The Chase Reserve card bonus is worth considerably more, and the points are considered one of the most versatile points currencies. Personally, I would go for the Reserve card bonus if: 

1. You can make it into a Chase branch today or tomorrow.

2. You have at least a "good" credit score with relatively high household income ($60k+)

3. You will pay off your statement balance in full every month, incurring no interest.

4. You can float the $450 annual fee. I will show you how to get this back in value and statement credits.

5. You plan on traveling in the next 12 months.

6. You don't own a business. If you do, there may/will be a better option.

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Ask me how to take almost free surf trips anywhere.

Edited: 03/10/2017 at 10:05 AM by occy

The Sapphire Reserve card comes with $300 in statement credit as reimbursement for travel purchases charged to your card, per calendar year.

This means that you can charge anything that Chase considers a travel expense to your card and they will automatically take it off your bill, up to $300. Then in starting Jan 1 2018, you can do it again. That is $600 in travel expenses covered for just one $450 fee. 

Here are some of the other benefits that matter:  

Complimentary Airport Lounge Access to 900+ airport lounges worldwide

Global entry fee credit up to $100

Primary auto rental CDW coverage

The rest are here:

https://www.chase.com/card-benefits/sapphirereserve/travel

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Ask me how to take almost free surf trips anywhere.

As a former professional credit consultant I can tell you that opening new credit lines absolutely hurts your credit.  So does getting your credit pulled.  So does closing credit lines.  A new credit line will start helping your credit after 6 months of on-time payments.  After 12 months of on-time payments that line starts to significantly help your FICO score.  Offically NO ONE knows the formula for your FICO score as it's a well kept secret.  However we know enough factors that go into the score to know that credit pulls, new lines, and recently closed lines hurt your score.  Obviously so does late payments, charge offs, high debt to credit ratio (over 30% utilization), etc.  The score always changes and can bounce up and down fairly drastically, so as long as you don't need your credit for anything significant in the near future you're fine doing this.  Just throwing in my two cents...

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Jesus invented surfing...
Matthew 14:22-33

www.facebook.com/churchonthebeach

Looking for a new business card and wanting to take the family to Hawaii. any suggestions

I'm a small business owner with great credit and above average income. I purchase thousands of dollars of food and beverage product a week.  I'm not interested in opening and closing a bunch of cards but I would appreciate a suggestion for the best card for my situation. Any rewards would be awesome! I've been writing checks for everything! I have a credit card that I use sparingly and payoff every month. Any help would be greatly appreciated. 

If you are a frequent business traveler, I see the advantage of the CC miles, hotel points etc. I got sick of all the black out dates and hoops you had to jump through to fly on FF miles. Additionally the taxes for going out of the country seem almost as high as the air fare. I had a 2% cash back card on everything (now dropped to 1.5% need to find a new card). Spend 10K on a CC and get 10K in miles and jump through endless hoops and restrictions or spend 10K and get $200 cash back to buy a ticket anywhere. My friend is a dentist who puts all his office supplies on his CC and has racked up loads of miles. I do like the CCs where you get 40K miles just for joining and spending a minimal amount. That is at least one free trip right there.

What about the Bank Of America travel card if your a bank of america customer ? I think it gives 1.5% plus 10% if you have accounts with them and no annual fees.

Hi again, back from vacation.

@Gsus - Thanks for chiming in with good info. I hope you understand, I am not trying to mislead anyone here. Based on your background, I am sure you have a lot of helpful knowledge about credit and scores. I was trying to make it clear, that applying for new credit is not a good idea if your score is unknown, low, or needed for a large loan in the near future. I am also not advising to close cards after a short amount of time. Would you agree that having a lot of credit available, only using a small percentage of it, paying balances off every month, and holding on to cards with no annual fees for a long period of time, is a good idea and will negate the initial small hit that your score will take? Have you seen some of the bonus offers for some cards? I see it as financially irresponsible to not jump on some if your situation is right.

@surfntonto - If you're just looking for one card, the Chase Ink Preferred is probably a good all around suggestion. If you have specific plans in mind, like hotel or route/airline, I could probably customize the suggestion for you.

@Gil - Are the food and beverage purchases business to business or retail purchases? Where do you want to go surf? If you are writing checks when a card can be used, you are essentially overpaying by at least 2% everytime.

@surfnole - If you are looking for a return on normal spending, a 2% cash back card with no annual fee is hard to beat. The sign up bonuses rae where the high returns are.

