yeah, and for any listeners, you know,
I think this stuff can sound a little
complicated, can give you a little bit of
(29:40):
a headache.
I think the one thing to take away
from what I'm saying here is, there are
ways to probably get two to 10x more
value from your points than you're currently getting.
The gap between you doing that is, where
you are now and you're doing that, is
a little bit of education.
All that information is available for free online
(30:01):
somewhere.
You can certainly find it, I certainly did.
I did not pay anyone to learn the
amount of things I know about points and
miles.
So I'll be the first to say, it's
all free, it's all out there, but it's
a lot of information.
Yeah, exactly.
So that's why I started this business though,
really, is that I like to take it
(30:22):
from 30 hours of random research on deep
Reddit threads to a 60-minute call with
me, where I can tell you not how
to get to Sri Lanka in first class.
That's probably not relevant to most people listening,
but to do exactly what you want to
do.
Most people, they have like three places.
For me, Europe, Caribbean, cool hotels in America.
Great, we can talk about that.
Maybe your thing, I just talked to a
(30:43):
guy, he's got family in Norway.
That's the only place they want to go.
They live in Atlanta, they want to go
to Norway.
Awesome.
So let's figure out a strategy all about
Norway.
What are the airlines to go there?
So that's what I'll do in my calls.
So my two main products, if anyone's interested,
would be my one-on-one consultations.
What we do is we get on, so
like you guys, we might get on and
say, okay, you got Hilton, you got JetBlue,
(31:04):
you got Chase.
Why do you have these?
How can we optimize?
Should we switch credit cards?
How can we get higher Hilton status?
How can we get status with JetBlue if
that's an airline that's important to you?
Okay.
We've found a strategy that makes sense.
That's simple.
That's repeatable.
Now we've earned a bunch of points.
Let's talk about ways we can optimize the
redemption of those points.
(31:26):
Where do you guys want to go?
You want to go to Florida.
Okay.
Here's the best times to go.
Here's the best hotels.
We'll get you the best deals in Florida,
all that.
So we talk through all that specific to
you.
On the trip planning side, it's very simple.
If you have about 250 to 300,000
points or more, you're probably a fit.
And what I do is you just reach
(31:46):
out via a form.
You pay a $40 deposit to me.
And you say, okay, I've got 500,000
points.
I want to go to Hawaii.
I've got four people in my family.
I don't want to figure this out.
So you give me all your information in
the form.
And then if I can help, which I
can't always help, I can help probably 80
% of the time, but sometimes stuff comes
up where there's just no deals and it's
(32:07):
just not possible.
Then I'll tell you how I can help.
And then you pay the rest of my
fee, which right now is $310.
So it's a $350 total fee for the
trip planning.
And the goal would be I would save
you minimum $1,000, but it's typically a
lot more.
Just yesterday, me and my, I've got a
guy working for me that helps me with
(32:28):
this.
We just helped someone book like a $25
,000 trip to the Maldives to one of
those overwater bungalows.
So he didn't do any work.
He filled out our form.
We used a bunch of points.
It was like 800,000 points he had,
but we got him this ridiculous trip.
He's flying Qatar business class there.
(32:49):
He's staying in the Hilton Conrad overwater bungalows.
So whether that's the kind of trip you
want to do or something simpler, I just
helped a family of three, you know, get
a nice Caribbean vacation.
They only did about 250,000 points out
of pocket, you know, $0 out of pocket
for cash, which is awesome.
And they're staying at this nice hotel in
St. Kitts, flying there direct from Florida.
(33:10):
So it doesn't have to be something crazy.
And both of these people, they're saving, you
know, it was over $3,000 for one
guy was like 20 plus.
So those are my two offerings there, the
trip planning services, and then the one-on
-one consultations.
That's really how I can help people.
I also do have an online course that's
helpful that I sell.
Again, that's on my website, gosomewhere.world. And
(33:34):
then I would have some free resources that
I can share in the show notes.
The one is called how to 2-10x
the value per point.
So it's really a much deeper breakdown of
what I've shared here.
I've shared, you can get 2-10x more
value for your points.
That guide would be, here's some ways to
do it.
Again, there's hundreds of ways to do it.
