Tentmaking Tips

Chase was running an all-time high bonus on the Chase Ink Business Preferred card of 120,000 points & an all-time high referral bonus offer of 40,000 when you referred that card to a friend.

Our original plan was to get one card for me and one for my wife & then refer as many people as we could.

What we didn’t know at the time is that Chase would approve both me & my wife for TWO of the same card in a short period of time.

We just finished hitting the 4th welcome bonus, so here’s how all the points stacked up:

My wife referred me to the card = 40,000 points

We hit the welcome bonus on my 1st card = 120,000 points

I referred my wife to the card = 40,000 points

We hit the welcome bonus on her 1st card = 120,000 points

My wife referred me to my 2nd card = 40,000 points

We hit the welcome bonus on my 2nd card = 120,000 points

I referred my wife...

Everyone was unsure whether or not the merger would make it all the way through or if the Department of Transportation would object.

About a month ago, AMEX was offering a 20% transfer bonus on points transferred to Hawaiian Airlines, one of their travel partners.

Travel Hackers online were discussing whether or not Hawaiian Miles would transfer 1:1 to Alaskan Miles if the merger went through. Hawaiian Miles are not worth much and easy to earn, but Alaska Miles are very valuable and very hard to earn.

Alaska Airlines is part of the One World alliance, so you’re able to book American Airlines flights at great point redemption rates.

This potential merger provided an opportunity for Travel Hackers with many points to put some at risk by transferring to Hawaiian, hoping Alaskan would honor the points if the merger were to go through. But no one was sure, so it was definitely a risky play.

I...

I reminded him that when I first started, I just focused on flipping a few houses in my own neighborhood.

It’s easy to wrap your mind around this.

It’s easy to find distressed houses because you drive by them regularly

And it’s also easy to build relationships with sellers who live near you.

Too often we overcomplicate flipping.

We start thinking about how to dial in the marketing, what marketing channels to use, and how often to send out marketing.

All of this is important and will come with time.

But, when you’re first getting started, the key is to keep it simple.

I spoke to another student last week who asked about forming an LLC, picking a name, setting up bank accounts, etc. All good questions. But I reminded him that when you’re just starting, none of that actually matters.

You can flip your first house...

That is, finding ways to reduce the costs of our home by renting something out on our property.

In the last 2 homes we’ve lived in, we have covered all of our primary housing expenses just by renovating a garage space and putting it on Airbnb. This reduced our ongoing housing costs to essentially $0.

We moved into a new house last year and we’ve been trying to figure out how we want to “hack” it. Once you get used to not having housing expenses, it’s hard to go back to paying them.

We’ve had multiple options:

1. There is a large storage shed in the backyard that we could renovate.

2. There’s a separate wing of our house that we could wall off for guests.

3. We could build an additional small structure in the backyard.

But, honestly, we didn’t love these options for a variety of reasons.

That’s when we had an idea.

Unique...

My Dad used to say it tastes better when it’s free!

I’ve recently entered the world of online meal kits.

Not so much because we didn’t like cooking, but just because it seems like they’re trying to give you great meals for almost nothing.

It saves on groceries & eating out.

Now you may be thinking, “Whoa! I thought those online meal kits were really expensive?”

They can be.

If you just subscribe to a single kit & get a delivery week after week, it really adds up.

But I don’t do that.

I’ve gotten two meal kits now.

The first kit was 3 meals for 2 people for free (retail at nearly $70). I only had to pay $11 in shipping. This was from Marley Spoon.

The second was 3 meals for 4 people for free (retail at nearly $120). I only had to pay $5 in shipping. This was from HelloFresh.

Lest you think they were just sending us cheap food, the first one had multiple steak dinners and the second box had...

Well, we decided to try something that we haven’t done before & we weren’t sure if it would even work.

Here’s a little backstory:

• When the big Chase Ink welcome bonus first came out, I wasn’t sure I’d be able to get it. Why, you might ask? Because I was already at 5/24. Technically, Chase shouldn’t approve me for any more of their cards until I drop back down under 5/24.

• I thought I would try anyway since the bonus was so great, and to my surprise, I was instantly approved! What?!? It’s not common that they’ll violate their 5/24 rule, but I’ve read online that sometimes they may still let you nab a business card. It’s rare, though.

• Once I hit the minimum spend, we immediately had my wife apply for the...

One concern people often have with a card like this is, “How do I meet the high minimum spend?”

The minimum spend to earn the welcome bonus on this card is $8,000 in 3 months.

That’s a lot.

You may not be sure how you could spend enough to hit it.

Not to worry.

There are other ways to generate this spend.

I’ll share one of my favorites today.

Funding bank accounts.

Some banks allow you to fund accounts using a credit card.

That’s what I did this past week.

We needed some extra spend to hit the $8,000 for our 2nd Chase Ink Business Preferred card.

US Bank is known to allow credit card funding of new business accounts up to $3,000.

I opened up a new account for one of our businesses & used the credit card to...

My wife chose the Cayman Islands where we went this summer & loved it.

My oldest daughter chose to go back to Beaver Creek to ski this Christmas & it’s already booked nearly free with points.

My youngest daughter wanted to go to Las Vegas over Spring Break to see some shows & visit a famous donut shop that she’s seen on YouTube.

We decided to try to book the Bellagio based on family recommendations from people who had been before.

Here’s how we booked 3 free nights with points:

I have the Capital One Venture X credit card which includes a $300 yearly travel credit when booking travel through their portal. I booked the first night using this travel credit combined with points I had in my Capital One account.

I booked the next two nights with Marriott points that we had earned in 2019 from a welcome bonus on the Marriott Bonvoy Boundless card...

And the most sought after business class seat on Qatar is called the Qsuite.

It’s literally a small suite in the sky. Check out this video to see it.

Our family has been planning to go to Thailand next summer to see our extended family. We’ve hosted multiple exchange students from Thailand and they’ve become like family to us. We’ve been wanting to take a trip to see them before my oldest daughter graduates from high school.

I knew getting all 4 of us in Qsuites with points would be extremely difficult, but I was up for the challenge. The reason it’s so difficult is because they don’t release many award bookings for Qsuites per flight & they sell out quickly. Many travel enthusiasts are competing to book these seats right when they release them.

I needed to book each leg separately because if I waited for the round trip booking, the first...

And, who wouldn’t?

They are offering $325 if you open a new Everyday Checking account (at this link) by August 20, 2024. You can also open the account in-branch and give them the code that you get at the same link.

To earn the bonus, you need at least $1,000 in qualifying electronic deposits (think direct deposit of your paycheck) within 90 days of the account opening.

That should be pretty easy for most people.

And the good news is, you can do it twice. Once for you and once for your spouse (if you’re married).

That’s $650 in just a few months by direct depositing at least $1,000 into the two accounts you open.

Wells Fargo is also offering a $2,500 bonus (at this link) if you’re willing to do something a bit more complicated with significantly more money.

They’re giving a $2,500 bonus (in branch) if you’ll open a Premier...