Optimizing Vacations, New Ways to Earn Points, Airline Changes and More

00:00:00.000 | This year's spring break in Hawaii turned into one of the most strategic and rewarding travel

00:00:04.200 | experiments I've ever done, mixing points, promotions, and perks to pull off an epic

00:00:09.100 | vacation, which included what might be the best hotel experience we've ever had. So I'll walk

00:00:14.040 | through every detail of how we made it happen so you can use these takeaways on any trip you're

00:00:18.760 | planning. But that's not all. I'll also dig into a few new ways I've been earning a lot more points

00:00:23.440 | recently, some big airline program changes, a way to save on flights, a few last-minute Mother's

00:00:28.860 | Day gift ideas, and more. I'm Chris Hutchins. If you enjoy this episode, please share it with a

00:00:33.560 | friend or leave a comment or review. And if you want to keep upgrading your life, money, and travel,

00:00:38.180 | click follow or subscribe. So I got such great feedback from tons of you when I did the episode

00:00:44.700 | a few weeks back about, it was a little bit off the cuff, it was a little bit last minute, and it was

00:00:49.440 | about a few things that were just happening recently going on. It was a little bit of a mishmash and

00:00:54.460 | people loved it. So I'm going to do that again today. And I'm going to try to do it once a month

00:00:59.540 | or as often as there are things to talk about. First, I'm going to talk about our recent spring

00:01:04.020 | break trip to Hawaii. There are a lot of lessons in here on travel, getting upgrades, saving. So I think

00:01:10.300 | it's gonna be really helpful for anyone, even if you're not planning on going to Hawaii or repeating

00:01:14.160 | this trip. For whatever reason, we didn't have any plans for spring break. I'm not sure this was only a

00:01:18.980 | few months before we were leaving. And so we decided we wanted to try to do something. And

00:01:23.960 | we had so many options for how we could do the trip. We had lots of points and miles. But when it came to

00:01:29.800 | where we were staying, we actually had a handful of Hilton free night certificates from Hilton cards.

00:01:35.720 | We had a bunch of Hyatt and Marriott points. We had this fractional home with Picasso that we could

00:01:41.120 | swap either through Picasso, or we actually have this third party network of vacation homes called

00:01:47.180 | third homes. And we had some keys there. And then we'd actually we've bought into exclusive resorts

00:01:52.920 | membership, which is like a private vacation rental club. And our initial idea was, let's find a place

00:01:59.620 | we can go that we're excited. But let's use the things that are expiring soon. So maybe those were

00:02:04.280 | our third home keys or Picasso nights or Hilton certificates. And so we started with third home

00:02:08.620 | because we have the ability to book a really nice property anywhere in the world. But we have to book

00:02:14.160 | it by May 23. That's when our all of our keys, their virtual currency expire. And we couldn't find

00:02:18.980 | anything for spring break. So if anyone's looking for a nice villa or a home, and you're really flexible

00:02:22.980 | on dates, take a look at what's on third home, shoot me an email, maybe we can make a deal.

00:02:27.160 | So we moved on. And we were like Hilton, Marriott, Hyatt, what should we do? And it was impossible,

00:02:32.960 | but not because it was hard to find availability. There was a lot of availability all over the world.

00:02:37.460 | But it was impossible because there were just too many options. And it didn't feel like we were

00:02:41.980 | choosing our vacation at all. So we did a hard reset. Amy and I sat down and said,

00:02:46.480 | okay, it's spring break. We have two young girls. What do we want to do? Where do we want to go?

00:02:50.860 | And the requirements we had were we just wanted a direct flight somewhere warm, where we had some

00:02:56.460 | pools or beaches, because we just didn't want to be doing a bunch of city activities when we had to

00:03:02.520 | come back for naps with young kids who, by the way, are really excited to swim all the time right now.

00:03:07.920 | So we were like, it looks like the best options are Hawaii and Mexico. So now that we scoped it back

00:03:13.640 | really, really tight, it felt like it was a much more manageable search.

00:03:17.800 | Now, because we have kids, we were looking for places that had room for four people.

00:03:23.260 | And yes, we could do one hotel room with two queen beds. But our kids throw their arms around at night,

00:03:30.440 | no one can share a bed with one of them when they're sleeping. It's kind of a mess. And there's

00:03:33.900 | actually a whole episode coming out soon about kids and travel. But we were looking at our exclusive

00:03:38.580 | resorts thing. And we found five nights at a three bedroom place at the montage in Kapalua Bay in

00:03:44.800 | Maui. Now, we've never been to Maui with the kids. We've only been to Maui once ourselves had an amazing

00:03:49.360 | time. It seemed like that was such a great option. And funny enough, we were like, well, we don't really

00:03:54.740 | need three bedrooms. And I was talking to my parents and they said, Oh, like, who's gonna stay in the

00:04:00.040 | third bedroom. And you know, there's been a laughing joke about whether they invited themselves

00:04:05.000 | or we invited them. But at this point, they were kind of excited to come with us. Girls were excited

00:04:09.900 | to be there. We thought if they were here, maybe we could slip away for dinner one night. And they

00:04:14.960 | could help with the kids. And so we thought, great, we could just go for five nights to Maui lined up

00:04:20.780 | during the week of spring break. But right in the middle of all this, I heard Robert from

00:04:24.880 | Milenomics talking about how his stay at the Four Seasons Lanai was literally everything you could

00:04:29.760 | ever want a nice hotel to be. And so I immediately checked it out and thought, you know, I've had

00:04:35.660 | some friends that have been to Lanai. They thought it was amazing. Maybe we should go. Four Seasons is

00:04:40.520 | usually pretty out of our budget. You know, we can't use your points. You can't use your miles.

00:04:44.740 | There's not really a deal to be had. However, maybe that's not the full story. So we looked and it was

00:04:51.740 | out of our normal price range. The initial price was about $1,400 a night, which depending on your

00:04:57.220 | budget, maybe that's cheap. Maybe that's astronomical. But that price wasn't the full story. And I want to

00:05:03.100 | break it down because I think sometimes you could find a hotel and say, wow, that hotel is 800 bucks a

00:05:08.920 | night. That's way better than this $1,400 a night room. But when you start to peel back all the things

00:05:14.340 | that might come with that $1,400 a night room and the end cost you'll pay to stay there. In this

00:05:20.700 | particular case, I think you're going to be very, very surprised. So first we were looking at booking

00:05:25.640 | the hotel through the All The Hacks hotel upgrade program. Thanks to our partnership with Savanti,

00:05:30.940 | we're able to offer anyone access to a ton of perks and benefits and upgrades at luxury hotels,

00:05:37.860 | over 5,000 of them around the world. So if you go to hotels.allthehacks.com or find the link on the

00:05:43.300 | website, the password is perks. You can go and you can just search for any hotel. So for example,

00:05:48.400 | I'm searching right now and I see the Four Seasons Lanai. And the one thing I'll tell you as a way to

00:05:54.200 | know how to use the site is there's a list of rooms and rates for each hotel. Make sure you click the full

00:05:59.680 | description for any of those rooms. And if you're looking, it usually says refundable, breakfast

00:06:04.720 | included, and then some phrase, it could be virtuoso, cadence preferred, inspirato, like there are

00:06:10.740 | different rate codes that are our partners. And so those will dictate what benefits you get.

