I love credit cards so much! v2.0 (see first page for add'l details)

[nycdisneygal]

Quick question. Got the amex delta with the nice sign up bonus - thanks to advice here (which i hit quickly due to car repairs!! ). If I want to gain status (silver) by spending do I need to spend 25K or 50K ? I am confused by the charts. Any of you gurus know?

 

[disneymagicgirl]

I used to only like sweet milk chocolate,until life forced me to completely overhaul my diet a few years back..... now I have no taste for overly sweet stuff. A tiny square of dark chocolate is enough to satisfy my chocolate needs,so much flavor! As far as peanut butter cups..... my current massive weakness would be Trader Joes or Aldi DARK chocolate peanut butter cups...(or Justins brand) .....which is why I don't buy them in general b/c I just can't stop if I have them at hand..... i can't even go near Reeses anymore after trying these.....it's like comparing a Big Mac to a Filet Mignon (for me at least) and as for honey...... oy. learn about it folks..... honey from local sources is so amazing and flavorful in so many ways!

I loved the Aldi ones but my store has milk choc cups now. I don’t care for those.

 

[disneymagicgirl]

We bought our boys cheap starter sets at Dicks. Smart to see if he'll like it and wait for him to finish growing. Check your Chase offers: I have a 10% off at Golf Galaxy on a couple of my Chase cards (They are part of Dicks).

This is is timely. My dd preschool asked for golf galaxy GC for their class auction basket. Thanks!

 

[disneymagicgirl]

Man that skyliner thread

ETA: Aaaaand it’s no longer a thread

Oh dang. I missed the fun. Dd3 was sick yesterday and very clingy.

 

[ski_mom]

So... bad news: DW gets her arm run over by her car last week before the car drove itself in reverse until it hit a tree (she was backing out of a friends driveway and hit a kid's bike and forgot to put the car in park before getting out). miraculous news: She went to an orthopedic doctor yesterday and is expected to have a full recover within about 6 weeks. silver lining: car needs $6k in auto body repairs that I can pay with cards after the insurance company sends me the check. I posted a couple of days ago that I was stressing about meeting 13k in 5 months and thought I'd end up paying plastiq and venmo fees. The circumstances really stink but the timing of this freak accident couldn't have been better.
A certain Biz card is arriving today and P2 was approved for SW Biz Performance yesterday. Looking forward to another exciting CP season with you folks. @3 DD love princesses looks like we're on the same schedule.

Wow! So glad your wife is going to be ok. Sounds like it could have been much worse.

Good that you can at least see a silver lining.

 

[1st*toright]

That is a crazy loaded question...You ask it to 50 churners, you might get 50 different answers.

Some food for thought:

• To earn a CP you have to earn 110,000 SW points. Even if you NEVER used the CP, the 110k points is worth > $1,600 in flights for one person. They don't expire for 2 years after earning them AND they're easy to keep active by simply earning 1 SW point in some fashion.
• You could also just cash those points out for something like Amazon gift cards (I think that's still an option) and it's worth $1,100 that way...
• I'm not saying it makes ANY sense to earn a CP and not use it, but the points themselves have A LOT of value. I'd say to pursue a CP you have to at LEAST be using it once...otherwise, there are likely better card options out there for you.
• Every time you use the CP you are either saving (a) the points value or (b) the cash value of the flight you took. So thus, the more often you use it the more value you'll get.
• So if you used it 3 times on $200 Round Trip Flights you saved $600 OR $600 worth of points
• BUT let's say you just used it once but that happened to be an $800 round trip flight at Christmas. Well now your CP was worth $800 (or $800 in points)
• Depending on when you earn this, you can have it for up to 23 months so that's a lot of time to allow for flights. I think most people who get it are flying at least 3-4 times when they have it.
• The good news is those 110k SW points don't need to be used during that time period so even if you don't use the CP a lot you'll still have all of the leftover points for future free flights!

So as you can see - there are potentially too many variables to answer this question in a vacuum. I would think of the bare minimum that you think you would use it and what those flights would cost and that might help you understand what it would be worth to you. Feel free to share that here too if you want some additional critique, but without that info I'm taking a stab in the dark.

As @miztressuz said, part fo the calculation is opportunity cost. DH had the CP for the last 2 years, and we've gotten lot of use out of it (and the RR points). My original plan was for me to get cards at the end of this year so we could have it again for the next 2 years, but when I actually looked at our travel plans for next year, we don't have a lot of plans to fly SW. I decided that both URs and MRs are more valuable to me in 2020, because we are traveling to international destinations and need the flexibility of moving points to different carriers/hotels.

