2019 began on a relaxed note. With a free vacation to the Caribbean.
Are you serious? That is my dream destination. You mean the flights were free. Yes they were.
Were the hotels expensive ?. Yes you bet, but not for me.
How did you do this. Do you work for the airline ? No I don’t . Never have.
Over the last six years we have never paid a dime in airfare for our twice a year or more annual vacations – for a family of four . Yes! But How?
Let me introduce you to our great vacation partners. Chase. Yes, for the past many years Chase has indirectly sponsored all our vacations, in return for us subscribing to their credit cards. Two of our favorites are the Chase southwest credit card and the Chase IHG credit card.
Mrs and I had applied for Southwest Rapid rewards credit cards when they had an offer of 60K points after you spend $4000 within three months. Two cards each during last two years gave us 240K points for travel. At a value of around $800 per round ticket from Chicago to Grand Cayman islands for four people, this saved us around $3,200. We did pay the mandatory international fee.
Currently our favorite airline Southwest has a great offer with their priority credit cards wherein you can earn a companion pass and 30k points after spending $4K. Companion pass is extremely valuable as this means that an additional person designated by you travels free with you for a whole year. This is a rare offer from Southwest and will not last long.
For hotel stay we use Chase IHG credit cards thereby we stay for free at IHG properties around the world. We stayed at the Kimpton Seafire property in Grand Cayman islands, which is their luxury property and was priced at around $ 2150 per night during the period of our stay.
We had two free anniversary nights redeemable at any category of IHG hotel around the world, which was a perk from our IHG credit card (IHG has discontinued this now) and the for the balance two days we paid out of points. For four nights priced at around $ 8600, we ended up paying zero, except for the resort fees.
So in effect the airfare and hotel costs which added up to around $12,000 was almost free for us.
Through a planned effort to accumulate travel points, we have a healthy balance for many more travels for the family.
Our current points balance after the Caribbean vacation is as below:
Southwest rapid reward points – 400,000
Chase Ultimate reward points – 145,000
Chase IHG points – 250,000
Hilton reward points – 100,000
BA Avios points – 125,000
Delta travel points – 100,000
We have over a million points banked for future travels. Getting a travel deal is sweet, but traveling for free is even better!. So for filling in a credit card application, and some planning in ensuring that the credit card balances are cleared on time, we have been able to enjoy free travel to multiple destinations. For more stories on free travel read 800 km road trip through Costa Rica
If you would like to evaluate great offers on credit cards, million mile secrets is a great blog.http://www.millionmilesecrets.com
If you are aiming to achieve financial independence and travel the world send us a note and we will send you a FREE booklet on “How much do you need to achieve Financial Independence.”
Happy Travels.