Tentmaking Tips

Because we plan to stay for several weeks, we’ve found that renting an Airbnb will use far fewer Chase Ultimate Rewards points and put us in a better location than booking 17 nights at hotels in London, Bath, Windsor, and the Cotswolds. Plus, if you’ve been to England, you know most hotels only allow 2 per room. So, our family of 4 that usually books 1 room in US hotels, would have to book 2 hotel rooms and cost us double the points in England.

You may be thinking, “Points for an Airbnb stay? How is that possible?”

Usually points are redeemed for flights and hotel stays but the Chase Ultimate Rewards portal gives you the opportunity to “Pay Yourself Back” by redeeming points for a statement credit against a cash purchase in certain categories.

And, even better, Chase is currently running a special where you get 25% more value with the Sapphire Preferred card a

My family and I have been traveling “nearly” free for years now. We’ve earned tens of thousands of dollars in free travel just by following a simple process.

I’ve written many blogs on the various details of this process, but today I’ll keep it big picture and show you how to get started.

Step 1: Watch and improve your credit score.

• Start by finding your credit score and working to improve it. I’ve written extensively about that here. Even if you have a very low credit score, you can still play the travel rewards game.

• Your credit score will determine what credit cards you can qualify for, and the higher the score, the better the cards you can get.

Step 2: Apply for a Chase credit card with a large welcome bonus.

• The welcome bonuses are the key to accumulating a lot of travel rewards quickly. A welcome bonus is essentially a big chunk of points they give you to incentivize you to apply for their credit card.

• You
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My oldest daughter wanted to go skiing.

Our family loves staying in Hyatt hotels, so we looked for a Hyatt near good ski slopes. We found a Park Hyatt, one of our favorite Hyatt brands, in Beaver Creek, Colorado. My wife and I grew up skiing in Colorado but neither of us had been to Beaver Creek. What we loved about this Park Hyatt was that it was a ski-in/ski-out resort. Meaning, you could basically ski up to the hotel. Often on the ski trips my wife & I took growing up, you’d have to drive 45 minutes down the mountain to where you were staying after you finished skiing for the day. We thought it would be fun to get to stay right on the slopes.

We booked the trip for this upcoming December, right around my

I’d love to help.

By tentmaking, we mean earning money to support your ministry from outside your ministry. This could be supplemental income if you already have a ministry income. Or it could completely replace a ministry income and you could derive all of your income outside of your ministry.

Here are 4 steps to begin a tentmaking journey:

1. Determine how much extra income you need

Are you just needing an extra $5,000 each year? Or are you needing part-time income? Or do you need full-time income? This will help you decide what types of tentmaking opportunities to pursue.

2. Determine how much time you have to generate this extra income

Do you only have a few hours available each week or could you spend more time? Depending on the type of ministry you’re in now, you may either have quite a bit of flexibility to pursue tentmaking on the side or you may have very little. Knowing

My wife & I enjoy Broadway shows as well, and although we’ve been to NYC several times, we started getting the itch to go again.

We had actually planned a couples trip to the Caribbean, but due to some fairly stringent COVID restrictions in the place we were going, we decided to rebook to NYC. This was somewhat last minute, so the point totals I’m going to share are likely higher than you might pay if you booked further out. But I wanted to give you another example of how we booked this trip for “nearly” free.

Flights:

• We fly Southwest as much as possible because we have the Companion Pass. That allows a companion to fly with you free.

• My wife used 42,526 points (because it was last minute) on her Southwest account for a flight to La Guardia Airport in NYC. And
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Many people assume they can’t get business cards because they don’t own their own business.

But, credit card carriers aren’t as picky as you might think about what constitutes a business.

You don’t have to have an LLC or a corporation or a partnership formed to be a business in the eyes of the credit card company.

You can simply be a sole proprietor.

Here are some examples of businesses you may already have (or could start) that would qualify:

• Real estate agent

• House flipper

• Airbnb host

• Landlord

• Blogger

• Tutor

You get the idea. The list could go on.

And if you don’t currently do anything that would qualify as a business, why not start something small on the side? It would provide another stream of income in addition to qualifying you for these business card bonuses.

Even if you don’t have a long business history,

It’s through Refer-A-Friend bonuses.

Many cards will give you bonus points for referring a friend who signs up for the same card. I try to max out these friend referrals each year because they give you tens of thousands of extra points.

Not all cards have refer-a-friend bonuses & not all cards that do have the same bonus. And, on top of that, the various cards often change the bonuses.

Here are some examples (I’m going to focus on Chase cards here but other carriers will have them as well):

• Chase Sapphire Preferred Card - 15,000 bonus points for each friend who signs up with a maximum of 75,000 per year. If you get 5 friends to sign up & receive the 75,000 points, that’s equal to approximately $1,500 in free travel (~2 cents per Chase point).

• Southwest Rapid Rewards Cards - 20,000 bonus points for each friend who signs up with a ma
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I bet you can guess her answer.

We spent some time looking at the Travel + Leisure best places to visit website and consistently found Charleston, South Carolina on many of the lists.

My wife was eager to head to the east coast around the time the leaves would be changing colors. We had never been to Charleston before, so we booked the trip.

Here are the details:

• We had generated enough Chase UR points (Ultimate Rewards) to be able to transfer them 1:1 to both Southwest and Hyatt. Southwest & Hyatt are both travel partners of Chase, so we could simply go to Chase’s Ultimate Rewards website, click on Transfer to Travel Partners, & transfer 1,000+ Chase points for 1,000+ Southwest or Hyatt points.

• We flew from Lubbock, with a stop in Dallas, on the way to Charleston. The number of Southwest points we needed was about 25,000 points each. At that time we didn't h
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The Southwest Companion pass truly is an amazing travel reward!

In fact, it's the gift that keeps on giving.

You can get it again, and again, and again. And not just you. Your spouse can get it too.

My wife and I have both had a Companion Pass for the last 2 years and we are about to renew my wife’s for another 2 years. That means that both of our daughters have traveled free as our companions on all of the trips we've been on the last few years.

How cool is that?

Here are the details.

You are allowed to receive the welcome bonuses on the Southwest cards once in a 24 month period. If you earn the bonuses on both a Southwest personal & business card right at the beginning of the year (and reach the 125,000 points), you'll have the Companion Pass for the rest of that year & all of the following year (nearly 2 years). By the time your Compani