ATHLLC6931539866
00:00:00.000 | (upbeat music)
00:00:03.000 | - Hello, and welcome to another episode of All The Hacks.
00:00:05.880 | I'm Chris Hutchins, I'm excited you're here.
00:00:08.320 | Two weeks ago, I did an episode
00:00:09.600 | that was a bit of a combination
00:00:10.880 | of questions you've sent in, hacks you've shared,
00:00:13.520 | some takeaways from some recent trips I've taken,
00:00:16.000 | some of the latest deals on points and miles,
00:00:18.360 | and honestly, there was so much good content to cover
00:00:21.120 | that I didn't even get to the questions about money
00:00:23.560 | and a lot of the other categories in life,
00:00:25.440 | and we focused mostly on travel.
00:00:27.760 | So today, I wanna do another similar episode,
00:00:30.200 | but dive into a lot of money and life questions.
00:00:33.040 | Things like where to put cash, whether it's T-bills,
00:00:35.680 | high-yield savings, CD ladders,
00:00:37.700 | even things like Wealthfront's new bond portfolio,
00:00:40.360 | for anyone who had iBonds, what to do about them,
00:00:42.920 | when to sell them.
00:00:44.200 | I'll talk a little bit about some bank bonuses,
00:00:46.220 | which actually could be a compelling alternative
00:00:48.240 | to earning interest, share some hacks from listeners,
00:00:51.400 | and then on the life side, I've got a few fun things
00:00:53.880 | on food, especially on how to save money on meat.
00:00:56.800 | I've also done a really big deep dive on cell phone plans.
00:01:00.040 | I've gotten a lot of questions from you all
00:01:01.520 | that I wanna dive into, and then a few other hacks
00:01:03.840 | on personal data, photo storage, and a lot more,
00:01:07.320 | but to kick us off, I wanna share a few wins
00:01:09.600 | that listeners have sent in.
00:01:11.160 | So the first came in as a review on Apple Podcasts
00:01:13.680 | from Timit687.
00:01:15.240 | Thanks for writing that review.
00:01:16.440 | I really appreciate these reviews.
00:01:18.200 | I'm gonna start highlighting them,
00:01:19.500 | so if you wanna write them in
00:01:20.640 | with something interesting in the topic,
00:01:22.640 | I'd love to share them on the show.
00:01:24.480 | I just wanna give him a shout out.
00:01:25.960 | He started listening to this show about three months ago,
00:01:28.800 | and he's already earned over half a million points.
00:01:31.520 | He's already taken two free trips and more to come.
00:01:34.240 | I wish I had your contact info,
00:01:36.040 | because I would ask you how you earned those points
00:01:37.960 | so I could share more to everyone here,
00:01:39.880 | but great work there.
00:01:41.320 | So glad you've been able to take so many trips.
00:01:43.620 | Really excited for you.
00:01:44.840 | Next was from Brian, who was staying
00:01:46.760 | at the Broadmoor Hotel in Colorado Springs.
00:01:49.000 | He did what I've always recommended,
00:01:50.560 | book directly with the hotel, email them in advance,
00:01:53.200 | let them know he's coming and how excited he is for the trip,
00:01:55.720 | and while he didn't actually get an upgrade this time,
00:01:58.320 | he ended up getting champagne, nuts, chocolates,
00:02:01.240 | and free desserts at all his meals at the hotel,
00:02:03.640 | which was amazing.
00:02:04.960 | And finally, Drew was on a hybrid personal work trip
00:02:07.900 | where the work part got canceled
00:02:09.940 | and he needed to book a flight home himself.
00:02:12.040 | The cheapest flight out there was about $400,
00:02:14.860 | but he found the same flights
00:02:16.360 | on American Airlines' website for only 7,500 points,
00:02:19.920 | which ended up being over five cents of value per point,
00:02:23.000 | which is an amazing option.
00:02:24.800 | For those who don't know, American Airlines miles
00:02:27.040 | are some of the hardest to come by.
00:02:29.080 | The main ways to get them are flying American,
00:02:31.420 | signing up for an American Airlines credit card,
00:02:33.840 | or getting a Bilt card,
00:02:35.560 | because Bilt is the only transferable point
00:02:37.600 | that transfers to American.
00:02:39.560 | It's one of the reasons I'm so happy to have Bilt points
00:02:42.200 | because American has such great value in so many cases
00:02:45.380 | and they're just so hard to come by.
00:02:47.160 | If you're interested in the Bilt card,
00:02:48.620 | which, by the way, also lets you earn points on rent,
00:02:51.320 | three points per dollar on dining,
00:02:52.760 | and two per dollar on travel,
00:02:54.740 | you can go to allthehacks.com/bilt and check out that card.
00:02:58.000 | Those are a couple quick wins I wanted to share,
00:03:00.060 | so let's jump into the topic of money right after this.
00:03:03.460 | (upbeat music)
00:03:06.080 | So first off, as much as this is a topic
00:03:08.000 | that's come up quite a few times,
00:03:09.720 | I feel like changes in the market affect the answer enough
00:03:12.340 | that it's worth addressing again.
00:03:13.680 | And it's the question of what to do with cash.
00:03:16.520 | And I'll define what to do with cash
00:03:18.200 | as what to do with money that you think you need
00:03:20.440 | in less than five years,
00:03:21.800 | because for me, long-term savings,
00:03:23.860 | things I don't need to touch for five years,
00:03:25.920 | I put in my Wealthfront Investment account,
00:03:27.840 | invest it in the market.
00:03:29.200 | But for short-term money that I wanna earn a return on,
00:03:32.120 | I feel like there are a few options.
00:03:33.720 | The traditional option that I think many people
00:03:35.840 | have done in the past is high-yield savings accounts,
00:03:38.100 | but there's also CDs and treasury bills,
00:03:40.720 | which have been really popular lately.
00:03:42.840 | The way I think about it is,
00:03:44.560 | ultimately, I'm looking for a combination of return,
00:03:46.640 | but actually after-tax return,
00:03:48.520 | because there are some tax benefits
00:03:49.920 | of some of these options,
00:03:51.140 | but I'm also looking for liquidity and ease of use.
00:03:54.000 | So I'll start with high-yield savings.
00:03:55.800 | It's typically the easiest option
00:03:57.760 | because it's transferring money into an account.
00:04:00.360 | There's no buying, there's no trading,
00:04:01.960 | there's no locking up.
00:04:03.380 | Obvious downside is that you're not locking in any rates.
00:04:06.400 | So if rates were to change,
00:04:07.940 | your interest rate would change immediately.
00:04:09.680 | For high-yield savings, there are so many options.
00:04:12.320 | I'll link to a post from Doctor of Credit,
00:04:14.200 | which has a list of every high-yield savings option compared.
00:04:17.460 | Personally, I keep all of my high-yield savings cash
00:04:20.200 | in my Wealthfront cash account.
00:04:21.700 | If you have an individual cash account at Wealthfront,
00:04:23.660 | there's a big advantage that you can also do
00:04:25.500 | a lot of things you can't do
00:04:26.980 | in most high-yield savings accounts,
00:04:28.940 | which is you can do bill pay,
00:04:31.300 | you can take money out from an ATM.
