I love credit cards so much! v6.0 - 2023 (see first page for add'l details)

[CyndiLouWho]

For those of you that don't get over to the Disney gift card thread. Costco is offering $250 Disney gift cards for $224.99 while supplies last. It says max 2, but many people have been reporting they have been able to place 2 orders of 2 cards.
https://www.costco.com/.product.400...lSwVSDQfHVmWdlCC8wyM_i5_T2Zs6eJ47UdJvDuW1VaSc

Thanks to @misssue23 for the heads up!

I am so bummed my CFF was hacked this week and I am waiting for a new one to arrive.

 

[hsmamato2]

quoting myself to double check this detail...... if I app'd for this card before offer ends (12/11) and then didn't hit MSR till a day or 2 after my "24 months from bonus date" (the date they got dropped into my account,bc I can't recall the actual date I saw them on my cc acct page and I closed it) would that work? Or no b/c I can't APP until 24 months after getting bonus?

Again... anyone experienced with this timing? I want to app for personal swa on 12/10... it won't be 24 months from last bonus till 2/2/24.. will that work, or the actual app has to be done after 2/2/24? ( I was thinking app now, hit spend early feb.)

 

[havaneselover]

My daughter is on the way home for Christmas break and blew a tire in the middle of no where SC. All the tire shops around are closed. Luckily her dad is way overprotective and helping.

 

[sinnika]

I just returned from an NYC trip with DS. I flew in from Houston to New Jersey using United points And took the train into NYC Penn Station, which was very easy and reasonable. $16 for one way fare. DS was arriving from Philadelphia where he just started a new job at the Philadelphia zoo. He took the Megabus to NYC. Our goal was to see Broadway shows and enjoy the Christmas decorations and the atmosphere of Christmastime in NYC. It truly is my most favorite time to visit the Big Apple! All last minute show tickets and meals were to help DS earn a SUB for his CIC. We both arrived at noon at the Hyatt Midtown on 36th Street. Great location for shopping at Macy’s and they upgraded our room to an Empire State building view! It’s so beautiful to see that especially at night when it’s all lit up! Also, the Christmas market at Bryant Park was fun and was only four blocks from our hotel. We visited briefly on two separate evenings, enjoying some of the holiday snacks, like hot cider and cider donuts! I used Hyatt points for our 2 night stay. We managed to see Sweeney Todd on Wednesday at 2 PM, then went back to our hotel to check in and visit the Christmas market on our way to see the 7 PM show for Book of Mormon. We had a late dinner at Ellen’s Stardust diner on 51st Street. If you have never been, it really is a fun place especially after an evening show. There’s always a line, but is generally shorter after 10pm. So we got to see 3 musicals and the Rockettes Christmas spectacular. I won Book of Mormon seats on Lucky Seat and the rest of the tickets were purchased at TKTS in Times Square. Just another great tip, we purchased Sweeney Todd and the Rockettes tickets on Wednesday afternoon. We were waiting to see if we won any other Luckyseat tickets for Thursday evening. Since we did not, we went back to TKTS and now they have a fast pass line so if you have purchased tickets from TKTS within the last seven days and show your ticket stubs, you get head of the line privileges. That was awesome! All of our seats for every show were in the orchestra, 7th row or closer with the exception of Sweeney Todd, which only had mezzanine seats left. But still great seats, and I was mainly there to hear Josh Groban! We also fit in a stroll through Central Park, and a shopping trip to Macy’s. Our final day was spent at the Bronx zoo. This was our second time up there, and since DS is now working at a zoo, it’s quite impressive for him to see. If you are a zoo person and in the NYC area, it is definitely worth the trip!
We had free breakfast at the Hyatt, and enjoyed two sit down meals and cocktails at nicer restaurants. Our out-of-pocket for all travel and lodging, meals and entertainment was right around $1000 for everything, tickets included! I love this board, and all the great tips that I have learned along the way! And I especially love making new memories with family! This was my second mother son trip to NYC. We saw Hugh Jackman in the Music Man last summer. So glad he loves the theater as much as his mama!