So you can't, everything can't be covered, but
(33:57):
that guide shows you some of that.
And then I also have one about choosing
a travel credit card.
So yeah, those are all the ways I
can help.
And again, if you never want to talk
to me or pay me a dollar, there
really is so many great resources out there.
I can't recommend enough the Daily Drop.
They're a really large company.
They've got a newsletter, they've got a YouTube
channel.
(34:17):
Everything is free.
You will never pay them for anything.
I love their stuff.
I've learned so much from them.
So again, the Daily Drop.
Highly recommend you subscribe to them and support
their stuff.
I've met a few people from there and
they're really good.
So that's probably everything I can think to
share.
That is great.
That is chock full of great information for
everybody.
Were you going to say something, Kristen?
No, I was just going to say, before
(34:37):
you go, what favorite trip that you've been
on?
That's a good question.
I think just in February, I went to
the Park Hyatt and St. Kitts.
St. Kitts is, I didn't even know it
was an island two years ago.
It's this beautiful island in the Caribbean.
(34:58):
Actually, it's St. Kitts and Nevis.
And Nevis is actually where Alexander Hamilton was
born.
So any fans of the musical, the line
is like, dropped in the middle of forgotten
spot in the Caribbean.
Well, we were on a beach looking at
that forgotten spot in the Caribbean, his little
island.
And they have tours of his family's house
and stuff like that.
So that's for any musical nerds out there,
(35:18):
people like the show.
That trip was amazing because the hotel was
$1,500 a night for the base room
and we even got upgraded.
And so I was sitting there just like,
it really was so mind blowing because I'm
like, I in a million years would have
not been able to afford this and would
never have paid for this.
And because I figured out how this point
stuff works, I got my flights covered to
the Caribbean.
(35:38):
This again, this is my two little kids
as well and my wife.
I've got my flights covered.
I'm at this ridiculous resort that I have
no business being here.
I'm 25 years old.
Everyone else there was at least 55 years
old.
Like there was no young people, probably because
no one could afford it.
You know what I mean?
And people didn't know about the points thing.
And so I just was felt so blessed
(35:59):
and so like amazed that this stuff is
possible.
So yeah, that was a fun trip.
Now I've been other places that are maybe
more adventurous or cool, but I think it
was like the level of luxury that I
experienced there.
I was just so mind blown.
Like this stuff is possible when you understand
points.
So I just felt I'm still kind of
in shock.
That was possible.
So that was an awesome trip and many
(36:21):
more to come.
I went crazy and I was able to
find business class flights to Switzerland for the
summer for me.
And I'm going to have a three-year
-old and a six-month-old in a
business class seat.
So that'll be some funny pictures that hopefully
go viral.
So I'll have to share this with you
guys and that's coming up here in August.
So that might become the favorite trip once
(36:41):
we get there.
Well, I love that you're sharing all this
great insight for our listeners and thank you
so much for being with us today and
all the great tips.
We're going to add some great content from
you in the show notes.
Check out gosomewhere.world. In addition, share our
(37:02):
episode with people you care about who you'll
want to be able to travel with you
perhaps along the way.
So Colin, thanks for being with us today.
Sure.
Thank you so much for having me.
I really appreciated it.
All right, everybody.
Until next time, keep striving for something more.
Thank you for listening to Something More with
(37:23):
Chris Boyd.
Call us for help, whether it's for financial
planning or portfolio management, insurance concerns, or those
quality of life issues that make the money
matters matter.
Whatever's on your mind, visit us at somethingmorewithchrisboyd
.com or call us toll free at 866
-771-8901 or send us your questions to
(37:45):
amr-info at wealthenhancement.com.
You're listening to Something More with Chris Boyd
Financial Talk Show.
Wealth Enhancement Advisory Services and Jay Christopher Boyd
provide investment advice on an individual basis to
clients only.
Proper advice depends on a complete analysis of
all facts and circumstances.
The information given on this program is general
financial comments and cannot be relied upon as
pertaining to your specific situation.
(38:07):
Wealth Enhancement Group cannot guarantee that using the
information from this show will generate profits or
ensure freedom from loss.
Listeners should consult their own financial advisors or
conduct their own due diligence before making any
financial decisions.
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