I don't have a ton of time to devote to this hobby, so I'm typically a "slow churner" and meet my MSRs with organic spend, so I can't get ALL THE CARDS (as much as I would like to!) So, I'm passing up the CP for 2020, and will take another look in a year and determine what makes sense at that point.

 

[1st*toright]

So... bad news: DW gets her arm run over by her car last week before the car drove itself in reverse until it hit a tree (she was backing out of a friends driveway and hit a kid's bike and forgot to put the car in park before getting out). miraculous news: She went to an orthopedic doctor yesterday and is expected to have a full recover within about 6 weeks. silver lining: car needs $6k in auto body repairs that I can pay with cards after the insurance company sends me the check. I posted a couple of days ago that I was stressing about meeting 13k in 5 months and thought I'd end up paying plastiq and venmo fees. The circumstances really stink but the timing of this freak accident couldn't have been better.
A certain Biz card is arriving today and P2 was approved for SW Biz Performance yesterday. Looking forward to another exciting CP season with you folks. @3 DD love princesses looks like we're on the same schedule.

Oh my goodness! I'm glad she will be ok, and so glad that nothing worse happened!

 

[shairpdrh]

So... bad news: DW gets her arm run over by her car last week before the car drove itself in reverse until it hit a tree (she was backing out of a friends driveway and hit a kid's bike and forgot to put the car in park before getting out). miraculous news: She went to an orthopedic doctor yesterday and is expected to have a full recover within about 6 weeks. silver lining: car needs $6k in auto body repairs that I can pay with cards after the insurance company sends me the check. I posted a couple of days ago that I was stressing about meeting 13k in 5 months and thought I'd end up paying plastiq and venmo fees. The circumstances really stink but the timing of this freak accident couldn't have been better.
A certain Biz card is arriving today and P2 was approved for SW Biz Performance yesterday. Looking forward to another exciting CP season with you folks. @3 DD love princesses looks like we're on the same schedule.

That sounds very scary. Glad it turned out ok.

 

[needsomesun]

I think I've seen this discussed before, how many times do you need to use a SW CP for it to be "worth it"?

It's always worth it to me, because I end up planning more quick trips with DH because of it. Places I wouldn't have gone otherwise. Like Chicago in 2 weeks. Financially, it's probably not worth it at all because I'm spending money that I wouldn't have spent without the CP.

 

[miztressuz]

My new Disney Visa also came today! I was honestly shocked at how fast is was mailed. Bummer about the design on the back of MF.

Toy Story does have 3 aliens as expected! I will miss Pluto on the back of my old design, but I agree that I still think the old card will work. I did have to go to the website and verify it though. Is that not the same as activating?

ETA: I realized from my old quote that I mentioned Pluto possibly on the back of the TS card. I meant Bullseye. I must have been tired when typing LOL

Hm, well I didn't look real close at the paper, maybe it does say to verify. The sticker on it was just about the contactless feature. I'll have to fish it out of the shred pile. Although now part of the experiment is to try it without verifying it....

 

[disneymagicgirl]

If she can't get that card, try the CFU. My DD and other college kids on this thread were able to start with that card and very minimal (far, far less than what you listed) income.

Did your dd do the discover cc first or straight to the cfu?

 

[Limes96]

Finally all caught up! My CIP came Monday, so I now have a big MSR to work on. Still also have $700 left on my Amex Bonvoy biz but trying to spread that one out over my 3 months.

Not so much a fan of Reese’s anymore after trying the Trader Joes’s Peanut butter cups!!! They are awesome! Also, the Dove chocolate peanut butter candies are excellent. Just bought some yesterday since my nearest TJ’s is an hour drive.

The whole Skyliner incident is disappointing. DD and I have a stay at Pop coming up in November and I was really looking forward to making use of it. Maybe we still will if it’s open then. Maybe not. We’ll have to think about that. This will be my first trip there ever without having a car available.

 

[needsomesun]

Our oldest dog has been on Apoquel for 3-4 years now. Prior, she would scratch till she had sores, then we'd go to the vet, prednisone shot and we'd be go for about another month. The monthly vet bills got to be too much and I broke down and put her on the Apoquel. I don't love having her on the medication but it has helped tremendously. When she hasn't had her pill in the morning I can tell by the scratching. I feel bad because it just seems miserable.

My lab is on Apoquel also. For about a year now, but i'm assuming she'll be on it forever. We tried changing her diet a few times but nothing seems to work except apoquel...

 

[Judique]

@Haley R said:


Man that skyliner thread

ETA: Aaaaand it’s no longer a thread

Oh dang. I missed the fun. Dd3 was sick yesterday and very clingy.

