calypso726
Escaping reality one Disney vacation at a time
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2006
You hit the nail on the head. Right now, I have a few hotel cards and their respective points that give me the additional rooms I presently need outside of Disney. (I like the beaches in summer.) For Disney I have DVC. And although everyone can use a little extra cash, I had no consuming need for cash out strategies. I had purchased enough Disney tickets to do me for the next 15-20 years. So a Disney trip for me is gas and groceries mostly and a few nice meals when I feel like it. All well within my budget.
The big change is that come next January, my youngest grandchild will be 3. Tickets will then be needed for 4 people in that family and if I have a UR stash, I can help without much impact to my budget. So my future needs will hopefully be met with UR's or any other method that presents itself. For me there is no pressure to do anything, but by careful plodding away, I can make it easier for my own family to enjoy trips.
This morning my son (through text) shared that he may be attending a wedding this summer on the west coast - a friend of his girlfriend who is from the west coast. I offered him some southwest gift cards and some points. He wasn't expecting this as he didn't know I had them. It made it much easier for him to plan his getaway with his girlfriend.
So, this is just one way of saying I didn't feel the need for big rewards either and I'm happy with my plan as it stands. I may loosely follow my plan or not. I think I'm fairly conservative about churning, but like you open to a certain limit of it, but I don't have to have every Barclay, citi, chase, amex that is out there. And I may continue the UR journey and get a few of those cards later this year or in 2020, or not. It's all a loosely laid out opportunity that doesn't consume me or make me crazy.
I do like this community and I like to know what's going on. Many subjects pop up here that keep it interesting and the human element is attractive to me. I hope it continues for a long while in the same spirit it is now. At the end of the day we all make our own decisions and are responsible for them but it's always nice to know the options and have people that will give the pros and cons as well as celebrate successes.
Disney tix for the next 15-20 years is awesome!
I love this community and sometimes struggle to keep up with the thread, but do enjoy many of the OT discussions. It makes it feel like a group of friends.
I think as a group our greatest strength is our diversity in how we choose to churn. I think that the collective experience we share here is invaluable when it comes to the pros and cons of any strategy. The only way to see a different perspective is when someone is doing something different and shares the how and why of it.
Thank you for this. I was a tiny bit worried about my post - thinking it would be misconstrued as I DON"T NEED TO DO WHAT YOU ALL DO. Lol. I don't need to do what you all do - but totally understand why and how you are doing it. In a few years, DH and I will hopefully have more time to travel (retirement - ahhh) and my strategy may change. But right now I am content slowly building my little nest egg of points.
Oh no that's the beauty of this community. No matter how different we are in our strategies we all seem to have a "you do you" outlook towards one another and celebrate whatever that may mean to each of us. I know some here consider what I do to be somewhat extreme whether that be in points accumulation or points redemption and perhaps they are right. If I were posting on r/churning or Flyer Talk (which I'm not), I would likely not be viewed as extreme at all on my points accumulation and point redemption and perhaps they would be right too. The point is, the perception of what I do, doesn't change what I'm doing. It works for me right now and I'm good with that. I only post about it here because we don't have anyone who is Judgey McNasty to anyone and I trust it will stay that way.