 

[NewbieMom]

That's a great suggestion, and no I haven't yet. Partly because this is my 5th BizPlat and I don't want to draw eyes to my account if I can avoid it. Plus, I also have a targeted email for another BizPlat that I'm halfway considering doing, before closing #5.

FWIW, I had this happened to me around #3 and called in to merge. It was simple and the rep did not ask any questions and just mentioned this had happened to a lot of people. I saw some rumors of the nll drying up, so I also just got targeted for another and took it. This one's #5

 

[NewbieMom]

Again... anyone experienced with this timing? I want to app for personal swa on 12/10... it won't be 24 months from last bonus till 2/2/24.. will that work, or the actual app has to be done after 2/2/24? ( I was thinking app now, hit spend early feb.)

I don't think Chase would even approve you if you haven't hit the 24 months mark yet.

 

[NewbieMom]

I saw this comment on Reddit. Can someone shed some light? Sounds like MS that I could jump on.

"Fed up with a certain teen banking app. Attempted to fund with fixed BHN MCGC as usual, autodrains the card but glitches going in to the account. Apparently it’s an issue for all customers, not just MSers. Been waiting a week for the engineers to figure out how to give me back my money. Small amount in the grand scheme of the things and I’m glad I don’t have much tied up there."

Is it Greenlight?

Would you just pay the monthly fee?

On a related note, I was looking at getting a debit card for my oldest and keeping only a very small amount for her to "manage." She's recently expressed interest in earning some money and loves to spend the gift cards she gets for Christmas/birthday at stores. I think a debit card would help her understand how much she earns, spends, and saves. Anyone have recommendations?

 

[EACarlson]

On a related note, I was looking at getting a debit card for my oldest and keeping only a very small amount for her to "manage." She's recently expressed interest in earning some money and loves to spend the gift cards she gets for Christmas/birthday at stores. I think a debit card would help her understand how much she earns, spends, and saves. Anyone have recommendations?

If it's for regular use I would go with a teen checking account from a credit union. Another option if she's not going to be depositing is to add her to a credit card that has a limit you can set. That's what I'm planning to do with my older son as soon as he turns 12. The card I have in mind also gives him a Precheck credit to use, and would make it possible to temporarily raise the limit if you needed to give them access to more funds quickly for some reason.

 

[IFlossU]

Would you just pay the monthly fee?

On a related note, I was looking at getting a debit card for my oldest and keeping only a very small amount for her to "manage." She's recently expressed interest in earning some money and loves to spend the gift cards she gets for Christmas/birthday at stores. I think a debit card would help her understand how much she earns, spends, and saves. Anyone have recommendations?

I don’t know how old your daughter is, but I did what @EACarlson plans to do. When my kids turned 13 I took them to our bank to open checking accounts, which are linked directly to my bank account, and then I made them authorized users on one of my credit cards. Obviously you know your daughter better than anyone, and whether she’s ready for the responsibility, but it’s so important to me that my kids understand how to responsibly use credit cards that I want to be the one guiding them through this process. A debit card is a great idea as well. I’m all for anything that teaches kids how to budget, and manage money. I also think it’s never too early for them to start learning that credit cards don’t have to equal debt.

 

[becauseimnew]

Would you just pay the monthly fee?

On a related note, I was looking at getting a debit card for my oldest and keeping only a very small amount for her to "manage." She's recently expressed interest in earning some money and loves to spend the gift cards she gets for Christmas/birthday at stores. I think a debit card would help her understand how much she earns, spends, and saves. Anyone have recommendations?

If you have a Chase checking account, you can open a teen account which uses the same software as Green Light.

 

[ljhayes]

Hi all! I'm new to the thread and to the cc game. We are a family of 4 and we travel 2-3 times a year. Mostly jetblue recently but also have some points and credits with southwest and AA and have a delta flight coming up in a few months. My main goal is to start working to get at least 2 award tickets for flights from Boston to Japan in June 2025. Neither DH nor I have any new cards in the past 24 months other than the Chase Sapphire Preferred which I just got this week. I have Disney and Jetblue cards (which I don't think can help us at all for this goal) and DH already has some old version of the Chase Sapphire that seems like the preferred but doesn't have an annual fee, and an AMEX. It seems like I can get award tickets out of AA, BA, AC, UA or CX and I've just started to dig into the different transfer options and point amounts. I plan to try searching through this thread more but happy for any advice anyone has to offer!