C&P'd this so I wouldn't have to go back and find the original.
I read the entire thread and the best part were the links that it provided with info on gondolas.

Because of my aversion to heights - I still remember the much shorter sky ride in MK from my 1988 visit and how petrified I was when I got on it - I probably will not ride the gondola. That said, if it's safe, I think it's a great addition for transportation for others, who don't have height issues. I enjoyed reading a lot of the posts.

However, it seemed to me that the moderator shut it down for no really good reason, other than maybe he was tired of it. He/she was continuously posting his own thoughts on the subject repeatedly. And at shutdown, it was, 'give it a rest and we'll come back when we know more'.

There is another thread but I'm not so interested that I want to wade through it. Just surprised that this particular thread was closed as I think we might have seen more posts from actual riders in a few days.

 

[WVMomof3]

https://onemileatatime.com/southwes...UC-CN4el_EliMHAd7OxqNLgFWusj99l7oHr6I4wwd1Vns

 

[WVMomof3]

Oh dang. I missed the fun. Dd3 was sick yesterday and very clingy.

C&P'd this so I wouldn't have to go back and find the original.
I read the entire thread and the best part were the links that it provided with info on gondolas.

Because of my aversion to heights - I still remember the much shorter sky ride in MK from my 1988 visit and how petrified I was when I got on it - I probably will not ride the gondola. That said, if it's safe, I think it's a great addition for transportation for others, who don't have height issues. I enjoyed reading a lot of the posts.

However, it seemed to me that the moderator shut it down for no really good reason, other than maybe he was tired of it. He/she was continuously posting his own thoughts on the subject repeatedly. And at shutdown, it was, 'give it a rest and we'll come back when we know more'.

There is another thread but I'm not so interested that I want to wade through it. Just surprised that this particular thread was closed as I think we might have seen more posts from actual riders in a few days.

DH and I were talking about it yesterday and wondered if there was ever an incident with the old sky ride that it needed evacuations or got stuck for a long period.

 

[disneymagicgirl]

Be careful, you might just decide to travel more due to the CP. That is where I am. I normally only take one family trip a year but with the CP and points, I will have flown 3 times this year. Leaving Thu for a weekend in Orlando. Without CP, I might not have done this. It is easy when it only costs $22.40 to fly two people roundtrip!

100%! And the AP has the same effect. So when DD3 and I go alone to disney, I cover our hotel with discounted gift cards that i cash out URs for, use CP for her flight and SW points for mine, and no tickets needed. It makes it really easy/tempting to go A LOT!

 

[Judique]

DH and I were talking about it yesterday and wondered if there was ever an incident with the old sky ride that it needed evacuations or got stuck for a long period.

I have no idea. I do remember that a cast member was killed there at one point but don't really remember details. I think he was working after hours not during guest time. I can't even remember what the actual ride's name was and couldn't be bothered to google. My biggest thrill that trip was 20000 Leagues under the Sea. I even have a snow globe for that attraction with a little light inside (that still works after all this time).

Edit: I've rode plenty of ski lifts - never had a problem probably due to the fact that they are fairly close to the ground. That said, I haven't skied in a long time.

 

[SouthFayetteFan]

100%! And the AP has the same effect. So when DD3 and I go alone to disney, I cover our hotel with discounted gift cards that i cash out URs for, use CP for her flight and SW points for mine, and no tickets needed. It makes it really easy/tempting to go A LOT!

Oh man, a CP + WDW AP is definitely a deadly combo. The year we had that, it was all I could do to keep myself from scheduling 5 weekend trips. We managed to hold it to just 1 for my daughter’s 4th birthday but other trips were booked in a moment of weakness and then cancelled

 

[disneymagicgirl]

So... bad news: DW gets her arm run over by her car last week before the car drove itself in reverse until it hit a tree (she was backing out of a friends driveway and hit a kid's bike and forgot to put the car in park before getting out). miraculous news: She went to an orthopedic doctor yesterday and is expected to have a full recover within about 6 weeks. silver lining: car needs $6k in auto body repairs that I can pay with cards after the insurance company sends me the check. I posted a couple of days ago that I was stressing about meeting 13k in 5 months and thought I'd end up paying plastiq and venmo fees. The circumstances really stink but the timing of this freak accident couldn't have been better.
A certain Biz card is arriving today and P2 was approved for SW Biz Performance yesterday. Looking forward to another exciting CP season with you folks. @3 DD love princesses looks like we're on the same schedule.

omgoodness, that is terrifying! So glad she is ok!