00:06:15.620 | But usually the benefits are upgrade, early, late check-in, early check-in, late checkout. Most of

00:06:22.200 | those are subject to availability, but sometimes for the right stay at the right dollar amount,

00:06:26.140 | you can confirm them in advance. But it almost always also includes free breakfast and a property

00:06:31.060 | credit. And as you're scrolling through, you can see what it includes. It'll say free breakfast,

00:06:35.500 | one spa credit available at this spa, or it'll say early check-in or $100 property credit or anything

00:06:43.380 | like that. So in addition to all of that, because of the relationship a lot of travel agencies have,

00:06:51.200 | you even get usually an even higher upgrade likelihood than booking through something like

00:06:56.660 | Amex, fine hotels and resorts. So for the Four Seasons Lanai, you know, it said upgrade was going to be a

00:07:02.480 | thing. And when you look through the description of the room type, it also said you're going to get

00:07:08.060 | free continental breakfast for two guests, category upgrade spa credit. Now, sometimes if you look at

00:07:14.700 | these rates, they say virtuoso, which is a travel conglomerate, you know, collection of hotels, you can

00:07:19.440 | go to the virtuoso site and get even more details. The virtuoso site said daily breakfast, $45 per person,

00:07:25.740 | up to two guests, $100 resort credit can be used anything, anywhere, and early check-in, late

00:07:31.760 | checkout, and an upgrade. There was also another rate for Cadence, which is another travel group,

00:07:37.400 | and it said daily breakfast for two, hotel credit, upgrade, free transportation, and then $100 credit.

00:07:43.640 | So it's basically the same thing. So if you could book either one, it doesn't really matter which one

00:07:47.700 | you book. Rates are usually cancelable. So we ended up booking this, reached out to the hotel,

00:07:52.720 | asked them about the upgrade. Sometimes you can do this in advance, and they will confirm your upgrade

00:07:58.680 | if there's enough availability. Maybe they'll wait till you check in. But definitely, if you're doing

00:08:03.020 | a booking here, and the value of the booking across your stay is in the, let's call it thousands of

00:08:08.160 | dollars for the stay, then reach out to us. And we'll try to do what we can to see if we can help you

00:08:14.100 | secure an upgrade in advance. One trick here is the upgrade is often, you know, one, maybe two

00:08:21.580 | categories. So if you book the cheapest possible room, you might go from garden view to ocean view.

00:08:27.320 | But if you were to book, you know, the oceanfront room, the only real thing above that might be a

00:08:32.560 | suite. And so a one category upgrade could be really, really lucrative. We ended up getting upgraded from

00:08:37.700 | a garden view to an ocean view, which was a huge jump, right? That $1,400 room, if we had booked an

00:08:42.640 | ocean view was $2,300. We knew we were going to get at least a partial ocean view in advance. And

00:08:46.440 | then we found out, you know, when we checked in that we got an ocean view might have even been

00:08:49.660 | actually, I think it was an oceanfront. I'm not sure because they didn't say oceanfront, but the

00:08:54.200 | ocean was right there. But that's just one of the things that you can layer on to make this a better

00:08:58.280 | deal. The rest of them come with the specific property. And you have to look at the website of

00:09:02.840 | the hotel to know this. But if you look at the Four Seasons Lanai website, you'll see that until

00:09:08.640 | December 31st, 2026, all of the room bookings also include round trip flights from Honolulu

00:09:16.000 | to Lanai. And that's on a public airline that really feels a lot more like a private airline

00:09:21.220 | called Lanai Air. They have two different planes. I think one of them has six or eight passengers.

00:09:26.200 | One of them has more like 20. And it's a true VIP experience. And those flights are all included.

00:09:32.440 | So I'll talk about the review of everything and that experience. But that was part of the stay.

00:09:37.420 | Then there's a bunch of packages on the Four Seasons website if you click offers. And one of them was the

00:09:43.340 | Discover Lanai package. And so it's basically good from, I think it's the rest of this year and all of next

00:09:49.440 | year except Christmas and New Year's. If you book a three-night minimum, you get an additional $200 a day

00:09:54.780 | credit or $400 a day if you're in a suite. So there's that credit. And then last, right now,

00:10:01.900 | one of the restaurants is closed. And they're doing a little bit of construction at the front of the

00:10:06.600 | hotel. Honestly, I'd be surprised if you even really noticed it audibly. You know, it's visually you can

00:10:13.040 | see the entryway to the hotel outside as being redone, but it affected our stay in zero possible

00:10:18.600 | way. But until August 31st, 2025, they say to thank our guests for their understanding. Each guest will

00:10:26.000 | get a complimentary daily activity to enjoy the island. That includes horseback riding, hiking,

00:10:30.640 | target sports, aerial experiences at the adventure park. And they also have a separate restaurant they're

00:10:36.800 | setting up where Malibu Farm, which is normally just lunch, is also doing dinner. So if you tally

00:10:41.400 | everything up, we ended up getting free breakfast for two people every day, which was $132 credit that we

00:10:47.280 | could use. We got inner island flights that I would value at about $100 a person. Plus, we got $200 a day

00:10:53.620 | credit. Plus, we got $100 per stay credit from the All the Hacks Upgrade program. We got the upgrade,

00:10:59.860 | which I'm not even going to include in this value. Plus, we got a free activity every day. So my daughter

00:11:05.060 | got to go horseback riding one day. And then we went to the adventure park, which is kind of like a ropes

00:11:09.300 | course one day. So when I added up all of those extras, the total price of the room was

00:11:17.220 | a lot less. So all those extras divided by the number of nights was about $700 a night, which means

00:11:23.560 | that our $1,400 a night room included $700 a night of benefits. Now, maybe you don't value all these

00:11:31.700 | benefits the same way we did. But we certainly spent all the credits, we would have done a few

00:11:35.940 | activities, we would have had to fly to the island, and we did our best to eat massive breakfasts. Though I

00:11:41.760 | will say, kids breakfasts were also included, and the kids could order whatever they want. I'm not even

00:11:46.380 | including that. So when you factor all that in, if it's really only $700 a night room, is that

00:11:51.240 | expensive? Yes. But is it a lot less expensive than $1,400? Also, yes. And so I thought overall,

00:11:59.240 | it was an amazing deal. We booked it. And I will get to the review of it in a couple minutes. But

00:12:06.020 | preview, it was amazing. So once we booked our flights, we had three nights in Lanai, then we had,

00:12:12.780 | we reduced the stay at the Montage to four nights. And then we were just going to take the ferry between

00:12:17.840 | the two. So, you know, we could fly from Honolulu to Lanai, take a short ferry, and then fly back home

00:12:23.640 | from the island of Maui. So now we kind of had the infrastructure of where now we had to get there.