 

[CyndiLouWho]

Yay! Instant approval for SW personal. DH got SW biz last month and $700 from MSR with next closing 1/2/24.

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

Just back from Costa Rica, and it exceeded all our expectations! We’ve been to Hawaii, and CR felt very similar, but with wildlife viewing on steroids! I’ll try to write up a review this week if I have time, but some initial thoughts and a few pics:

1) Los Altos is totally worth it! We stayed for 5 nights. Breakfast was great every morning. We enjoyed the pool and hot tub, beach is no Punta Cana and isn’t the best in the area but we did go twice because of convenience, and enjoyed it. The complimentary drinks and snacks in the room were a really nice touch. The residence is almost bigger than our entire house we loved it!

2) Driving was mostly fine from San Jose to Manuel Antonio, to Dominical for a day trip, and around MA and Quepos areas for dinner. If you aren’t used to driving on hills, be prepared! It made me nervous but it was ok. The roads are in better condition than I expected!

3) The attitude of the Costa Rican people we found was a lot better than some other Latin or Caribbean countries we’ve been to where they try to scam you or ask for money a lot. We found it more laid back and the people were so nice.

4) We’ve never seen so much wildlife in our life! Sloths, coatis, capuchin and squirrel monkeys, iguanas, boas, agoutis, so many parrots, scarlet macaws outside our balcony every morning, etc etc. We were in awe every day.

5) Our favorite excursion was to Nauyaca Waterfalls. Seriously incredible. Go if you can! We drove there, and then took a pickup to the falls instead of hiking it. The drive to their parking lot is not for the faint of heart though. It is a seriously steep hill for 2km+ and I was freaking out

6) Drink lots of water!! I got heat exhaustion our last full day there and passed out on the hiking trails. I underestimated the humidity. It was 90 degrees and 85% humidity, and I wasn’t drinking much water every day so I was seriously dehydrated. I was drinking mostly coffee and juice at breakfast, and then happy hour drinks in the evening, and my water consumption compared to when I’m at home was seriously lacking. Only thing I’d change is paying more attention to this!

7) I didn’t find the mosquitos to be as bad as I expected. When I’m at home and go outside at dusk, I can easily get 20 bites in 5 minutes. I’m a mosquito magnet. I got a total of 7 bites over our 6 day trip, and most of them were on the last day when I forgot to apply bug spray.

I’d be happy to answer any questions you have! We loved this trip, and thanks to all here that already went and recommended it. Would have never knew about the redemption without yall!

 

[IFlossU]

Just back from Costa Rica, and it exceeded all our expectations! We’ve been to Hawaii, and CR felt very similar, but with wildlife viewing on steroids! I’ll try to write up a review this week if I have time, but some initial thoughts and a few pics:

1) Los Altos is totally worth it! We stayed for 5 nights. Breakfast was great every morning. We enjoyed the pool and hot tub, beach is no Punta Cana and isn’t the best in the area but we did go twice because of convenience, and enjoyed it. The complimentary drinks and snacks in the room were a really nice touch. The residence is almost bigger than our entire house we loved it!

2) Driving was mostly fine from San Jose to Manuel Antonio, to Dominical for a day trip, and around MA and Quepos areas for dinner. If you aren’t used to driving on hills, be prepared! It made me nervous but it was ok. The roads are in better condition than I expected!

3) The attitude of the Costa Rican people we found was a lot better than some other Latin or Caribbean countries we’ve been to where they try to scam you or ask for money a lot. We found it more laid back and the people were so nice.

4) We’ve never seen so much wildlife in our life! Sloths, coatis, capuchin and squirrel monkeys, iguanas, boas, agoutis, so many parrots, scarlet macaws outside our balcony every morning, etc etc. We were in awe every day.