00:04:33.060 | It functions very much like a checking account
00:04:34.900 | and has all the typical checking features.
00:04:36.900 | And so you can use that account
00:04:38.260 | to direct deposit your paycheck,
00:04:40.000 | to pay your bills and do everything normally,
00:04:41.940 | and still earn high yield.
00:04:43.620 | So from a simplicity standpoint,
00:04:45.320 | I think the individual cash account at Wealthfront is great.
00:04:47.860 | If you sign up with a link at allthehacks.com/wfcash,
00:04:52.860 | for the first three months,
00:04:54.560 | you'll get an additional 50 basis points,
00:04:57.240 | meaning the 4.8% rate they are marketing
00:04:59.440 | will get bumped up to 5.3.
00:05:01.880 | That's not my referral link.
00:05:03.120 | Actually, it's the referral link from All The Hacks members.
00:05:06.020 | It's a unique link that any member
00:05:07.760 | who sent in their referral link,
00:05:09.660 | it cycles through them randomly.
00:05:11.360 | So you'll be supporting other All The Hacks listeners
00:05:13.560 | by using that link.
00:05:14.840 | But if you wanna add your links
00:05:16.320 | and you're an All The Hacks member, send it to me.
00:05:18.040 | If you're not, check out allthehacks.com/join.
00:05:21.320 | Now, I think high yield savings accounts
00:05:22.640 | might be the easiest,
00:05:23.920 | but if you want a little bit higher return,
00:05:26.040 | CDs and treasuries are an option
00:05:28.240 | that I think a lot of people have been talking about lately.
00:05:30.720 | Depending on the day you look at it,
00:05:32.280 | CDs and treasuries might have the same rate,
00:05:34.420 | one might be slightly better, one might be slightly worse.
00:05:37.120 | The durations are not exactly the same,
00:05:39.500 | but I think they're very similar.
00:05:42.560 | I think CDs have an advantage of being a little simpler
00:05:45.480 | because you just put the money in your bank,
00:05:47.480 | it's very clear how it all works,
00:05:49.040 | and treasuries feel a little bit more complicated.
00:05:51.200 | If you buy them directly from an auction,
00:05:53.440 | that process can feel overwhelming.
00:05:55.160 | You can buy them on the secondary market
00:05:57.280 | through your brokerage firm, which makes it a little easier,
00:05:59.840 | or you can even just buy an ETF that holds them,
00:06:02.460 | something like SGOV, or you can even buy a mutual fund,
00:06:05.480 | a money market fund that holds treasuries as well,
00:06:07.680 | like VUSXX.
00:06:09.280 | So I think those are the options out there.
00:06:11.520 | I have a slight edge for treasuries
00:06:13.400 | because I live in California,
00:06:15.040 | we have high state taxes,
00:06:16.400 | and treasuries are state tax exempt.
00:06:18.520 | So that gives a return boost
00:06:20.400 | because I'm not paying an extra 10% of taxes
00:06:23.000 | on the return from those treasuries.
00:06:24.760 | As for whether you want to buy the ETF
00:06:27.040 | or buy the treasuries directly at auction
00:06:28.960 | or buy them in the secondary,
00:06:30.740 | I'm gonna leave that up to you.
00:06:31.760 | But if you have a specific term in mind
00:06:33.640 | and you wanna lock that interest rate in,
00:06:35.880 | you can directly buy those specific duration treasuries.
00:06:38.880 | So you could buy a one-year treasury
00:06:40.800 | and lock in that rate for one year.
00:06:42.920 | So if you have a specific duration in mind,
00:06:45.280 | that can make sense.
00:06:46.240 | But if you just wanna park money,
00:06:48.040 | you don't have a duration in mind,
00:06:49.720 | you live in a high tax state,
00:06:51.080 | so you appreciate that state tax exemption
00:06:53.820 | for treasury bills,
00:06:55.160 | putting it in an ETF or a money market fund
00:06:57.160 | that invests in treasuries
00:06:58.480 | is not gonna be that different of an outcome,
00:07:00.920 | certainly correlated the same,
00:07:02.720 | and might be a lot easier for you.
00:07:04.880 | The one that I've used is SGOV,
00:07:06.660 | but there are a lot of other ones out there,
00:07:08.440 | so feel free to take a look.
00:07:10.160 | Similarly, I got a question from Dan
00:07:12.040 | about CD laddering,
00:07:13.560 | and he's looking at some options there.
00:07:15.760 | The way a CD typically works
00:07:17.200 | is you can invest an amount of money,
00:07:19.200 | get a return,
00:07:20.200 | but you agree to lock it up for a certain period of time.
00:07:22.800 | But if you do need to take that money out early,
00:07:25.040 | you'll probably forfeit some number of months of interest
00:07:27.740 | as a penalty.
00:07:28.700 | But if you're someone who likes to lock up
00:07:30.520 | that interest rate for a long period of time,
00:07:33.140 | you could buy a five-year CD
00:07:34.800 | and know that you're gonna get that return for five years,
00:07:37.580 | which is a pretty compelling thing
00:07:38.840 | for people who don't wanna take any interest rate risk,
00:07:41.640 | but it means you don't have access to that cash
00:07:43.640 | without some form of penalty earlier.
00:07:45.900 | And when interest rates change in the future,
00:07:47.880 | you have a little bit of risk that at that point in time
00:07:49.840 | when you're reinvesting,
00:07:51.000 | rates have gone down.
00:07:52.280 | And so you're concentrating the entire reinvestment risk,
00:07:55.360 | if it were a five-year CD,
00:07:56.920 | at that five-year mark.
00:07:58.460 | So one option is called CD laddering,
00:08:01.040 | which the end outcome would be,
00:08:03.120 | and I'm gonna use one example of doing it over five years,
00:08:05.760 | the end goal would be to end up with five-year CDs,
00:08:08.800 | but that start every five years
00:08:10.800 | so that every year you're reinvesting 20% of your money
00:08:14.200 | and you're spreading out that reinvestment risk,
00:08:16.440 | and then also every year,
00:08:17.880 | you get the chance to take out 20% of your money
00:08:21.040 | without having a penalty.
00:08:22.720 | And so the way you would implement that
00:08:24.280 | is you would buy a one, two, three, four,
00:08:26.520 | and five-year CD now,
00:08:28.160 | and in the end of one year,
00:08:29.680 | buy another five-year CD with that money,
00:08:31.800 | and then the end of two years do the same thing
00:08:33.720 | until you've got rolling five-year CDs every single year.
00:08:37.640 | I think if you're someone who likes
00:08:39.200 | taking less interest rate risk,
00:08:40.880 | someone who likes to lock in that interest rate
00:08:42.840 | for five years, maybe wants a little more liquidity,
00:08:45.920 | and wants to spread out that reinvestment risk
00:08:48.600 | over five years, instead of knowing that every five years
00:08:51.720 | you're gonna lock that up, that could make sense.
00:08:54.080 | For me, as much as I would love to lock in a great rate
00:08:56.560 | for five years, I don't like locking my money up
00:08:58.600 | for that long, so it's not a product I've played with.