00:12:28.780 | Now, flights seemed a little daunting at first, because it's spring break, we looked at the dates,

00:12:35.120 | and it was pretty expensive, right? Each way to Hawaii, whether we were flying to Honolulu or Maui

00:12:41.560 | was like five, six, as much as seven or $800 for direct flights, which was not ideal. And certainly

00:12:48.140 | not something when you're booking four seats that you're really excited about. So I looked at using

00:12:53.400 | points and miles, as I always do. And it turns out that some of those flights that were five,

00:12:57.900 | $600, I could book on Hawaiian Air using Alaska points for just 26,500 points. So, you know,

00:13:05.640 | let's call that ballpark, you know, $300 of value, way, way better deal. So found that and book that

00:13:11.780 | on the outbound. On the return, it was a little less easy. We did find that same price, 26,500 miles

00:13:17.980 | for flights that were normally $600 or $700. But it was only one stop. So we couldn't fly direct from

00:13:24.940 | Maui to the Bay Area on any carrier on the day we wanted, even if we stayed an extra day without

00:13:31.600 | spending $700 or $800. So that was off the table. So we looked, we said, okay, we could spend 26,500

00:13:37.140 | miles per person, fly through Honolulu, not the end of the world. But when I was doing this searching

00:13:43.060 | just for fun, and I don't know what made me think about it, I looked at searching from Honolulu home

00:13:49.340 | on the off chance that maybe there was an inter-island flight that was really cheap and we could get direct

00:13:54.420 | home cheaper. And it turns out there were four business class flights on that same Hawaiian air

00:13:59.200 | flight going home. But when I searched for Maui, there were only two. Now, this sometimes happens.

00:14:05.180 | It turns out the flights inter-island from Maui to Honolulu only have two seats for business class

00:14:11.560 | award space. But the larger flight from Honolulu back to Oakland had four seats in business that

00:14:19.220 | you could book with points. So we ended up booking two flights, one on the like, let's call it the

00:14:26.240 | 9am flight from Maui to Honolulu and one on the 945. So my wife and I were going to split with one kid

00:14:33.080 | each, fly to Honolulu separately. And then on the way from Honolulu back to the Bay Area, we'd all be

00:14:38.440 | together. So that was the way we were able to get four business class seats for 40,000 points each.

00:14:42.600 | And the limiting factor was just flying from Maui to Honolulu. Now on some airlines, you can just call

00:14:48.360 | and you could say, hey, could you just book us an economy for this leg? And no problem. But in this

00:14:53.900 | particular case, we couldn't do that. Hawaiian and Alaska, whatever way their systems work, they didn't

00:14:59.380 | allow that kind of mixed award booking. And so we had to book it separately. But if you find this scenario

00:15:04.760 | on other airlines, it is often possible to call them or even sometimes use the multi-city search

00:15:10.200 | and book a economy first leg connecting to a business class second leg.

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00:17:40.840 | Now to get all these points, I had maybe 50,000 Alaska points, and Alaska is only a transfer

00:17:45.800 | partner of Bilt, so there weren't a ton of options. But right now, you can transfer from Amex to Hawaiian,

00:17:51.560 | and Alaska and Hawaiian are in the middle of a merger, which is why a lot of this availability exists,

00:17:55.960 | and you can transfer from Hawaiian to Alaska. So for the time being, and I'll cover that in a couple

00:18:00.040 | minutes, going from Amex to Alaska is possible. Now, unfortunately, you know, we have two young kids,

00:18:05.720 | we try to do bedtime in the, you know, 7:30 range. That flight arrived in Oakland at 8:30,

00:18:11.240 | and there were no other good options to get home earlier, except for these direct flights that were

00:18:16.360 | eight or $900 from Maui straight to the Bay Area. However, we did try a backup tactic. We booked a

00:18:22.840 | separate flight using Southwest points for 26,000 points from Maui through Honolulu back to San Francisco,

00:18:31.400 | but we would have much preferred to take one of those direct flights. But like I mentioned,

00:18:34.600 | they were $800. However, I did have one idea, and that's based on the same day change rules of

00:18:40.440 | Southwest. So Southwest had plenty of seats on the direct Maui to Oakland flight, and we would love

00:18:46.120 | to have taken it, but at $800, it just didn't seem worth it. I'd rather fly through Honolulu in business

00:18:51.000 | class for 40,000 points than pay $800 to fly direct. However, there was a Southwest flight from Maui through

00:18:58.760 | Honolulu back to Oakland with terrible times and layovers, but it was only 26,000 Southwest points.

00:19:06.120 | So I booked us on that with the goal of checking at midnight on the day of departure whether that

00:19:12.600 | space was still available on the direct flight. And if so, Southwest allows you, if you have the right

00:19:18.840 | fare class, to transfer to another flight on the same day between the same two airports.

00:19:23.800 | So going into the trip, we had a plan of direct flight to Honolulu, change to Lanai Air, take

00:19:30.680 | a ferry over, and then coming home, we had two options. We could either fly business through

00:19:35.080 | Honolulu, or maybe we would get lucky and we'd be able to change it to direct. And so that was the

00:19:39.320 | plan going in. So let's talk about the experience. About three, four, five days, I can't remember

00:19:44.280 | exactly before, I got an email from Hawaiian that said, "Hey, do you want to bid on an upgrade from the

00:19:50.200 | Bay Area over to Hawaii?" And I thought, "Oh, I wonder how much do you have to bid, right? Like

00:19:54.520 | there's some price at which I'd pay for that upgrade." And I looked in, and there was no way

00:19:58.520 | to bid any less than $325. And I thought, "Gosh, if they're looking for us to bid, there must be a lot

00:20:03.560 | of seats." And I looked, and there were four seats available in business. So I went on and said, "Were

00:20:08.920 | there available in miles?" And two of them were. So it was a bit of a dice roll here, because you never

00:20:15.640 | know what will happen. So I thought, "What if I book two of those seats in business and hope that those

00:20:21.960 | other two seats show up and I can book them before the day of departure?" Because at the end of the day,

00:20:27.720 | the difference between 26,500 points and 40,000 points was way less than paying $325 for an upgrade.