5) Our favorite excursion was to Nauyaca Waterfalls. Seriously incredible. Go if you can! We drove there, and then took a pickup to the falls instead of hiking it. The drive to their parking lot is not for the faint of heart though. It is a seriously steep hill for 2km+ and I was freaking out

6) Drink lots of water!! I got heat exhaustion our last full day there and passed out on the hiking trails. I underestimated the humidity. It was 90 degrees and 85% humidity, and I wasn’t drinking much water every day so I was seriously dehydrated. I was drinking mostly coffee and juice at breakfast, and then happy hour drinks in the evening, and my water consumption compared to when I’m at home was seriously lacking. Only thing I’d change is paying more attention to this!

7) I didn’t find the mosquitos to be as bad as I expected. When I’m at home and go outside at dusk, I can easily get 20 bites in 5 minutes. I’m a mosquito magnet. I got a total of 7 bites over our 6 day trip, and most of them were on the last day when I forgot to apply bug spray.

I’d be happy to answer any questions you have! We loved this trip, and thanks to all here that already went and recommended it. Would have never knew about the redemption without yall!

So happy you shared your experience. I also can’t believe all those monkeys on your balcony we saw them on property, but wow! How cool! And yes. the size of the room is crazy. It’s now how my kids assess all properties we stay at “well it’s not Los Altos” we didn’t make it down to the falls, and I’m kind of kicking myself after seeing your photos. Glad you had a great time!!

 

[CyndiLouWho]

Just back from Costa Rica, and it exceeded all our expectations! We’ve been to Hawaii, and CR felt very similar, but with wildlife viewing on steroids! I’ll try to write up a review this week if I have time, but some initial thoughts and a few pics:

1) Los Altos is totally worth it! We stayed for 5 nights. Breakfast was great every morning. We enjoyed the pool and hot tub, beach is no Punta Cana and isn’t the best in the area but we did go twice because of convenience, and enjoyed it. The complimentary drinks and snacks in the room were a really nice touch. The residence is almost bigger than our entire house we loved it!

2) Driving was mostly fine from San Jose to Manuel Antonio, to Dominical for a day trip, and around MA and Quepos areas for dinner. If you aren’t used to driving on hills, be prepared! It made me nervous but it was ok. The roads are in better condition than I expected!

3) The attitude of the Costa Rican people we found was a lot better than some other Latin or Caribbean countries we’ve been to where they try to scam you or ask for money a lot. We found it more laid back and the people were so nice.

4) We’ve never seen so much wildlife in our life! Sloths, coatis, capuchin and squirrel monkeys, iguanas, boas, agoutis, so many parrots, scarlet macaws outside our balcony every morning, etc etc. We were in awe every day.

5) Our favorite excursion was to Nauyaca Waterfalls. Seriously incredible. Go if you can! We drove there, and then took a pickup to the falls instead of hiking it. The drive to their parking lot is not for the faint of heart though. It is a seriously steep hill for 2km+ and I was freaking out

6) Drink lots of water!! I got heat exhaustion our last full day there and passed out on the hiking trails. I underestimated the humidity. It was 90 degrees and 85% humidity, and I wasn’t drinking much water every day so I was seriously dehydrated. I was drinking mostly coffee and juice at breakfast, and then happy hour drinks in the evening, and my water consumption compared to when I’m at home was seriously lacking. Only thing I’d change is paying more attention to this!

7) I didn’t find the mosquitos to be as bad as I expected. When I’m at home and go outside at dusk, I can easily get 20 bites in 5 minutes. I’m a mosquito magnet. I got a total of 7 bites over our 6 day trip, and most of them were on the last day when I forgot to apply bug spray.

I’d be happy to answer any questions you have! We loved this trip, and thanks to all here that already went and recommended it. Would have never knew about the redemption without yall!

We loved it there too! We did see macaws from our balcony but not monkeys. That is crazy! I have to say I would have been pretty apprehensive because they can get aggressive but that's still pretty cool.

 

[Crazed4DisneyinSC]

So happy you shared your experience. I also can’t believe all those monkeys on your balcony we saw them on property, but wow! How cool! And yes. the size of the room is crazy. It’s now how my kids assess all properties we stay at “well it’s not Los Altos” we didn’t make it down to the falls, and I’m kind of kicking myself after seeing your photos. Glad you had a great time!!