00:09:01.120 | I don't have a strong opinion for or against it,
00:09:03.680 | but I think you need to be someone
00:09:04.800 | who really wants to lock interest rates in for a long time,
00:09:08.160 | not need access to capital for a long time,
00:09:10.480 | and want to spread out your reinvestment risk
00:09:12.400 | for it to make sense.
00:09:13.780 | But speaking of locking your rate in for a while,
00:09:16.420 | if you are someone who has a very, very defined need
00:09:19.200 | for money, let's say I need $100,000 in 12 months,
00:09:24.000 | and you know you don't need access to that money,
00:09:26.600 | that's where I think it could make sense
00:09:27.920 | to use a product like a one-year treasury bill
00:09:30.860 | or a one-year CD, because you can lock that interest rate in
00:09:34.040 | and not have to worry, because let's say the market corrects
00:09:37.320 | and rates go down lower and lower,
00:09:38.960 | you will be in a place to continue to get that interest
00:09:41.400 | no matter what, so you can plan on it.
00:09:43.460 | However, if interest rates continue to rise,
00:09:45.720 | you would not get those higher interest rates.
00:09:48.020 | Getting the crew together isn't as easy as it used to be.
00:09:52.480 | I get it, life comes at you fast, but trust me,
00:09:56.020 | your friends are probably desperate for a good hang.
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00:12:17.940 | Hopefully that was helpful thinking about cash
00:12:20.060 | and cash-like options.
00:12:21.580 | But what happens if you wanna take a little bit more risk?
00:12:24.300 | Brian and Sean both wrote in asking what I think
00:12:27.020 | of Wealthfront's new bond portfolio.
00:12:29.100 | And while I haven't used it yet,
00:12:31.220 | I will take a little bit of time
00:12:32.940 | to explain my quick thoughts.
00:12:35.460 | So first off, the idea of the product was,
00:12:38.220 | what exists between a stock investing account and cash?
00:12:42.060 | What if I don't wanna take all the risk
00:12:43.700 | of investing in the stock market,
00:12:45.000 | but I wanna take a little bit more risk
00:12:46.920 | for a little bit more return than just investing in cash
00:12:49.700 | or treasury bills or cash-like alternatives?
00:12:52.260 | So Wealthfront created an automated bond portfolio
00:12:54.420 | that has some of the same features,
00:12:56.260 | tax loss harvesting, automated rebalancing,
00:12:59.000 | as the investment account,
00:13:00.500 | but it targets a higher yield than cash
00:13:03.260 | and a much lower volatility.
00:13:04.780 | So right now they say that they target a 3% volatility.
00:13:08.140 | It's an interesting product
00:13:09.500 | that I haven't quite figured out how it fits in my world.
00:13:12.660 | One advantage is that some of those bonds being held
00:13:15.260 | are in treasuries and U.S. government securities.
00:13:18.340 | So you do get a tax benefit there
00:13:20.320 | if you live in a state with high state taxes.
00:13:23.380 | But I had a conversation with my old co-founder
00:13:27.220 | about how to think about this.
00:13:29.000 | And the point he made was that high-yield bonds
00:13:30.800 | are very similar to regular bonds,
00:13:33.280 | except for the fact that you're also taking
00:13:35.960 | a little bit of risk in the company,
00:13:37.440 | which is essentially similar to equity risk.
00:13:39.780 | His perspective was he would be more interested
00:13:42.840 | in just taking a smaller percentage of equity risk
00:13:46.080 | instead of having a entire portfolio of bonds
00:13:49.420 | with some corporate bonds and high-yield bonds.
00:13:51.240 | What if you just made a portfolio
00:13:52.680 | that was 90% treasuries and 10% stocks?
00:13:56.400 | And we were trying to figure out
00:13:57.520 | why that wasn't an obvious thing that people did.
00:14:00.000 | And we came to the conclusion that high-yield bonds
00:14:02.960 | actually have a marketed yield.
00:14:04.960 | So because there is a yield, like a 30-day SEC yield
00:14:08.840 | for corporate bonds and high-yield bonds,
00:14:10.800 | you're actually able to create a number
00:14:13.280 | that you can use to market the return of the portfolio,
00:14:15.960 | which Wealthfront does and shows a 5.75%
00:14:19.200 | blended 30-day yield on the website.
00:14:21.840 | You can't do that with stocks.
00:14:23.000 | Stocks don't have an advertised yield.
00:14:25.800 | So I actually think one of the reasons
00:14:27.240 | that this product is a little easier
00:14:28.520 | is you can just explain what that risk reward looks like
00:14:32.080 | in an easier way than you could
00:14:34.040 | with a 90% government bond, 10% equity portfolio.
00:14:37.840 | Functionally, they're probably a little bit similar,
00:14:40.080 | but the argument was if you want risk, go for equities.
00:14:43.560 | If you want stable income, go for government securities,
00:14:46.120 | and maybe don't do something in the middle.
00:14:47.640 | I don't have much more that I could add
00:14:50.240 | on the automated bond portfolio right now,
00:14:52.120 | but by no means do I think it would be
00:14:53.400 | a bad investment decision to use a product like this.
00:14:56.320 | Certainly lots of smart investors out there
00:14:58.280 | are investing in corporate bonds, high-yield bonds,
00:15:00.680 | so it's not a product that I think
00:15:02.360 | someone would be crazy to use,
00:15:04.640 | but I just have to ask myself
00:15:06.320 | if I do want more risk than cash,
00:15:08.360 | and by cash, I mean treasuries and CDs and high-yield savings,
00:15:11.960 | I could just put some of the money in equities
00:15:14.440 | and not try to create something in between,
00:15:16.960 | but for some people, I think it's just much easier
00:15:19.120 | to have an automated thing
00:15:20.360 | that fits that kind of middle ground
00:15:22.560 | and not need to go buy some equities
00:15:25.240 | and combine them with another portfolio,
00:15:27.120 | potentially in another account or another brokerage firm.
00:15:29.400 | So hopefully that helps to make sense
00:15:31.640 | of everything I talked about,
00:15:33.160 | but I did actually wanna go to a completely different idea,
00:15:36.080 | which is a little bit more work,
00:15:38.080 | but might actually result in a higher return for cash,
00:15:41.280 | and that's bank bonuses.
00:15:43.040 | So Tyler wrote in saying he got a $750 bonus
00:15:46.880 | for parking $15,000 in a U.S. bank account for 60 days.
00:15:52.400 | Now, if you look at that return,
00:15:54.040 | $750 on $15,000 is a 5% return,
00:15:56.440 | but getting that in about two months instead of 12 months
00:15:59.880 | means that the effective annual rate is 30%.
00:16:04.000 | So if you want to earn the highest amount of yield
00:16:06.920 | on your cash, and you're willing to go through the hoops
00:16:10.080 | of opening up a new account, transferring your money there,
00:16:13.160 | and earning interest in the form of leaving that money there
00:16:16.360 | and getting a bonus and closing the account,
00:16:19.400 | I think it seems like that actually might be
00:16:21.600 | one of the best options.
00:16:22.640 | And I looked through a few other options.