00:20:35.080 | We didn't really need the upgrade. And normally we don't like to separate on the flight. However,

00:20:41.000 | we did have our youngest, and we did have a hypothesis that she might nap better on a lie

00:20:46.040 | flat in business. And I personally had never flown Hawaiian in business. So I thought, "Get to experience

00:20:52.760 | it. Daughter might get some sleep. Only an extra 13,500 miles a person for two of us." So unfortunately,

00:21:01.640 | those other two seats never did open up. So it was just me and one daughter. I did offer my wife to take

00:21:07.880 | it. But she said, "I would rather you take our youngest and deal with her trying to nap on the

00:21:13.400 | plane. And I'll stay back here with our other daughter." So I'll speak to the business class

00:21:18.840 | experience. But you know, wife said the coach experience was also great. So business class,

00:21:23.720 | great food. I wouldn't say it was anything to write home about, but good options. There were

00:21:29.080 | not a lot of amenities for a, what was a daytime flight. You know, I didn't lie down to go to sleep.

00:21:34.120 | But I did notice that in coach, they were serving actual meals. You get a full, I think it was a

00:21:38.120 | breakfast sandwich. So that was nice. I feel like a lot of times, you know, if we were on the Southwest

00:21:43.640 | flight, we might've gotten a few snacks, but we wouldn't have gotten a real, real kind of meal sized

00:21:49.000 | thing. So that was great. But the real highlight of the entire flight was Starlink. This was my first

00:21:56.120 | flight on an airline that has Starlink. And I cannot explain how incredible it is. It seems so

00:22:04.840 | unnecessary and not that exciting to have Starlink on a plane, right? Like it doesn't seem like it would

00:22:11.720 | change your experience, but it literally just felt like you could actually work as if you were at home,

00:22:18.200 | work as if you were in a high speed internet anywhere. And I was so productive. And about a week before,

00:22:24.840 | a friend of mine told me he actually opted to change planes on the way home from Hawaii,

00:22:29.560 | so he could have Starlink. And at the time I was like, that's crazy. I would fly direct over changing

00:22:34.760 | planes every day of the week. And now I'm like, if I had no children with me, I would definitely

00:22:41.080 | consider changing planes for a long flight for the quality of the productive work I would get done.

00:22:47.400 | With kids, I think it's a different story. But I'm just, I'm so excited for the day when Starlink is on

00:22:53.320 | all the planes. I know United's announced it's coming. It's going to be incredible.

00:22:57.880 | So land in Honolulu. Right as we land, we got a text from Lanai Air from someone saying, we're ready

00:23:05.800 | to meet you by baggage claim. We're ready to help you move your bags over to a private car. We got

00:23:10.840 | in a town car. It was actually a suburban, drove us over to the private terminal and waited for maybe

00:23:16.600 | one hour. We actually landed early and our Lanai Air flight was about two hours later and they were

00:23:22.360 | able to move us to get on an earlier flight an hour earlier. And it really does feel like you're flying

00:23:27.800 | private. I will say, unfortunately, they have these six passenger planes that look like they are truly

00:23:33.960 | private that I thought would have been a fun experience. But would I rather have gotten to the

00:23:38.600 | hotel earlier and gotten on the 19 passenger, I think, flight that was leaving earlier? Yes.

00:23:44.680 | And so the only thing that felt a little less private like was the fact that it was a larger

00:23:49.640 | plane with more people. But you know, you get to the plane riding on a golf cart out to the tarmac.

00:23:55.000 | It just was such a amazing experience to be included in the cost of your hotel room. So really, really

00:24:02.440 | awesome. Obviously, no real service on the flight. It wasn't very long. I think, you know, maybe 30

00:24:08.840 | minutes landed, got picked up by the hotel and and headed off to the resort. For anyone not familiar,

00:24:16.760 | Lanai is a very interesting island. It's about 140 square miles, about three or 4,000 people. But the

00:24:24.120 | most interesting thing is that it is almost entirely owned by Larry Ellison, who founded Oracle. He owns

00:24:30.200 | about 98% of the island. It used to be a pineapple plantation, almost the entire island. And the family or

00:24:35.880 | company that owned it, when the pineapple plantation shut down, they had to find a new owner, and he

00:24:40.600 | bought the island effectively. He doesn't own 2% of it, which is kind of the downtown Lanai city where

00:24:45.960 | a lot of people live. There's two main hotels, there are two Four Seasons hotels, and there's one

00:24:51.800 | smaller hotel downtown. One of the Four Seasons, we didn't experience it at all, is called Sensei,

00:24:57.640 | and it's adults only. It's more in the middle, is a much more wellness-focused resort. It looks

00:25:03.080 | amazing, but it's adults only, and we had our children, so it wasn't really a thing we were

00:25:06.840 | going to experience. And as soon as we got to the resort, it was about a 20-minute drive. From that

00:25:14.200 | point forward, it was everything you could ever want in a hotel. The staff was incredible. The room was

00:25:21.080 | incredible. Every little detail was just perfect. It made you see things in other hotels that you've

00:25:30.440 | stayed at differently, thinking backwards, and unfortunately probably thinking forwards, because

00:25:36.120 | they just really care about every detail. So, so great with kids. I can't even explain how great it

00:25:44.360 | was. They'd asked about our kids' names and ages, and in the room were small robes and small slippers

00:25:51.240 | that fit them. They lined up sponges with the letters of their name in the bathtub. Every place you went

00:25:58.120 | had coloring mats and stuff. It was dialed in for kids, but it was so relaxing for adults. I think my wife

00:26:06.360 | said somehow they managed to like make an adult and kid experience magical for both sets. And it was

00:26:13.800 | just, I haven't experienced that before. The food was amazing. If you do go, the smoked wagyu dumplings

00:26:20.920 | at Nobu, which is one of the restaurants there, are just amazing. And within the $132 breakfast credit,

00:26:29.400 | you can get this salmon caviar breakfast spread that was also amazing. Pretty much everything was

00:26:34.120 | amazing. I don't want to list it all, but highly, highly recommend lots of cool free things just to

00:26:39.160 | do walking around. You know, they have cultural activities from ukulele classes to palm weaving.

00:26:46.280 | They have really cool birds that they've adopted that were kind of rescue birds all over the property.

00:26:54.040 | They are walking around with them from day to day. They have a couple koi fish ponds and you can pick

00:27:00.600 | up some food at the front desk. We probably fed koi fish a hundred times. Um, they really try to be

00:27:07.560 | sustainable. So they give you two Four Seasons Lanai water bottles, um, in the room, really nice Yeti

00:27:13.560 | ones, uh, that you can use throughout the property where there's water filling stations and free sunscreen

00:27:18.520 | and free aloe. And God, I just can't express how awesome this hotel is. Like, I think it is very likely that

00:27:25.640 | we will go back because it was just everything you could ever want in a hotel. Like the description

00:27:31.480 | that we were sold on is exactly what we got. And then within about a 20 minute drive, all of these

00:27:37.320 | activities that for right now, while one of the restaurants is closed are free were really great.

