Before you dive too deep into points and miles, make sure you have clarified your “why” for travel first!

How do you know if you should use points or miles to book a hotel or to buy it in cash instead? How do you find the best value you can to ensure your points/miles go further, while also not spinning our wheels so long that we miss out on good value?

Confused on whether to keep a credit card open after the annual fee hits? We’ll help you figure it out!

One of our favorite starter travel rewards credit cards, the Chase Sapphire Preferred, has an elevated sign-up bonus offer of 80,000 bonus Ultimate Rewards points (Chase’s transferrable points currency) right now (and is rumored to be ending soon)! We especially love that if you utilize the $50 hotel credit and the $15 in quarterly Instacart credits you receive with the card, you can actually get more value for the card than you pay in the annual fee, without even taking the bonus into account!

Come find out all of the credit cards we currently have open, why we opened them, and if we think we will keep them open long-term!

Don’t get lost in the nuances of the points and miles world, but stick to the basics to succeed by using credit cards for free travel!

A cancellation of one of our award flights to Thailand caused us to need to do some last-minute shuffling. Come find out how we made Peru happen on points/miles only a few weeks out!

Come find out how I earned 200k American Airlines Loyalty Points over 14 months to qualify for Executive Platinum status!