00:16:24.200 | There are a ton of banks that offer cash bonuses
00:16:26.800 | for opening up checking and savings accounts.
00:16:29.120 | I actually worked with a company called Bank Bonus
00:16:31.160 | to set up a site to find them all and sort them.
00:16:33.880 | So if you go to allthehacks.com/bankbonus,
00:16:37.200 | you can see all the different bonuses.
00:16:39.000 | And the way I would think about it is take the bonus,
00:16:40.920 | divide it by the balance you need to maintain
00:16:42.840 | to get the interest rate you're gonna get,
00:16:44.800 | but then divide that interest rate
00:16:46.160 | by the number of days you need to have it in the account
00:16:48.160 | and multiply it by 365
00:16:50.200 | to get an effective annual interest rate.
00:16:52.480 | So on one hand, I look at this and I think,
00:16:54.280 | wow, it's a great way to get a 30% return on cash,
00:16:58.480 | but you're only getting it for 60 days.
00:17:00.200 | And a lot of these bonuses are for accounts
00:17:02.360 | where you can put 10 or $20,000 in,
00:17:05.200 | but it's not an unlimited amount.
00:17:06.760 | If you had $20,000 and you wanted to earn the most interest
00:17:10.160 | you could in a year, you'd probably have to open up
00:17:12.600 | five or six accounts across the year and you'd be okay.
00:17:15.600 | But if you had $200,000, you need to open up
00:17:18.560 | somewhere between 30 to 60 accounts throughout the year,
00:17:21.800 | which is just too much work for me
00:17:23.280 | and I imagine most people to earn that extra return.
00:17:25.960 | Now, because I mentioned how much I love American Miles,
00:17:28.760 | I'd be remiss if I didn't talk about one other bank bonus,
00:17:31.840 | which comes from Basque Bank, who I have an account at.
00:17:34.800 | And the difference between Basque Bank and other banks
00:17:36.800 | is that they pay their interest in American Airlines Miles,
00:17:39.560 | which as I mentioned earlier, are very hard to get.
00:17:42.480 | And the offer that they have is if you deposit $50,000
00:17:45.680 | and they have lower tiers as well,
00:17:47.000 | you earn 20,000 American Airlines Miles
00:17:49.160 | after you've kept that money in there for 180 days.
00:17:52.080 | But on top of that, you also earn 2.5 miles
00:17:55.080 | per dollar per year.
00:17:56.640 | So if you put $50,000 in for 180 days,
00:17:59.640 | you're gonna earn a little over
00:18:01.320 | 81,000 American Airlines Miles.
00:18:03.960 | So what's 81,000 American Airlines Miles worth?
00:18:06.820 | Depending on who you ask,
00:18:08.160 | well, if you're able to get the value that Drew was,
00:18:10.260 | it's worth about $4,000.
00:18:12.280 | But if you look at the PointsGuys valuations,
00:18:14.480 | which is about 1.6 cents per point, it's about $1,300.
00:18:19.120 | Now, if you put that same $50,000
00:18:21.840 | just in the Wealthfront Cash account, earning 4.8%,
00:18:25.640 | you'd get about $1,200.
00:18:27.260 | So in this case,
00:18:28.100 | you're not actually getting that much more value.
00:18:30.680 | Now, if you factor in taxes,
00:18:32.080 | it probably goes up a little higher
00:18:34.200 | because they actually value the miles for tax purposes
00:18:37.600 | at 0.42 cents per mile,
00:18:39.760 | which is much lower than the 1.6 cents per point
00:18:42.560 | we talked about earlier.
00:18:43.440 | So your tax bill on that will be a little smaller
00:18:46.400 | than your tax bill would be if you had earned cash.
00:18:49.000 | But at the end of the day,
00:18:49.840 | this is not really gonna be an option
00:18:51.200 | to earning a much higher return
00:18:53.040 | as much as it is an option to earn a type of point
00:18:55.820 | that is much harder to get.
00:18:57.200 | Okay, I think that covers
00:18:58.440 | a lot of the options related to cash.
00:19:00.800 | The one follow-on to that that I'll include
00:19:03.320 | is about I-bonds.
00:19:04.560 | In the past, we've talked on the show about buying I-bonds
00:19:07.520 | because when inflation was high,
00:19:09.240 | you could earn a yield as high as 9.62%,
00:19:12.240 | and that was locked in for six months.
00:19:14.560 | But inflation has dropped,
00:19:16.400 | and Nathan wrote in asking,
00:19:17.720 | "When do we actually sell these I-bonds?"
00:19:19.640 | He sent a good article,
00:19:20.960 | and so I thought I'd just help anyone who bought I-bonds
00:19:23.200 | think about how to do this,
00:19:24.400 | and I'll explain it with the example
00:19:25.880 | of how I'm thinking about it.
00:19:27.120 | So I bought my first batch of I-bonds in December 2021,
00:19:31.120 | and the way that works
00:19:32.240 | is that the interest rate on those I-bonds
00:19:33.880 | adjusts every December and June.
00:19:36.260 | So for the first six months,
00:19:37.240 | I was earning a little over 7%.
00:19:39.680 | The next six months, I was earning 9.6%, then 6.4%.
00:19:43.640 | And finally, starting in June 2023,
00:19:46.480 | that interest rate dropped to 3.38%,
00:19:49.160 | which is much lower than I can get elsewhere,
00:19:50.960 | and I would normally like to take that money out.
00:19:53.020 | However, the way I-bonds work
00:19:54.440 | is that if you take your money out before five years are up,
00:19:57.440 | you lose the last three months of interest.
00:19:59.880 | So what I wanna do is make sure
00:20:01.960 | that I lose three months of the 3.38% interest,
00:20:05.440 | not three months of the 6.48% interest.
00:20:08.600 | So for me, that means I'm gonna let June, July, and August,
00:20:12.020 | those first three months of earning 3.38%,
00:20:15.120 | be those months that I don't wanna earn interest on,
00:20:17.460 | and on September 1st, in a few days,
00:20:19.160 | I'm gonna withdraw all of the funds
00:20:20.800 | from that first I-bond investment.
00:20:22.800 | I bought another tranche of I-bonds in April 2022.
00:20:25.920 | Those adjust every April and October.
00:20:28.360 | October this year is when that rate will drop to 3.38,
00:20:31.880 | or whatever the rate is at the time,
00:20:33.560 | and I'll leave it in there for October, November, December,
00:20:35.900 | and take it out in January 2024.
00:20:38.140 | There's a great blog post
00:20:39.480 | that I'm gonna link to in the show notes
00:20:40.980 | that will show you exactly if you bought them this month,
00:20:43.400 | this is probably the month you'd wanna sell them,
00:20:45.220 | if you wanna follow a similar strategy to what I'm doing,
00:20:47.880 | so that's really helpful.
00:20:48.760 | So hopefully for anyone who has I-bonds
00:20:50.800 | that's trying to figure that out,
00:20:52.120 | this will make it a lot easier.
00:20:53.480 | On the topic of money, I've got a couple quick things.
00:20:55.600 | First, thank you, Russ, for writing in.
00:20:57.780 | Russ shared that most people don't realize
00:21:00.160 | they can negotiate a mortgage rate
00:21:01.800 | directly with their broker.