00:27:42.440 | So we went and did an adventure ropes course with the kids. Um, my wife took one of our daughter's

00:27:47.000 | horseback riding. There was so much to do. And interestingly enough, probably not what you're

00:27:51.880 | expecting as far as activities. The island of Lanai actually has a lot of invasive axis deer, similar

00:27:59.880 | to Maui. If anyone remembers, I've talked about Maui Nui Venison, which was a sponsor from the show a

00:28:05.720 | while ago, still a brand I love and their products are incredible. And so if you are interested in

00:28:10.920 | Venison, check out Maui Nui Venison. But at the Four Seasons Lanai, there were actually people there

00:28:15.720 | for hunting trips, which is not what you typically think of at a Four Seasons. So it was really

00:28:19.560 | interesting to just see people walking through the lobby in their full camo gear, carrying their bow or

00:28:24.360 | rifle cases, you know, checking into their room, uh, or, or having just gotten back from a hunt.

00:28:29.560 | And then the next day, see them just relaxing at the pool. So if you enjoy hunting, but also need

00:28:34.680 | a family friendly vacation, this would also be a great place for you to go. We had an amazing time.

00:28:39.240 | I just can't say more about how great the property was shout out to the entire staff there.

00:28:43.800 | And this was not a comp to visit. We paid for this visit, uh, out of our pocket. So, um,

00:28:49.000 | I wish it was, if anyone listening wants to comp our visit anytime we'd love to go back, but, uh,

00:28:53.960 | I think we would even pay for the trip again. It was just such a great experience.

00:28:57.560 | When we finished, we took the ferry over to Maui, which was about an hour boat ride.

00:29:02.520 | Really nice boat ride. Um, little bumpy, but not enough to stop both of our kids from falling asleep.

00:29:09.080 | And where it comes into the harbor, there's a little bit of an area with the little shops and an ice

00:29:14.120 | cream store and, um, maybe a couple of restaurants. We grabbed a snack, hopped in a lift and went up to

00:29:21.320 | the montage and also incredible property. This was a little bit of a different experience, right?

00:29:27.720 | This time, one, my parents were already there. They got there about an hour before us and met us there.

00:29:31.880 | And it was a three bedroom condo at a resort property. And there's something interesting

00:29:36.600 | about the montage in Maui is that my understanding is it used to be the Ritz vacation club. I didn't

00:29:42.120 | fact check this, so I could be wrong, but because of that, it was historically a place where most

00:29:48.280 | people staying there were owners and a lot of the condos have kitchens. And so it kind of was missing

00:29:55.320 | some of the kind of restaurant options you would see at a big resort like this. I think there's just

00:30:00.280 | one restaurant and poolside dining. And so we did go to the restaurant one night. It was great. It was

00:30:06.600 | expensive, like you would expect, but it was good food. The rooms were excellent. So we had this three

00:30:10.600 | bedroom place with ocean view. I love how at least exclusive resorts, I don't know if their villas are

00:30:16.680 | different than others, but you know, every room has a Sonos, they have a full kitchen, they have laundry.

00:30:22.600 | It just was really dialed in. But because it was on the resort, you could still order room service if you

00:30:27.720 | needed to. You still had daily house cleaning. And so that was awesome. The experience of being

00:30:33.160 | able to have multiple bedrooms with kids and in our case with my parents, but also be at a resort where

00:30:38.120 | you can just walk very close to massive pools and lounge chairs and get poolside service was really,

00:30:44.360 | really great. The pools are awesome at the montage in Maui. I want to say there's four tiers of pools.

00:30:51.000 | There's like the adult pool and then three tiers of kids pools with little waterfalls between them

00:30:55.960 | with rocks that kids can jump off of, weird little water features and multiple hot tubs,

00:31:01.480 | shallow section for younger kids. It was definitely more of a family vibe than some hotels I've stayed at,

00:31:09.160 | but we were there with our kids. So that was exactly what we were looking for. And this was also true at

00:31:13.080 | the four seasons. But you never felt like there weren't chairs. At the montage, they told us

00:31:18.120 | explicitly they had this policy. You could go down seven o'clock, you could sit in chairs. And if you

00:31:22.840 | don't use them by nine o'clock, you lose them. So I appreciated that they had a policy that was stated.

00:31:27.880 | So but because there were not so many people there when we were there, at least they had enough chairs

00:31:34.680 | for people never felt like it was too crowded.

00:31:37.400 | There were some cool other things to do. So I'd highly recommend if you go to the montage, there are these

00:31:43.400 | tide pools that you can walk to not very far of a hike. And it was really awesome. It was like a little rock

00:31:49.040 | scrambling down to some tide pools. That was great. The beach is right next to the property. All the beaches in Hawaii

00:31:55.640 | for anyone who hasn't been are public. So they don't operate quite the same as some of the beaches you might have been to at a

00:32:01.560 | resort in Mexico, where the resort is kind of really operating the beach. And so in this case, I think the

00:32:08.280 | montage, you could check in at the beach shack and you would get, you know, two chairs and an umbrella free for staying

00:32:14.400 | at the hotel. But they also had a place where you could rent snorkel gear and paddle boards or even wetsuits if you

00:32:20.760 | wanted them. Our girls do not love the ocean and are a little bit shy when it comes to big waves. However, in this

00:32:29.880 | particular case, the waves were pretty calm here. The waves in Lanai were a little bit bigger. The waves

00:32:35.720 | in the montage were calm enough that we actually got our girls out a bit, but not nearly enough to go

00:32:40.760 | snorkeling. It looks like there was some awesome snorkeling. Didn't get to do it on this trip. Hopefully,

00:32:46.760 | maybe next time girls are more excited. The other cool thing about this location

00:32:50.600 | location is there's a restaurant called Merriman's. It's pretty well known. I think they have multiple

00:32:55.960 | locations on different Hawaiian islands and excellent restaurant. And it's, you know, five, 10 minute walk

00:33:03.200 | from the hotel. And if you walk a little bit further, there are a few other restaurants. And so really nice

00:33:08.440 | that you could walk to a great restaurant. Now, Merriman's is also so popular that it's very hard to get a

00:33:13.740 | reservation. And we did not plan in advance and it's quite expensive, but they actually have an outdoor

00:33:18.620 | part of the restaurant called On The Point, which is no reservations, walk-in only, and honestly, I think

00:33:24.760 | better views because you're out right on the water. We ate there twice. It was excellent. Great happy hour

00:33:30.740 | menu, which times very well for having children. For breakfast, we walked to this Island Vibes acai shop

00:33:38.460 | one day, which was great. And for the most part, we ate breakfast in the room because we had a full

00:33:44.240 | kitchen and it was just easier. We did take one trek one night to a restaurant called Monkey Pod, which is

00:33:50.840 | operated by Merriman's, also a big restaurant conglomerate in Hawaii. It was awesome. Live music,

00:33:57.160 | really fun, great cocktails, would highly recommend it. That said, it's in the middle of like a shopping

00:34:04.080 | center and shopping center vibes is not exactly what I was going for with a relaxing Hawaiian vacation.