@Waverider - I have the BOA Travel rewards card, but it really only makes sense if you have more than 50k on deposit with them. The 1.5% plus 10% can be beat by a straight 2% cash back card. But, when you get to Preferred Rewards Platinum or Platinum honors, it comes with a 50% or 75%bonus on all points earned instead of 10. That is a good return on spending, though the bonus is only worth $200. Where are you looking to go?

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Ask me how to take almost free surf trips anywhere.

Thanks Occy for all the useful info and link. I too am a "churner" and frequent sites like Thepointsguy.com. I also use an app called the award wallet to keep track of all my points. I currently have the following cards: SPG, Chase Ink, Chase sapphire, Southwest, JetBlue, Alaska Air and Club Carlson. Since I also have several businesses I have applied for cards for them as well and have reached a point where I get denied for more cards. Should I start reducing my allotted credit on each card? Should I close cards and how long should I wait to reopen? I have opened and closed so many cards that I lost track of how many I have open currently. The good thing is that I have accumulated a wealth of points: 200K British airways, 200K AA miles, 26K Alaskan airlines miles, SPG and club carlson points, 25K Jetblue points and southwest points. I fly out of Orlando and have been taking many trips snowboarding to Colorado on SW points. I also took my wife and I to seattle free on Alaskan Air partner Delta. And I have flown free to Costa and PR on Jet blue. I normally transfer my Chase UR points into SW. Still trying to figure out what to do with my British airways miles since using them to go to Europe incurs ridiculous fuel surcharges ~$800. I am looking for a free way to Europe and maybe a trip to South America. Any recommendations? Will my credit report show all my open cards and help me decide which ones to change?

Good discussion here, the Chase Sapphire Reserve card is awesome, my wife uses it for her backup business card when she can't use Amex. Obviously it was the priority card during the promo period to hit the required balance.

Have churned Amex Blue (for cash bonus), two Chase Sapphire cards (one in my name one in my wife's, added each other as authorized users for more miles for a total of 120k points), the Chase Sapphire Reserve and now working on what our next card will be. Flown to PR twice, once just my wife and I and once the whole family of four, plus a solo trip to St. Maarten (then paid my way for the flight to Saba) all on miles, and we have about 150k Chase Rewards pts we are sitting on right now wondering what our next trip should be

Thinking the Southwest card will be next but need to do a little more research to see if it's still best bet for us. We both work and have two elementary kids, and with both extended families in Florida "personal" vacation time is at a premium, so we aren't too crazy on the churning, we go through about two cards a year and even at that rate we can't use all the miles.

Epic, be careful taking advice or mostly using card app links found on the Points Guy's site. He sold his blog to Bankrate and they now, more than ever, advertise/push cards with lower than the best current bonuses. In other words, Brian is considered a sellout, but was a shill before that. I use AwardWallet as well to keep track of things. Are you getting denied for personal cards or just business versions? It is not usually a good move to proactively reduce credit lines on cards. If you are denied, there is always another chance at approval through reconsideration lines. If you were denied because you already have too many cards from that issuer, or they don't want to extend you more credit, that is when you can offer to move credit from one card to the new one you want. They see that as not taking on any new risk with you, and will usually approve you on that condition. The only time you should close a card is if you don't think the annual fee is worth paying, and there are no options to "product change" it to another that you want or can keep fee free. It is always a good idea to keep good records. You can check on your open and closed accounts by viewing your 3 credit reports once a year for free here. Also, Credit Karma is good for counting and monitoring accounts for free as well.

Accumulating points is only part of the game. Acquiring them for as cheap as possible, then maximizing their value while also using them to go where you want, is the big key. While you do have a good number of points, they are spread accross a number of programs that tend to not be the most flexible. 

If you don't mind flying on Southwest, you can get tons of value from their easy to use program. I have not paid them a dime in the last 5 years and they are my go to airline for family travel. I have their Companion Pass that came with earning 110,000 points in one calendar year (2 versions of their credit card x 50,000 point bonus each). It is the best deal for domestic (and now some international) travel PERIOD. They now fly to Costa, PR, Cabo, Puerto Vallarta. Transferring Chase UR points to Southwest is ok if that is what you need to do, but there are much better uses for them.