00:21:03.200 | So his hack is to get a rate quote
00:21:04.960 | from three to four lenders,
00:21:06.480 | then pick the broker he likes best,
00:21:08.200 | and ask them to beat the lowest rate
00:21:10.080 | with the lowest fees to get your business.
00:21:12.280 | It got him a 2.75 rate for 30 years,
00:21:15.560 | obviously much earlier when rates were a lot lower,
00:21:18.400 | and he also got some lender credits towards closing,
00:21:20.920 | so definitely can't hurt to ask,
00:21:22.360 | and probably a good strategy in today's market.
00:21:25.240 | Next, I wanna talk a little bit about auto insurance.
00:21:28.000 | I've done a whole episode on it,
00:21:29.440 | it was episode number 104,
00:21:31.440 | but interestingly enough,
00:21:33.040 | our USAA auto policy just came up for renewal,
00:21:36.560 | and it went from about $1,700 every six months,
00:21:40.480 | and it went up over $750 over six months.
00:21:44.960 | When I first saw this, I was so frustrated,
00:21:46.960 | because we spent all this time trying to get the best rate,
00:21:49.040 | and here it is going up almost 40% by $750 every six months,
00:21:54.040 | by what would ultimately be over $1,500 a year.
00:21:58.160 | And so I called USAA, big credit to them
00:22:01.200 | for picking up my phone call at 7.30 in the evening,
00:22:04.640 | and helping me understand that when their policies renew,
00:22:08.000 | if you specify lower than the average mileage amount,
00:22:11.200 | sometimes you need to re-specify your mileage amount.
00:22:14.120 | So the default is 12,000 miles a year,
00:22:16.800 | but we had had our policies set up for our two cars
00:22:20.160 | at 3,500 and 5,000 miles per year each,
00:22:23.580 | so when I regave them those numbers,
00:22:26.420 | all of a sudden the rate went back down almost $670,
00:22:30.280 | so the rate had ultimately only really gone up $100
00:22:33.520 | for the six-month policy, which was such a relief.
00:22:36.620 | So two important things.
00:22:38.200 | One, if you drive less than 12,000 miles a year
00:22:41.120 | on any of your vehicles,
00:22:42.400 | you really should be telling your insurance company,
00:22:45.600 | and if you've already told your insurance company,
00:22:47.600 | make sure you keep it updated every single year.
00:22:50.080 | Finally, if you do have a Tesla,
00:22:51.640 | I highly recommend you sign up for Teslify.
00:22:54.340 | I'll get a free month if you use my link,
00:22:56.560 | which is allthehacks.com/teslafi.
00:22:59.720 | It's $5 a month,
00:23:01.160 | and it's basically an entire web dashboard for your car.
00:23:04.440 | Yes, you have to authorize your car data to Teslify.
00:23:08.040 | There is a complicated way
00:23:09.160 | that you could build this all yourself with the Tesla API,
00:23:11.940 | but ultimately you get access
00:23:13.520 | to all your car's information online,
00:23:16.400 | and that means all the drives, all the history,
00:23:19.400 | how energy-efficient it was, odometer readings.
00:23:22.080 | So when I wanted to make sure
00:23:23.820 | that I was giving USAA an accurate reading
00:23:25.980 | of how many miles we used for the car,
00:23:27.780 | I was actually able to go into this dashboard
00:23:30.420 | and say how many miles did we use in the last 12 months
00:23:33.940 | and see the exact odometer readings,
00:23:36.160 | which, kind of crazy,
00:23:37.740 | were within three or 4% of the estimates I gave USAA.
00:23:42.460 | So you can also do a bunch of other interesting stuff
00:23:45.400 | like tag your rides business and personal,
00:23:47.980 | get access to your charging,
00:23:49.820 | and even if you give them the right authorization,
00:23:52.020 | you can control your car in certain ways from the web
00:23:55.080 | and set up rules to do different things.
00:23:56.780 | It's really cool.
00:23:57.960 | Definitely recommend checking it out if you're a Tesla owner
00:24:00.480 | and like to nerd out on data,
00:24:02.000 | and especially because you get an easy way
00:24:03.820 | to track your odometer readings.
00:24:05.280 | While we're on the topic of cars,
00:24:07.560 | I definitely wanna let everyone know
00:24:08.840 | that two episodes ago when I talked about a hack
00:24:11.080 | by renting an electric car
00:24:12.360 | and not having to pay to refuel the car
00:24:14.680 | because they didn't charge for it,
00:24:16.040 | it turns out that my experience does not match reality.
00:24:19.120 | So thanks to Zach, Tyler, and Robert
00:24:20.960 | for reminding me that was not the case.
00:24:23.440 | Hertz does have a fee if you bring your car in below 70%.
00:24:27.720 | They charge $35.
00:24:29.920 | A lot of other companies do something similar.
00:24:32.300 | So I was completely mistaken.
00:24:34.360 | I very much apologize for it.
00:24:36.780 | I did look back at my Hertz receipt
00:24:38.840 | and when I picked up the car,
00:24:40.900 | it said it was at eight of eight charge
00:24:42.640 | when I dropped it off, even though it was at about 40%,
00:24:45.600 | it said it was at eight of eight charge.
00:24:47.400 | So I had assumed that was not the case.
00:24:49.860 | I'd had another friend have a similar experience,
00:24:51.800 | but it turns out that you actually need to
00:24:54.200 | with Hertz return it above 10%,
00:24:56.480 | but anything below 70
00:24:57.800 | and you're gonna have to pay that $35 fee.
00:25:00.080 | So not a hack for anyone.
00:25:02.480 | Definitely don't recommend trying to return your car
00:25:04.760 | with less unless you're willing to pay the fee,
00:25:07.280 | which honestly, when you're renting a car,
00:25:09.520 | having to go find a charger and then sit and wait to charge
00:25:12.440 | probably just isn't worth it.
00:25:13.600 | And you still do have to pay for that charge as well.
00:25:17.360 | When it comes to building wealth,
00:25:18.860 | taxes are such a big part of the strategy.
00:25:21.500 | And even if you've already filed,
00:25:23.220 | being proactive about this year
00:25:24.680 | to lower your future liability is so important.
00:25:27.340 | And now that I'm working with Gelt,
00:25:29.020 | I finally feel like I have a partner I can trust
00:25:31.180 | to handle everything for my business and personal taxes.
00:25:34.540 | And I'm excited to partner with them for this episode.
00:25:37.040 | Think of Gelt as the ultimate modern CPA.
00:25:39.640 | They not only offer an amazing tech platform
00:25:42.060 | that gives you personalized guidance to maximize deductions,
00:25:44.980 | tax credits and savings,
00:25:46.520 | but also everything is backed by an in-house team
00:25:49.220 | of expert CPAs who can recommend
00:25:51.460 | the most effective tax strategies
00:25:53.380 | to minimize risk and grow your wealth.
00:25:55.460 | And best of all, you can have this transparent,
00:25:57.700 | open communication with your team
00:25:59.460 | in whatever way works best for you,
00:26:01.380 | whether that's on their platform, over email,
00:26:03.740 | in Slack or scheduling a call.