00:34:10.940 | It kind of felt a little chaotic, but the food was great. But it was really easy to get to because one

00:34:16.320 | of the perks that I think is a little underrated at the montage and why I think anyone listening should

00:34:22.160 | always dig into the details of all the perks at your hotel, because I brought this perk up to multiple

00:34:27.980 | people we met in the pool and no one had heard of it. But they have a Cadillac XT6, which is an SUV that

00:34:35.880 | seats six or seven people. And you can just borrow it anytime you want for free for four hours. You

00:34:42.320 | couldn't book it, but they kind of told us no one's ever using it. So we picked it up, went and got

00:34:48.020 | groceries. We picked it up, we drove to dinner, had a nice dinner and came home. So really, really

00:34:52.520 | underrated perk that you would have found on the website, you would have found if you asked the

00:34:57.260 | front desk, but you definitely wouldn't have found if you had just hoped that they gave you a brochure

00:35:02.260 | when you checked in that said, here are all the perks. So I find that always ask those things, both the

00:35:08.020 | Four Seasons Lanai and the Montage had kids clubs also, which is an awesome perk, except for my

00:35:15.380 | understanding insurance reasons, almost every kids club needs all their children to be over five unless you

00:35:20.100 | stay with them. So we're not quite at that age yet. So overall, Montage was fantastic.

00:35:24.700 | Service was a little lacking. I think they must either be understaffed or just, you know, not put

00:35:31.960 | as much of an emphasis on it. Like the service at the Four Seasons was 100% perfect. And the service at

00:35:38.000 | the Montage was slow at times. When it happened, it was great. People were kind, people were awesome and

00:35:43.380 | helpful. But it just felt like, you know, you would be waiting for a while. If you wanted to order some

00:35:48.500 | lunch at the pool, it might take 20, 30 minutes for someone to stop by and another 30 or 40 minutes

00:35:53.440 | for your food to come. But overall would stay there again. The three bedroom condos that exclusive had

00:35:59.760 | were amazing and highly recommend for families. So end of our trip, everything was great. Set my alarm

00:36:09.260 | for 12am, wake up and quickly go look for is that Southwest flight still available? Can I switch? I could. So I

00:36:17.500 | immediately switched all four seats. We're now on a direct flight back. That $800 flight we ended up getting

00:36:22.820 | for 26,000 Southwest points, which is about, you know, three ish hundred dollars. So amazing savings. And then we

00:36:29.620 | canceled our Hawaiian flights, because Alaska lets you cancel up to honestly, up until the time of boarding. And we got all those

00:36:38.120 | points back. So to whoever was flying home on Hawaiian and thought they had no chance at an upgrade,

00:36:42.860 | um, you know, morning of, we opened up four business class seats. So hopefully four people got really

00:36:48.260 | lucky that day. That said, I would have loved to fly on that Hawaiian flight direct. The Hawaiian experience

00:36:54.020 | was fantastic. Everything, the flight attendants were amazing. Um, really big fan of Hawaiian, excited that

00:36:59.740 | they're partnering with Alaska, excited that I now have a ton of Alaska points, uh, actually transferred in

00:37:06.520 | the max, which was, I think either 990 or 999,000 Amex points. So I took a huge chunk of my Amex points

00:37:14.820 | and moved them all over to Alaska, primarily because we were booking this trip to Hawaii and we booked a

00:37:21.160 | trip to Europe, um, for the summer that we may end up needing to cancel, but really flexible cancellation

00:37:28.340 | policies. And so many partners, we've been really able to find a lot of opportunities to use Alaska points.

00:37:34.920 | So honestly, if we end up keeping the summer trip, I might move some more in the rumor is that a lot

00:37:42.500 | of the things happening with Hawaiian and Alaska are going to be finalized after June 30th. So my guess,

00:37:49.260 | and I have no inside information is that that Amex to Hawaiian transfer partner will probably end by

00:37:56.020 | June 30th. That said, if you want to transfer points into Alaska, I would do it now. I wouldn't wait.

00:38:01.600 | Um, I, I, I don't know how long it will last, but I do know that it will be gone at some point. And I

00:38:07.020 | don't anticipate Alaska being a, uh, Amex transfer partner. So if you're interested in Alaska points,

00:38:13.460 | I would do that. A few other ways to get them are, of course you get Alaska cards. There are two Hawaiian

00:38:18.480 | credit cards right now with 60 to I think 75,000 point signup bonuses. Those are probably eventually

00:38:24.620 | going to go away. They're issued by, uh, Barclays, but you can still get them now. So there's a way to

00:38:30.780 | add a few extra Alaska points. If you want, they have pretty good earning relative to the minimum

00:38:36.100 | spend. And if you hold a Hawaiian card, you can actually transfer points between any other person

00:38:44.620 | for free. So honestly, I want one of them, either me or Amy to have just because we have a ton of Alaska

00:38:50.640 | points in each of our accounts. I'd love to be able to move them freely between each other.

00:38:54.600 | There's also an Alaska premium card coming soon. My guess is it will probably launch around the same

00:39:00.000 | time. They kick off all of the finalization of these mergers. So that was our trip to Hawaii.

00:39:05.840 | I know that was a lot, but I think there are some tactics in there and some perspective in there and

00:39:10.700 | some suggestions in there for, uh, that are super valuable. And I hope you agree next. I have a bunch

00:39:15.940 | of things to run through. So I'm just going to get through it. So first, um, a couple of weeks ago,

00:39:19.820 | there was an episode on lounges and accessing them. Two things that people sent in that I didn't

00:39:24.920 | mention. One, there is a card that you can't get directly called the Ritz Carlton card from Chase.

00:39:32.360 | But if you do have one of the Bonvoy cards from Chase, you can change to it after a year.

