Since I offer advice on earning frequent flyer miles, often with credit cards and sometimes other financial techniques, I think it’s only fair to take an ‘open kimono approach’ with my own strategies.
And the best way to do that is to share with you my wallet. Because that will shows you what I carry with me and to explain my thinking about each choice I make — a choice that’s constrained by space and so reveals a lot about me.
Here’s my wallet:
And here are cards that I shove in behind other cards.
My wallet just shows what I’m carrying with me right now. I have cards in two other places as well — and I’ll get to those in a minute.
Allow me to explain why each card pictured has a slot in my wallet.
Chase Sapphire Preferred Card
I continue to view this as the best starter card for frequent flyers. The points are among the best you can earn because of their flexibility (transfers to airlines in all 3 alliances and more, plus hotel transfers) and you earn them quickly with a strong signup bonus (50,000 points after $4000 spend within 3 months; 5000 more for adding an authorized user and making a purchase within the same timeframe; double points on all travel and also all dining. I need to get myself into a Chase branch to see if I’m pre-approved for a Sapphire Reserve also.
The key use for me is restaurant spend, which I do a lot of for work and on the road.
Ink Cash Business Card
I don’t need to pay the annual fee on an Ink Plus card since I have a Chase Sapphire Preferred Card, the Ink Cash earns 5 points per dollar in the same categories, I pay my cell phone and cable and internet bills and use it at office supply sotres. The no annual fee business card’s points can be transferred to Sapphire Preferred and on to airline miles or hotel points.
Platinum Card from American Express
I didn’t used to use my Platinum card for spending, but I’ve started to now that it earns 5 points per dollar on airline tickets purchased from airlines. It was already clutch because it gets me Hilton HHonors Gold status and National Car Rental Executive status (I don’t need the Starwood status it comes with since I’m a Starwood Platinum anyway.)
And I carry it for lounge access. If I happen to fly Delta the card gets me into Delta’s lounges. I use it most, though, to get into American Express’ outstanding Centurion lounges. Currently there are locations at Dallas Fort-Worth, Las Vegas, New York LaGuardia, San Francisco, Miami, Seattleand Houston.
Citi Prestige Card
This card is getting less use. For awhile it was all airfare and hotels, but the Amex Platinum now gets air. This is my hotel spend card, and non-restaurant entertainment.
For air it does have the best trip delay protection (which I give up putting my airfare spend on Amex) with reimbursements kicking in on delays over just 3 hours.
I have a decision to make in the spring about keeping this card, and if I don’t want to do with the hefty points balance I’ve accumulated. I want to keep up my ThankYou balance and grow it because I’m sitting on seven figure balances with both Chase and Amex already and want greater diversification.
Starwood Preferred Guest Card from American Express
I’ve carried the Starwood card since 2001, and it remains my go-to for spending that doesn’t earn a bonus (that isn’t helping me with a signup bonus, a threshold bonus, or a category bonus). Starwood points are the one currency I never have enough of. They’re great for hotels, but they really shine for transfers to airline miles.
Starwood has the most 1:1 transfer partners, a built-in bonus of 5000 miles when transferring points to 20,000 miles (which makes the card better for earning American miles than the Citibank American cards, better for earning Delta miles than the Delta American Express, better for earning Alaska miles than the Alaska Airlines Visa, better for earning Virgin America miles…). This card is a great way to get some of the best airline currencies like Japan Airlines, Aegean, and Korean Air miles.
Citi / AAdvantage Executive World Elite MasterCard
This card comes with an American Airlines Admirals Club membership, and that’s attached to my AAdvantage account. I don’t need to carry the card to access American lounges. I put $40,000 in spend on the card each year to earn 10,000 elite qualifying miles and then I put it away.
Authorized cardmembers on the account now even get lounge access though they have to present their physical card. (One card account can leverage 33 people into a lounge.)
Drivers License
I really only carry this to show to the TSA, and because I’m supposed to have it with me when I’m driving a rental car. At home my wife and I share a car. I’m much more likely to drive a car in a city that’s not my own. And yet I’m renting cars less and less with recent travel mostly to major cities and the prevalence of Uber and Lyft.
Security card for my office building, elevator, and suite
This one is pretty self-explanatory.
Priority Pass Select Card
(The card sitting behind my office security card.)
Priority Pass developed a separate ‘Select’ card to offer to banks for their credit card customers, but there’s really no difference between Select and the standard product any longer since United Clubs withdrew from the network (bank-issued Priority Pass cards excluded United Club access because Chase had a monopoly over issuing club access to credit card holders).
The card gets me into Alaska Airlines lounges, The Club locations, certain Air France KLM, Korean Air, and Air Canada lounges and many more. There are over 40 airport lounges in the US and over 900 around the world. I have a Priority Pass Select from both my American Express Platinum card and from my Citi Prestige Card. I carry the one from Citi Prestige, because it doesn’t just include unlimited visits for me but unlimited visits for up to 2 guests with me as well.
Hyatt Visa
I find the card’s annual free night for hotels up to category 4 is well worth the $75 annual fee, and I have the option to spend $40,000 on it to earn 5 stays and 10 nights towards elite status.
American Airlines AAdvantage Aviator Silver Card
Since Citibank got the exclusive right to issue American Airlines cards in 2013, Barclaycard stopped being able to issue new AAdvantage cards. They’re going to be issuing new cards again, indeed at airports and onboard they’ll be available soon.
I upgraded my Red card to Silver so I can spend $40,000 for 10,000 elite qualifying miles. I don’t know why I did that though, I re-qualified for American’s 100,000 mile Executive Platinum status in June.
BankDirect ATM card
I’ve used a BankDirect checking account since July 2003. It earns 100 American AAdvantage miles for every $1000 average balance each month (no 1099 at the end of the year).
They’ve added a $12 per month fee that you cannot avoid with a minimum balance and they’vecapped the earning at 5000 miles per month. But in a low interest environment and since I wind up with big expense reimbursements sitting in a checking account until I pay off my credit card bill, it makes good sense for me.
There’s a signup bonus of up to 22,000 miles and they not only don’t charge out of network ATM fees, but also offer a rebate of fees that other banks charge you for use of their cash machines.
Ultimately the strategy here is to:
Use cards to access benefits, like lounges, and use spending to earn elite status faster with both airlines and hotels.
Earn as many transferable points as possible. I don’t want to earn airline miles as much as points that transfer to a variety of different airline (and hotel) mileage programs. I’ve got access to seven figure balances with Chase Ultimate Rewards and American Express Membership Rewards already, which is why I’m spending more on my Citi Prestige Card — to earn Citi ThankYou Rewards points that will transfer to airlines — even though I value the points from Chase Sapphire Preferred even more highly.
Transferable points let me put miles in the right place at the right time for the right award. They’re also a hedge against devaluation of airline frequent flyer programs. And earning miles in a portfolio of transferable currencies is a hedge against devaluation of those currencies.
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