00:26:05.900 | Finally, my favorite story
00:26:07.180 | is that when we first onboarded with Gelt,
00:26:09.260 | they reviewed our past returns
00:26:10.780 | and found a huge mistake our prior CPA had made.
00:26:13.600 | So they refiled and got us back all that money.
00:26:16.480 | So if you're ready for a more premium,
00:26:18.360 | proactive tax strategy to optimize and file your taxes,
00:26:21.960 | you have to check out Gelt.
00:26:23.860 | And as an All The Hacks listener,
00:26:25.300 | you can skip the wait list and get started today.
00:26:27.820 | Just head to allthehacks.com/Gelt, G-E-L-T.
00:26:32.140 | Again, that's allthehacks.com/G-E-L-T.
00:26:36.040 | Now that we have three people working full-time
00:26:40.220 | on All The Hacks, it's more important than ever
00:26:42.540 | to have a central place for everything we're doing,
00:26:45.020 | whether that's planning episodes, tracking projects,
00:26:47.620 | recording listener questions, or really anything else.
00:26:50.900 | And for us, that place is Notion,
00:26:53.020 | who I'm so grateful to have as our sponsor today
00:26:55.580 | because I truly love the product.
00:26:57.500 | And it's not just for work.
00:26:58.820 | We manage our entire personal life in Notion as well.
00:27:02.040 | But for the last few months,
00:27:03.220 | I've been learning how to use Notion AI,
00:27:05.220 | and I can't emphasize enough how much time I'm saving
00:27:08.080 | by letting AI do the tedious work
00:27:10.260 | so I can focus on the creative work.
00:27:12.480 | Notion AI helps you work faster, write better,
00:27:15.060 | and think bigger doing tasks
00:27:16.980 | that normally take you hours and just seconds.
00:27:19.500 | And the best part is that Notion combines your notes
00:27:22.140 | and docs into one space that's simple
00:27:24.700 | and beautifully designed with the power of AI
00:27:27.180 | built right into the product,
00:27:28.860 | not a separate AI tool or browser tab
00:27:31.020 | you have to copy and paste between.
00:27:33.060 | Try Notion AI for free when you go
00:27:35.160 | to notion.com/allthehacks.
00:27:38.020 | That's all lowercase letters, notion.com/allthehacks
00:27:42.600 | to try out the incredible power of Notion AI today.
00:27:46.160 | And when you use our link, you're supporting our show.
00:27:48.840 | Try Notion AI for free right now
00:27:51.260 | at notion.com/allthehacks.
00:27:54.000 | I just wanna thank you, Kwik,
00:27:56.760 | for listening to and supporting the show.
00:27:59.060 | Your support is what keeps this show going.
00:28:01.880 | To get all of the URLs, codes, deals,
00:28:04.600 | and discounts from our partners,
00:28:06.360 | you can go to allthehacks.com/deals.
00:28:09.920 | So please consider supporting those who support us.
00:28:13.060 | So now I wanna jump through a bunch
00:28:14.880 | of awesome hacks people have shared with me
00:28:17.020 | and a few things that I've been noticing
00:28:19.340 | that are really across the board.
00:28:20.980 | The first one's a little bit personal.
00:28:22.580 | So about a year ago,
00:28:23.660 | I went through a pretty crazy period of time
00:28:26.240 | where I went deep on everything security,
00:28:28.820 | identity protection.
00:28:30.020 | I published episode 78 and it was my action list
00:28:32.740 | of everything you can do to protect your identity,
00:28:34.580 | your accounts, credit, and family.
00:28:36.460 | If you haven't listened,
00:28:37.480 | it was the culmination of a lot of research
00:28:39.420 | and I think a really helpful episode from a lot of people.
00:28:41.980 | And one of those things was that there are data brokers
00:28:43.940 | out there selling your personal information
00:28:45.940 | every single day.
00:28:47.100 | So to get that data removed,
00:28:48.820 | I used Delete.me and had such a good experience
00:28:51.420 | that I partnered with them for the show.
00:28:53.040 | So one of the things Delete.me does
00:28:54.700 | is over the course of the year,
00:28:56.180 | they're constantly checking to see
00:28:57.640 | if there's more information of yours getting exposed
00:29:00.260 | and removing that as well.
00:29:01.860 | I'll be honest, I was a little skeptical
00:29:03.540 | at the beginning of how much data would really pop up.
00:29:07.300 | So I thought it's been about a year,
00:29:09.320 | let's go look into it.
00:29:10.780 | And so interestingly enough,
00:29:12.160 | every single time Delete.me has checked,
00:29:14.380 | that was in December, March, and June,
00:29:16.920 | there were 14, 15, and 16 different listings of mine
00:29:20.620 | that have popped up.
00:29:21.700 | So on average, there've been 45 listings of mine
00:29:23.980 | pop up over the last nine months
00:29:25.960 | with my phone number or email or address
00:29:28.740 | or other personal information.
00:29:30.600 | Thank you Delete.me for actually proactively going out
00:29:33.080 | and removing all of them.
00:29:34.140 | I haven't had to think about it at all
00:29:35.980 | and I'm keeping my information off the internet.
00:29:38.140 | My wife, Amy, who may be because she is just less out there
00:29:41.140 | on the internet than me,
00:29:42.500 | has only had 28 pop up over the last nine months,
00:29:45.860 | but it's still not zero.
00:29:47.520 | So first off, data brokers, I despise you.
00:29:51.180 | Please stop selling my information to the internet.
00:29:53.340 | Please stop saying you're gonna take it down
00:29:55.220 | and then putting it back up.
00:29:56.740 | I wish that you didn't exist
00:29:58.140 | and I honestly wish those companies went out of business
00:30:00.420 | because it's so infuriating.
00:30:02.420 | But also thank you Delete.me
00:30:03.820 | for helping continue to remove it.
00:30:05.440 | I'm so excited to continue to partner with them.
00:30:07.660 | I love the service.
00:30:09.140 | If you want 20% off,
00:30:10.180 | you can go to allthehacks.com/deleteme
00:30:12.460 | and get your data removed from the web as well.
00:30:14.740 | So next I wanna share a hack related to food
00:30:16.960 | that comes from Maxine,
00:30:18.300 | which really was something I never expected to think about.
00:30:21.660 | And she cooks 90% of her meals at home
00:30:24.340 | and she's a big believer
00:30:25.460 | that the quality of the ingredients matter.
00:30:27.260 | And the hack she's been using for almost a decade
00:30:29.820 | to save time, save money
00:30:31.500 | and maximize feeling good about her choices
00:30:34.040 | is buying meat by the animal from local farmers.
00:30:37.580 | I know it sounds a little crazy,
00:30:39.180 | but every year she fills a nine cubic foot freezer
00:30:42.060 | with a whole lamb, half a pig
00:30:43.700 | and an eighth of a cow that she gets from local farms,
00:30:46.420 | which still leaves leftover room for fish, chicken,
00:30:49.260 | anything else she buys throughout the year.
00:30:51.220 | She said it saves a ton of time
00:30:52.600 | 'cause she only buys the meat once a year.