00:39:37.540 | And the reason I brought it up now is that people reminded me that it gets free authorized users

00:39:43.040 | and every card holder has unlimited guests on priority pass. So that is a really cool lounge

00:39:48.860 | card we didn't talk about. And then the next thing is, I hope this isn't a trend, but it looks like a

00:39:55.200 | few of the priority pass lounges are starting to charge a fee on top of, you know, just having the

00:40:01.300 | priority pass membership. I think the first one was the Virgin lounge at LAX, but I just hope that's

00:40:07.460 | not a trend. So that's a quick little follow up to the lounge episode. Next, um, big shout out to

00:40:11.960 | Patrick, who heard me talking about VPNs and flights and wanted to put it to the test.

00:40:17.460 | And I've often heard that using a VPN can be helpful for international flights, but he was

00:40:22.520 | actually testing it domestically. And so he was looking for a nonstop flight from Washington, DC to

00:40:27.620 | Houston, Texas. And he pulled up a VPN for each city, ran it once on in DC, ran it once in Texas,

00:40:35.100 | and actually found that a United flight was about $30 cheaper booking it in Houston, the destination

00:40:43.560 | city than it was booking it in DC. Now he ran the search a few times for other cities and couldn't

00:40:48.760 | always replicate it. But really interesting that even sometimes domestic flights are priced differently

00:40:55.400 | based on where you are. So if you do have a VPN, um, I would suggest if you're about to buy a flight,

00:41:01.840 | at least quickly check whether that flight is cheaper, maybe open up an incognito window,

00:41:06.320 | check Google flights. If it is maybe worth buying, if it's not, you know, proceed as normal.

00:41:10.660 | Um, on the VPN front, uh, we don't have any sponsors that are VPNs, but, uh, we did in the

00:41:16.340 | past have Nord VPN. It's the VPN I use for things like this. I tried to get them to be a sponsor.

00:41:22.340 | Sounds like it wasn't, uh, it didn't perform as well for them as I had hoped. I still use it and

00:41:27.120 | pay for it myself. So if you need a suggestion, that's it. And I think there might be a deal

00:41:31.040 | still that works from that. I'll put it in the show notes. So that was one thing. And then the other

00:41:35.880 | thing was there's an article and I'll link to it where people found that searching for award inventory

00:41:41.360 | on United in some areas, you actually saw more award tickets at lower prices in different

00:41:49.040 | countries. So if you go to the top of the site and say, I'm not in the U S speaking English, I'm in,

00:41:53.780 | you know, France or Vietnam speaking English, you would actually see flights that weren't available

00:41:58.100 | on the U S site. I hope that's just a glitch, but maybe read the comments of the post. I'll include,

00:42:04.880 | but it's just goes to show that you never know what kinds of variables you tweak and you might

00:42:09.340 | end up finding better deals. So am I going to try that tip on United every time I search for flights?

00:42:14.960 | Probably not. It's a hassle, but you could be for sure. If I'm trying to book a really big

00:42:21.020 | international trip, that's going to be hundreds of thousands of points. I'm definitely going to

00:42:24.380 | probably mess around a little bit on whatever side I'm on just to see if something else is there.

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00:44:59.920 | and find the link in the description. Okay, next, Amex. Speaking of being on sites, I was on the Amex

00:45:07.280 | site logged in, and I was looking at the Hilton cards. And I noticed that we'd currently downgraded

00:45:13.760 | our Hilton Aspire card to a Surpass card. And there was some language saying, "Hey, do you want

00:45:17.760 | to upgrade?" And similarly, we had another upgrade offer to go from the Amex Business Gold to the Amex

00:45:23.760 | Business Platinum. So one, make sure you're checking on the Amex site just to see if those offers exist when

00:45:29.040 | you're logged in. If not, you can also call in and ask. But we ended up getting a bonus for both upgrades.

00:45:35.440 | So on the Amex Business Gold and the Amex Business Platinum, we got 120,000 Amex points after 10k

00:45:43.680 | spend. And that's just on an upgrade. We didn't have to open a new card. And then on the Surpass to the

00:45:48.800 | Aspire, we were just doing that so that we got back to the Aspire to have diamond status on Hilton.

00:45:54.960 | We didn't even think there was an offer, except we did that. And we recently put some spend on that card.

00:46:01.120 | And all of a sudden, we ended up getting another Hilton free night certificate that was labeled

00:46:05.360 | as the Amex upgrade certificate. So we didn't even know we were getting a bonus and we did.

00:46:10.400 | So I would say recommendation to anyone, definitely with Amex. I haven't heard of this working anywhere

00:46:15.200 | else. See if you're targeted for any offers. Call in to ask if you're targeted for any offers if you're

00:46:20.240 | looking to move cards within different programs. So it's probably only within Bonvoy, only within

00:46:26.720 | Delta, only within Hilton, or within Amex's cards themselves. But definitely, if you're trying to

00:46:31.920 | change, see if there are any deals and they can be lucrative. A few other changes in the

00:46:36.720 | airline points and miles world. So one, something weird is going on with Emirates.

00:46:41.280 | Citi just recently said that transfers from Citi to Emirates are going down. Instead of transferring

00:46:48.800 | one to one, you're going to get one to 0.8. So that's a bummer. I don't often use Emirates to book anything.

00:46:55.040 | If I, in fact, I've never done it, but a few days later, Chase and Amex said from the end of May to

00:47:00.880 | the end of June, transfers to Emirates won't even work. So I don't think anyone knows what's going on

00:47:06.640 | with Emirates and their award program, but something seems to be happening. And so expect some changes,

00:47:12.480 | hopefully not bad, but the city change makes me think that it's probably not a good change.

00:47:18.640 | Um, next, uh, there's some rumors that JetBlue has announced some big partnerships coming up.

00:47:24.880 | Uh, rumors seem to be that it's going to be some kind of partnership with United by the time this

00:47:29.840 | episode comes out. Maybe that news is there, but, uh, that seems to be something coming. And then if you

00:47:34.880 | use the point.me award search tool, they finally added alerts. So I love setting up point search alerts.

00:47:41.040 | I currently probably use them on seats.aero and the award tool the most, um, for things like,

00:47:47.600 | Hey, notify me. If this Maui to, you know, the Bay area flight opens up, it didn't, but I definitely

00:47:54.080 | set those alerts up. So love setting up alerts. And if you're already a subscriber to point me,

00:47:58.000 | um, they have alerts. The other big change in the points and miles world, we kind of knew this was

00:48:03.280 | coming, but a lot more details were shared about what's going on with Southwest and all the new changes

00:48:09.520 | coming because it's going to be a totally different experience. So starting May 28th,

00:48:14.000 | any new reservations, or if you have an existing reservation and you change it after May 28th,

00:48:18.480 | you're no longer going to have free check bags unless you're business extra. They're also launching

00:48:23.280 | on that same day, the basic fair, which is effectively the want to get away fair rebranded,

00:48:29.040 | but you're no longer going to be able to make any changes or earn more than two X points on those

00:48:34.480 | fairs. So they're kind of adding their basic economy. They are not changing the cancel fees.