BA Avios are useful because they are a distance based points system where all of our legacy carriers have switched to a revenue based system. That means the points price of the ticket is still based on the distance flown not the regular ticket price. I always use them for AA flights at the MilesAAver award level. For traveling to Europe you can use them on Air Berlin and Aer Lingus with no fuel surcharges and on Cathay Pacific and LAN with reduced charges. You could also transfer them into Iberia Avios to save as well. Or, just use them for intra-Europe flights.

What country in South America are you interested in?

 

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Ask me how to take almost free surf trips anywhere.

DHodges, I am going to offer you the same advise I gave someone else earlier in a pm.

I think it would be smart for you to proceed in collecting more Chase Ultimate Rewards points before going after others. They are widely considered the most valuable. One way I do this is with Chase Freedom (my link) cards. They offer 5% cash back (really 5 ultimate rewards points per dollar) for limited spending in rotating categories each quarter. The sign up bonus is 15,000 points after spending $500. This quarter is gas and next quarter starting April 1 is grocery/drug stores. I try to max these out (spend $1500 per card) every quarter. My wife and I each have 2. One from signing up and one from downgrading a sapphire to it when that annual fee came due. But, you can only get approved for one if you have gotten less than 5 new cards in the last 24 months. That is why it is smart to start with these cards. It is also many times a good idea to apply for 2 Chase cards on the same day because the inquiries can be combined. If Southwest generally works for you for family travel I would suggest that the Southwest Rapid Rewards Premier Card be the other one you go for, because the bonus is 50,000 points right now.

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Ask me how to take almost free surf trips anywhere.

Great topic and lots of good info! So, I have a major home purchase coming up...a new a/c system, inside and out. I was going to pay cash but after reading this thread, I'm thinking about applying the towards a travel miles credit card. Some advice and direction would be much appreciated here. My FICO score is in the excellent range.

It is a good start that you know your credit score. Assuming you are not buying it and installing yourself, have you asked if you will be able to pay with a cc and if there is a fee to do so? Many smaller A/C companies will tack on another 3% for a credit card payment. Other than that fact, where do you want to go? 

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Ask me how to take almost free surf trips anywhere.

i like the 5% back on groceries especially when using it at publix
and getting $10 off a $50 (20%) gas card for buying $50 in groceries
I try to get all my gas at publix

Yes, they are B to B purchases from USfoods for my restaurants.

CR or Mexico would be nice. Really anywhere. 

Thanks again for your time!

5% (or really 5 ultimate rewards points per dollar spent) is very nice, but what makes it even nicer is having (or your spouse having) a Chase premium card to transfer those points to. Then, those points are worth a minimum 1.25 or 1.5 cents each toward travel. Or, those points can then be sent to their travel partners where they can be used for up to 5 cents or more each:

Chase Ultimate Rewards Airline Transfer Partners: British Airways, Flying Blue (Air France/KLM), Korean Air, Singapore Airlines, Southwest, United Airlines, Virgin Atlantic

Chase Ultimate Rewards Hotel Transfer Partners:   Hyatt, IHG, Marriott, Ritz-Carlton

Gil, for those type purchases, I would recommend the Chase Ink Preferred card or the Barclay Arrival Plus card. The Ink sign up bonus is worth a minimum $1000 toward any airline ticket, hotel, car rental, or cruise. But, like mentioned above, if they are tranfered to a partner and used correctly, they could be worth multiple thousands of dollars. And, it earns 3 points per dollar spent on shipping; advertising purchases made with social media sites and search engines; travel; internet, cable, and phone services. 

The Barclay (50,000 bonus) points are worth only 1 cent each, but are earned at rate of 2 per dollar spent. So, that could get you more value over a long period of time, if the food purchases outweigh the business expenses mentioned above.

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Ask me how to take almost free surf trips anywhere.

Edited: 03/24/2017 at 01:40 PM by occy

Great info occy! Thank you 

@occy - I checked with the a/c company and they do not tack on additional charges for credit card payments. I'm looking at going to France this summer with my SO and also explore nearby countries while we are there. Other places I'd like to go? Puerto Rico, Cabo, Indo, Austrailia, etc.. I just looked at the Barclay Arrival Plus card and with all that it offers, that could be my go to card.

I don't want to think about the air fare or sharks, but South Africa's currency just tanked.  Cape Town's beautiful, even if 70% of the population live in shacks.  

@thinktank:  brush up your French as best as possible.  And enjoy.  I brought back a pile of quality cheese.  Gotta visit Pays Basque.