00:30:54.580 | And while it might not be cheaper
00:30:56.220 | than discount grocery store meat,
00:30:58.260 | buying in bulk is much cheaper
00:31:00.120 | than comparable quality meat at a farmer's market
00:31:02.860 | or a store like Whole Foods.
00:31:04.460 | It's super convenient because it's all divided up
00:31:07.060 | like you would want at a grocery store,
00:31:08.820 | putting two pork chops or a pound package of ground beef.
00:31:11.820 | So she effectively every week just shops her freezer
00:31:14.540 | instead of shopping the grocery store.
00:31:16.260 | And she loves that she gets to actually work directly
00:31:18.900 | with local farmers, local businesses
00:31:21.140 | and get meat that just tastes better
00:31:23.300 | and feels like the right way that we should be buying meat.
00:31:26.060 | So I haven't tried this yet though.
00:31:27.520 | She wrote to me that there are so many options
00:31:29.300 | in the Bay Area,
00:31:30.460 | but she's also written an entire book about it.
00:31:32.460 | It's called "There's a Cow in My Freezer,
00:31:34.020 | The Complete Guide to Buying, Storing
00:31:35.820 | and Enjoying Pasture Raised Meat in Bulk."
00:31:37.980 | She's got a website.
00:31:38.940 | I'll link to both in the show notes
00:31:40.500 | if you wanna check it out.
00:31:41.580 | Really interesting hack that we're thinking about trying.
00:31:44.820 | Another couple of cooking hacks from Len
00:31:46.740 | were one, buy a bench scraper.
00:31:48.880 | I totally agree.
00:31:50.100 | We have one that just makes it so easy
00:31:52.000 | to clean the counters and move things you chop up around.
00:31:54.860 | I'll link to the one he suggested in the show notes.
00:31:57.140 | He also said buy three to four cheaper paring knives
00:32:00.860 | that work really well,
00:32:02.180 | but you can also just throw in the dishwasher
00:32:04.020 | and you don't have to worry about hand washing them,
00:32:06.160 | which I know a lot of fancy knives suggest you do.
00:32:08.780 | And then next, when it comes to herbs,
00:32:10.280 | if you treat them like flowers,
00:32:11.600 | you can keep them fresh a lot longer.
00:32:13.540 | So wash them, put them stem side down
00:32:15.660 | into a glass of water,
00:32:17.020 | maybe even put some in the fridge.
00:32:18.500 | He said parsley and cilantro do better there,
00:32:20.980 | whereas things like basil and mint
00:32:22.420 | stay better on the counter.
00:32:23.500 | So Len, thanks for those cooking hacks.
00:32:25.020 | Super helpful, really appreciate it.
00:32:27.060 | Next comes from Brad,
00:32:28.560 | and he's built a really interesting productivity tool
00:32:31.860 | for Gmail that actually is the first thing I've seen
00:32:35.460 | that's made me consider switching off of Superhuman.
00:32:38.500 | I gave him my candid feedback
00:32:39.960 | that I'm not sure it would actually bring me to switch.
00:32:42.540 | I'm such a big fan of Superhuman,
00:32:44.100 | but if you're not using Superhuman and you want a tool
00:32:46.940 | that will basically use AI to auto-generate replies
00:32:51.340 | as drafts to emails in your inbox,
00:32:53.700 | which is kind of like having your own personal assistant,
00:32:55.860 | you should definitely check it out.
00:32:57.200 | It's called Ready to Send.
00:32:58.700 | Let me know what you think.
00:33:00.020 | I'm still using Superhuman for a bunch of other reasons,
00:33:02.740 | so I haven't gotten to check it out yet,
00:33:04.560 | but it's called Ready to Send.
00:33:05.780 | I'll link to it in the show notes.
00:33:06.920 | Next, Yelena sent in a service I'd never heard of
00:33:10.060 | called Return Queen,
00:33:11.340 | which just automates and makes super easy
00:33:13.580 | the process of monthly returns.
00:33:15.540 | They even sync with Amazon
00:33:16.840 | to make sure you're on top of returns,
00:33:18.860 | notifying you before a return window ends.
00:33:21.460 | They charge $99 a year, 19 a month, or $9 a pickup,
00:33:25.260 | and they just pick up all your returns from your house.
00:33:27.460 | You don't have to drive to UPS or FedEx or any of that.
00:33:30.300 | It's called Return Queen.
00:33:31.500 | I'll link to it in the show notes.
00:33:33.140 | And then next, I got an email from Jamie
00:33:35.900 | about a service called Evidation.
00:33:38.420 | I'm probably mispronouncing that,
00:33:40.300 | but you link your health apps
00:33:41.740 | like Aura, Apple Health, and Runkeeper,
00:33:43.860 | and they track your progress and give you points.
00:33:46.220 | And every time you get to 10,000 points,
00:33:47.940 | you can redeem another $10 gift card.
00:33:50.060 | He says he ends up getting a gift card every few months,
00:33:52.360 | not having to do anything,
00:33:53.500 | and they just stack up in the background.
00:33:55.500 | He shared his referral link,
00:33:56.940 | which I'll put in the show notes.
00:33:58.480 | You could support Jamie and check it out
00:34:00.220 | and earn some money as well.
00:34:01.400 | Now, I know the last episode like this was all about travel,
00:34:04.460 | and I was intending to not cover travel at all here,
00:34:07.220 | but a few things popped up in the last few weeks
00:34:09.300 | that I wanted to cover.
00:34:10.520 | First, a huge negative change to the Amex Platinum card.
00:34:14.380 | I am so disappointed by this.
00:34:16.420 | It really sucks, especially because starting this year,
00:34:20.120 | the Platinum card stopped giving guest access
00:34:23.060 | to the Centurion Lounge for cardholders,
00:34:25.260 | which basically means that if you're traveling
00:34:26.900 | with your partner or your kids,
00:34:28.780 | unless they have their own Platinum cards
00:34:31.180 | or your kids are under two,
00:34:33.060 | you can't bring them into the lounge
00:34:34.300 | unless you pay $50 for adults
00:34:37.260 | and $30 for kids two to, I think, 12.
00:34:40.380 | So the best fix for that has always just been
00:34:42.360 | to add them as authorized users,
00:34:44.100 | which Amex actually charged $175
00:34:47.060 | for three authorized users.
00:34:49.000 | Now, caveat, it's not the best option for young kids
00:34:51.500 | because you need to be 13 to be an authorized user,
00:34:53.860 | but for a spouse or for older kids, it's worked well.
00:34:57.620 | However, Amex has changed that price,
00:35:00.260 | and now instead of $175 per year for three authorized users,
00:35:04.260 | it's $195 per authorized user.
00:35:07.840 | So huge knock to the card, I think,
00:35:11.060 | takes away a lot of the value of being able
00:35:12.740 | to let your spouse, friends, or family
00:35:15.100 | into the lounge with you.
00:35:16.760 | If you do spend $75,000 a year on your Platinum card,
00:35:20.100 | you can get that guest access turned back on for your card.
00:35:23.580 | I believe it's up to two guests.
00:35:25.460 | But at the end of the day,
00:35:26.760 | the number of points you're gonna give up
00:35:27.840 | spending $75,000 on your Platinum card
00:35:30.340 | is not worth that cost.
