Hey gang, I’m shopping for a new credit card and wanted to ask you all for you opinions. There are so many cards out there now it’s difficult to keep up with them all; from Amazon to Uber! I’m figuring out that there really isn’t a “perfect card” for every single purchase. Some cards are better for traveling, others better for everyday expenses.
I love my bofa cash rewards card. I chose 3% cash back on online purchases, plus bofa give an additional 10% customer bonus, so it’s 3.3% online purchaes, 2.2% grocery stores, 1.1% anything else.
No annual fees. Interest Rate is high-ish at 24% but it’s always fully paid off.
I have both. Another good one I don’t have but I’m considering is the BofA Cash Rewards card which gives you 3% back on online shopping. $200 bonus with $1K spend right now.
Then Chase Freedom and Discover IT both have 5% rotating categories.
I’m toying with the idea of getting a AMEX Platinum card due to the incredible benefits that come with it. But at $550 a year membership, and not the best rewards program out there, it’s a difficult decision.
The Chase Preferred card looks pretty nice as well. I’ve already got a Chase Slate card and asked about swapping over to the Preferred card. They said I could, but I wouldn’t get the welcome bonus unless I started a new account with them.
I’ve got some old cards I used when they were 0% APR. Now I use them instead of handing out my debit card everywhere because it’s safer, IMO. But I’m getting zero reward points. I figured I might as well get some kind of reward for spending money I was going to spend anyways!
Citibank Costco Visa card. 4% on gas, 3% travel and dining, 2% on everything at Costco, 1 % on everything else. Very good card IF you are a Costco member. Benefits come as a Costco rebate to be spent there. If you are a Costco shopper, you already know that isn’t hard to do.
I recommending checking for a nearby local credit union to see what they provide.
Not quite as likely to be a target for a massive data theft as, say, Capital One. or other big national targets.
The most valuable credit cards are those that issue airline points, but you have to play the game properly.
Here’s a typical situation: A card will give you 60,000 to 80,000 points that either are flexible and you can transfer to airlines (chase or amex partners), or go directly to the airline (united, southwest, aa, etc). The catch is you have to spend $3000 within 3 months to qualify for the bonus. Main goal here is to use your normal spending, NOT spend more than normal.
How much are those points worth? 80,000 points can get you a round trip flight to new zealand which is worth around $1500. Even more valuable if you want to fly business class, but i prefer to do more economy flights.
The key here is you want to apply in a certain order because some card companies are much pickier than others. (Chase for example has a rule that you can’t apply if you’ve done more than 5 cards in 2 years).
It’s incredibly valuable, you just have to set reminders on when to downgrade the cards (to no-fee versions) and make sure you hit the minimum spend bonus targets.
If anyone is interested PM me and I can point you in the right direction / refer you to some good cards, but I don’t want to spam the thread with the topic.
If you do it right you easily get that back and can cancel the first year. Here’s a sample of a card I did with $450 fee:
Chase Sapphire Reserve first year: $450 got me:
- 100,000 miles (worth roughly $1800 in flights)
- $300 free to spend towards transport
- $100 towards global entry
other perks
You can see that if you cancel the next year, I just got $2200 worth of value for $450. That was a particularly good deal, but most card offers you can get around $800 worth of value for a $100 fee or less.
Credit cards are my field of expertise. Like you said, there is no “one card fits all”. You need to have a plan. What do you want? Travel to europe? Travel to asia? Get cashback to buy more flashlight? Get good insurance? Get good travel benefits such as lounge access and hotel status?