On our YouTube Channel and Podcast we talk about how we’re always looking for ways to maximize everyday spend and expenses to produce worthwhile Points & Miles for our adventures. In this blog post, we’ll share how we did this to be almost fully fund a getaway to San Francisco!
Airfare: Alaska Airline Miles Signup Bonus
The period December thru March are when we typically assess what our income taxes due will be for the year and what credit card signups we should do to maximize the return on that spend. In 2021, we decided to get the Alaska Airlines Visa Signature® card. While it is not an airline we use regularly, there were several benefits that we felt made it worthwhile:
- Alaska is an American Airlines / OneWorld Partner, which would mean our AAdvantage Status would be honored
- The 50,000 miles (now, 60,000 miles!) for signup is, on average, enough for 2 round-trip economy domestic tickets. It requires a $3,000 spend, which we had identified expenses we could apply to cover this in a 90-day period. We value their miles at 1.4c each, making the miles worth $700 (now, $900!).
- The annual fee is a low $95
- Free Checked Bag each for up to 6 passengers, though we have it even better through our AA status (2 bags per)
- And while we don’t think it’s a great value if you don’t live on the west coast, if our spend reached $6,000, we would also receive a free Companion Fare ticket (only taxes & fees)
We have sat on these miles since then, but recently decided to look for a weekend trip and found 25k per person roundtrip tickets between Chicago and San Francisco. So 50,000 miles + $22.40 (taxes & fees) later, we were booked. We then called to make sure our AA status was reflected, which automatically gave us the ability to select Premium seats for our flights.
Hotel: Hotel Adagio, A Marriott Autograph Collection Hotel
The length of our stay, 2 nights, isn’t one that we would look to an Airbnb for. So, we considered the trove of Hilton Points we had. But, because we are saving those for a to-be-determined luxury extravaganza, we decided to instead take advantage of another credit card benefit, the $50 Ultimate Rewards Hotel Credit provided annually by our Chase Sapphire Preferred card. It’s
a benefit we sometimes forget we have, but it really came in handy, as we were able to combine it with some of our Chase Ultimate Reward Points on the travel portal, where they are worth 1.25c each (normally, they are 1.0c each if cashed out). Together, when our hotel bill hits our credit card, we can use both to make it a $0 out-of-pocket stay! The only downside is that, while we have a Gold-level status with Marriott, because we are going through a 3rd party to book, hotels will not honor your benefits. Still, with all of our time being spent out-and-about rather than taking advantage of the hotel, we didn’t see this as a loss.
Excursion: 3-in-1 San Francisco Day Trip from Viator
San Francisco is a city we can never get enough of, but we’ve also never ventured beyond the Bay. This time, we decided to spend an entire day taking in 3 adventures: Muir Woods, Sausalito, and Winery Tours. We found a comprehensive tour for 2 on Viator, which came to $378. This being our only significant cost, we were ok with paying out-of-pocket, but you know us – we can always do better!
This Spring, there was an offer from U.S. Bank, wherein if you opened a checking account with them, made a series of deposits (including Direct Deposits) over 90 days, they would reward you with $500 cash! Normally, we save our money to our Edward Jones acounts, but decided that the return we would get by, instead, depositing it to U.S. Bank, would be greater, so we made the initial deposit from what we would have put into long-term investments, and then added a modest deposit from Chris’ paycheck as necessary for the subsequent 3 months. When the $500 landed, rather than keeping it there, we decided that this time we would exchange it for a $500 gift card. That card would then be used to cover the $378!
Transportation
Normally, we use Uber for transport to/from the airport, as we’ve found it less expensive than the rate to park at the airport when away 5+ days. But, we did use the Uber credits we get from our American Express Platinum and American Express Gold cards to offset the cost of transportation in San Francisco.
Meals
We used our Wells Fargo Autograph card for our meals, which gave us 3X points on spend, while also allowing us to use the points we have accumulated against that very same spend. As a bonus, we utilized a $20 Restaurant Credit we had from all of the OpenTable points we’ve accumulated for over a decade.
And that’s how we did it! We love our travel adventures, and were really excited to take this short getaway. Knowing that it would have minimal impact on our budget gave us even more peace of mind as we enjoyed our time together. If you would like to know more about our trip, please Subscribe to our YouTube Channel so that you can be notified when that video posts. And, follow us on Instagram (@b2g.travel ) for real-time sharing of our adventures. Lastly, our podcast, Unpacking with Chris & Steph shares more of our behind-the-scenes as well as tips & tricks that we use.
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