00:35:31.860 | I'd rather just pay the $30 to $50 for a guest
00:35:34.900 | or use your priority pass to go to a lounge
00:35:36.860 | where guests are free.
00:35:37.960 | When the VentureX card gives you four free authorized users
00:35:41.060 | and the Chase Reserve gives you $75 per authorized user,
00:35:44.460 | it seems like this pricing from Amex is a little crazy,
00:35:47.580 | but at the end of the day, it's changed, it's what happens.
00:35:51.220 | If you already have multiple authorized users on your card,
00:35:53.940 | like I do, when that next renewal comes around,
00:35:56.460 | you'll probably get a notice that the price is going up
00:35:58.900 | and I will very subsequently cancel
00:36:01.300 | those authorized user cards.
00:36:02.900 | And in fact, Amy right now has an Amex Platinum card as well
00:36:06.220 | and we were thinking of canceling it
00:36:07.980 | because I had those three authorized user slots
00:36:11.180 | and a really good friend of mine
00:36:12.540 | and my sister were on there.
00:36:13.980 | And when you have to divide that cost by two or three
00:36:16.340 | if my wife came over, it was pretty reasonable.
00:36:18.740 | But now that it's gonna be so expensive,
00:36:20.820 | given all the benefits and perks of the Platinum card,
00:36:23.860 | I think we're just gonna keep both of them,
00:36:25.980 | get access and we'll have to figure out
00:36:28.660 | what we do when we're traveling with kids
00:36:30.440 | 'cause $60 is just probably not worth it.
00:36:33.040 | So maybe we won't keep both,
00:36:34.740 | who knows what we'll end up doing, so stay tuned.
00:36:37.180 | Then the last two things I wanna talk about on travel.
00:36:39.220 | One, I went on a trip to Denver for podcast movement,
00:36:42.660 | really awesome to get to meet
00:36:43.800 | a lot of interesting podcasters,
00:36:45.180 | come up with ideas for where the show could go
00:36:47.300 | and things we could do.
00:36:48.380 | But when I went to go check in on the United app,
00:36:50.380 | I saw a pop-up for a United game
00:36:52.420 | where it said turn this United play game on,
00:36:55.020 | book two flights and get 4,500 miles.
00:36:57.620 | And the only caveat was you have to book the flights
00:36:59.860 | after you click the activation.
00:37:02.040 | And I had just booked the flights three or four days before.
00:37:04.620 | So just quick reminder,
00:37:06.260 | if you're booking flights for any airline,
00:37:08.740 | open their app, go to their website,
00:37:10.460 | see if there are any promotions.
00:37:11.740 | Normally I'm pretty good at this,
00:37:13.100 | but definitely will lose out on 4,500 points
00:37:16.260 | that I could have gotten by opening an app
00:37:18.100 | and clicking a button, which is a huge bummer.
00:37:20.380 | Last, the Marriott Bonvoy boundless card
00:37:23.260 | has come back with a five night free bonus
00:37:27.260 | after you spend $5,000.
00:37:29.180 | Those five nights come in the form of certificates
00:37:31.460 | that are good at properties up to 50,000 points a night.
00:37:34.740 | Though if you have Marriott points,
00:37:36.360 | you can bump that up with your own points to 65,000 a night.
00:37:39.900 | That offer is not on our allthehacks.com/cards page.
00:37:44.380 | So I'm just gonna link to it in the show notes.
00:37:46.380 | It's a unique offer,
00:37:47.500 | but I wanna make sure that you guys get the best offers.
00:37:50.340 | So like I always say, if you're signing up for a card
00:37:52.860 | and you wanna use our card links,
00:37:54.460 | I would greatly appreciate it.
00:37:55.820 | It helps support me and the show,
00:37:57.940 | but I wanna make sure you get the best deal.
00:37:59.860 | So if I find better deals, I'll always share them with you.
00:38:02.660 | So that deal's in the show notes,
00:38:04.660 | but anytime you're looking at cards,
00:38:06.220 | allthehacks.com/cards are all of our links for cards.
00:38:09.540 | And usually they have the best deals,
00:38:11.100 | but in this rare case, they don't.
00:38:12.740 | So I know I mentioned
00:38:13.580 | that we were gonna cover cell phone plans.
00:38:14.900 | So I'm gonna record that as a bonus episode.
00:38:17.380 | Expect that coming out soon.
00:38:19.300 | One other thing,
00:38:20.140 | if you're going back and listening to old episodes,
00:38:22.860 | Spotify has this program
00:38:24.700 | where you can turn on programmatic ads for old episodes.
00:38:28.820 | So I've long said that all the ads that I read,
00:38:31.820 | where I talk about brands, I talk about services,
00:38:33.820 | those are all products and services that I use.
00:38:36.900 | I've tested, I've talked to people,
00:38:38.700 | I've liked, so that's how I think about advertisers.
00:38:41.580 | But for the first 50, 60 episodes of the podcast,
00:38:44.220 | I didn't have advertisers.
00:38:45.940 | And so I've gone back and just put ads
00:38:48.500 | that I've recorded for brands I work with in there
00:38:51.220 | just to help give them a little extra boost.
00:38:53.620 | It's a free thing that I do for those advertisers,
00:38:56.100 | but Spotify has this feature
00:38:57.820 | that I talked to someone working at Spotify about this week
00:39:00.980 | where you can turn on programmatic ads,
00:39:03.340 | you can choose the categories they're in
00:39:05.300 | and have them run any place
00:39:07.260 | you don't already have ads in your catalog.
00:39:09.820 | So I'm gonna go ahead and experiment with turning that on.
00:39:12.540 | I don't know how it'll affect the listener experience.
00:39:15.100 | I don't know what kinds of ads you'll hear,
00:39:17.180 | though I've explicitly excluded many of the categories.
00:39:20.500 | And so if you hear any ads,
00:39:21.780 | listening to episodes in the back catalog,
00:39:24.080 | let me know what you think.
00:39:25.380 | It is a way to add a little bit of extra revenue to the show,
00:39:28.740 | which now that Amy is working here full-time
00:39:30.980 | is a great addition.
00:39:32.440 | I have no idea how much it is.
00:39:34.180 | At the end of the day, I really care about the show
00:39:36.380 | being very high quality and feeling like a show
00:39:38.860 | that everyone enjoys and wants to listen to.
00:39:41.040 | So let me know your feedback about those ads
00:39:43.380 | so I can decide whether it makes sense
00:39:44.800 | to keep them on long-term.
00:39:46.240 | I think that's all I have this week.
00:39:49.100 | There was a ton of stuff people wrote in,
00:39:50.860 | hacks, ideas, questions that didn't make it in.
00:39:53.540 | Expect that the next time.
00:39:55.100 | Continue sending in questions, hacks, deals,
00:39:57.580 | anything you want, podcast@allthathacks.com.
00:40:00.700 | Thank you so much for listening.
00:40:02.480 | I'll see you next week.
00:40:03.620 | (upbeat music)
00:40:06.200 | (whooshing)
00:40:08.520 | [BLANK_AUDIO]