I told DH that I want a Los Altos bathroom the second bathroom’s shower was the size of a walk in closet… I could fit a family of 4 in there, LOL!

We loved it there too! We did see macaws from our balcony but not monkeys. That is crazy! I have to say I would have been pretty apprehensive because they can get aggressive but that's still pretty cool.

The only monkeys we found a little aggressive were the capuchins on the mangrove boat tour… they boarded our boat and were climbing on our heads and getting a little mad when the captain wasn’t giving them food, because some of the other boats were feeding them but ours wasn’t. We didn’t mind though because we got some great pics. The monkeys on our balcony were squirrel monkeys and really apprehensive of us. DH saw them from the window, there were about 25 of them eating a fruit hanging from a tree 2 feet from our balcony. Well then we went outside to film them and DH went outside with a mango in his hand that he was eating. That was either the worst (or best!) idea ever as all the monkeys then jumped from the tree to our balcony to swarm his piece of fruit and after it was gone they were trying to grab his hands and find it and chittering at us and climbing all over him They didn’t stick around long and if you did any fast movement they jumped away really quickly. I don’t think the squirrel monkeys are as used to people as the capuchins are.

 

[NewbieMom]

If it's for regular use I would go with a teen checking account from a credit union. Another option if she's not going to be depositing is to add her to a credit card that has a limit you can set. That's what I'm planning to do with my older son as soon as he turns 12. The card I have in mind also gives him a Precheck credit to use, and would make it possible to temporarily raise the limit if you needed to give them access to more funds quickly for some reason.

I don’t know how old your daughter is, but I did what @EACarlson plans to do. When my kids turned 13 I took them to our bank to open checking accounts, which are linked directly to my bank account, and then I made them authorized users on one of my credit cards. Obviously you know your daughter better than anyone, and whether she’s ready for the responsibility, but it’s so important to me that my kids understand how to responsibly use credit cards that I want to be the one guiding them through this process. A debit card is a great idea as well. I’m all for anything that teaches kids how to budget, and manage money. I also think it’s never too early for them to start learning that credit cards don’t have to equal debt.

If you have a Chase checking account, you can open a teen account which uses the same software as Green Light.

Thanks for the input. She's not a teen yet and wouldn't be earning real money so she doesn't need a checking account and definitely not a credit card yet. I do want to eventually teach her about debt/credit. But I want to start with simply loading a debit with her allowance each week and she can make decisions to save/spend and budget. If she spends it all, that's it. No overdrafting fees, almost like a reloadable prepaid debit. Hopefully by the time she turns 13, she'll be ready for the checking and credit card responsibly.

 

[havaneselover]

I booked my Japan tickets through Chase UR. Of course there's been a schedule change that looks like it's significant enough to mean they may have to offer a full refund. On the return trip, the original flight went Osaka to San Francisco to Dulles to Richmond. Now it's going from San Francisco to Denver. I'm fine with the change but don't want to accept it because I'd like the flexibility of being able to cancel if needed (due to my dad's health and my 17-year old dog). Will they cancel our tickets if I don't accept the changes? I've already gone in and selected seats on the new flights. But Chase keeps emailing me about the change to the itinerary that I need to accept.

 

[becauseimnew]

Thanks for the input. She's not a teen yet and wouldn't be earning real money so she doesn't need a checking account and definitely not a credit card yet. I do want to eventually teach her about debt/credit. But I want to start with simply loading a debit with her allowance each week and she can make decisions to save/spend and budget. If she spends it all, that's it. No overdrafting fees, almost like a reloadable prepaid debit. Hopefully by the time she turns 13, she'll be ready for the checking and credit card responsibly.

Chase teen account is exactly that, linked to your account and you can add money.

 

[NewbieMom]

Chase teen account is exactly that, linked to your account and you can add money.

Thanks! I'll look into it. Maybe a year ago, they constantly sent me emails about a kids' account but I just deleted all of them.