00:48:38.800 | So even with that basic fare, you'll be able to cancel for a flight credit.

00:48:42.160 | But remember Southwest flight credits now will be expiring within, I think a year. So that also

00:48:49.040 | sucks. So a lot of the things that we all maybe loved about Southwest are disappearing.

00:48:53.360 | The other big changes they say are coming in Q3, but haven't.

00:48:58.480 | So I think flights starting in 2026 are going to have this whole different seating layout.

00:49:06.160 | And so typically, if you've been on Southwest ever, you know that all the seats are kind of the same,

00:49:10.560 | except except exit rows. Starting next year, the first five rows in the front are going to be extra

00:49:16.320 | leg room, as well as three rows around the exit row. And then everything between the extra leg room in

00:49:22.880 | the front and the exit row is going to be preferred seats that are really the same as the rest of the plane,

00:49:27.600 | just in the front of the plane. And then everything behind the exit rows are standard seats.

00:49:31.600 | And so you're going to have to, you know, pick those seats or pay for those seats or get them based on your fair class.

00:49:38.240 | And, and so that's something that's coming. And so those, those preferred seats in the front

00:49:43.600 | and those extra leg room seats, it looks like are going to be about five extra inches of leg room.

00:49:47.920 | So kind of compared to main cabin extra or economy plus, they're going to be able to start booking

00:49:52.960 | flights where you're going to need those assigned seats in Q3 for flights beginning in 2026 in Q1.

00:49:59.040 | A couple of the changes as far as who's going to be able to book them.

00:50:02.400 | Well, there are now the same four classes of service as always, except they're renaming all of them.

00:50:08.640 | So want to get away becomes basic want to get away plus becomes choice.

00:50:12.320 | Anytime becomes choice preferred and business select becomes choice extra.

00:50:16.800 | And depending on which one you book affects what kind of seats you can choose.

00:50:19.760 | So if you choose basic, you only get standard and you don't get it till you check in.

00:50:23.920 | If you book choice, you get standard and you can select it a booking.

00:50:26.960 | If you choose choice preferred, you get a preferred seat.

00:50:29.560 | And if you choose choice extra, you get the extra leg room.

00:50:32.140 | Um, you also don't get any checked bags unless you book that choice extra.

00:50:37.500 | However, there are still two other ways to get free bags and even some free seating options.

00:50:43.980 | Um, and that's by either having status or by being a Southwest card holder.

00:50:49.260 | So if you have a list, which is their base status, you get one bag free and you can select a standard

00:50:55.580 | or premium seat at booking on any of the fair classes.

00:50:58.220 | And then 48 hours out, you can pick an extra leg room seat if it's there.

00:51:01.700 | And then if you're a list preferred, you get two bags and you can pick any seat regardless

00:51:06.220 | of what fair class you booked.

00:51:07.800 | And then if you're a Southwest card holder, you get one checked bag on any fair class.

00:51:13.800 | But then depending on your card, you also get some seating preferences.

00:51:17.580 | So if you have plus or plus business, you get standard seats, 48 hours out.

00:51:21.900 | If you have the premier or the premier business card, you can choose standard, but you can also

00:51:26.160 | choose preferred seats at 48 hours out.

00:51:28.380 | And then finally, if you have the most expensive, the priority or the preferred business card,

00:51:33.020 | you get the same perks as a list.

00:51:35.060 | So you can choose a standard or premium seat at booking and you get extra leg room at 48

00:51:41.220 | hours out.

00:51:41.740 | So there's a lot of changes.

00:51:42.920 | I'll put a link in the show notes to a page that details out all of them.

00:51:46.740 | But the short version is if you have a card or you have status, you still get a free checked

00:51:51.540 | bag.

00:51:52.480 | And if you book anything other than the basic fare they're introducing, you can still do

00:51:58.080 | your same day changes and standbys.

00:52:00.060 | And so that's pretty nice.

00:52:02.720 | And you can still transfer your flight credit.

00:52:04.720 | So yes, you get a flight credit, but it doesn't have to be used by you.

00:52:07.880 | So I'll probably never be booking that basic class in the future, which is a bummer.

00:52:12.780 | But hopefully the kind of choice or what is now want to get away plus fares will be, you

00:52:18.300 | know, somewhat reasonable still.

00:52:19.620 | So another pretty interesting piece of news came from Built.

00:52:23.780 | And if you have the Built Rewards card, which I do and I love, you can earn points for paying

00:52:29.420 | rent and up to $100,000 of rent a year.

00:52:32.120 | You earn 1x points with no fees.

00:52:34.080 | You can set it up with a rental portal.

00:52:36.480 | You can mail a check to a landlord.

00:52:38.040 | So anyone that has rent, I highly recommend the Built card.

00:52:41.520 | It's just if you're paying that rent, you might as well be earning points.

00:52:44.760 | And Built points are fantastic.

00:52:46.080 | They have amazing transfer partners.

00:52:48.200 | Like I would trade my Amex points for Built points if that was an option.

00:52:52.500 | But you don't actually need the Built card to use Built points program.

00:52:55.680 | In fact, you can join Built Rewards for free and start earning points through all the various

00:53:00.180 | other things they do.

00:53:00.960 | They partner with tons of restaurants.

00:53:03.320 | So there's a bunch of great restaurants in the Bay Area and I'm sure in almost every city

00:53:07.460 | where when you dine out at that restaurant using any credit card you have, you can end up earning

00:53:12.380 | any plus 2, plus 3, plus 4 Built points on top of that.

00:53:16.700 | They have a bunch of partnerships with places like SoulCycle.

00:53:20.180 | They have a partnership with Lyft where when you get a Lyft ride, you can also earn Built points.

00:53:23.740 | You know, if you refer someone who opens up a Built card, you get Built points.

00:53:28.280 | So there are a lot of reasons to join the Built Rewards program and I think it's pretty reasonable

00:53:33.560 | to rack up Built points without even having the Built card.

00:53:36.020 | But they've just launched another way to do it and that is paying rent not through the

00:53:41.040 | Built card.

00:53:41.700 | So as a Built Rewards member, you could have always used any credit card to pay rent, but

00:53:47.140 | they charge a 3% fee and they weren't awarding you any points.

00:53:49.580 | So it was kind of an expensive way to pay your rent.

00:53:52.480 | Now, they've added earning Built points on top of whatever you get from your credit card

00:53:56.620 | for that same fee.

00:53:57.560 | So if you were to use any card that's not an Amex to pay your rent, you'll pay a 3% fee.

00:54:03.120 | You'll still get all the credit card points from that transaction and you'll also get 1x Built

00:54:08.820 | points.

00:54:09.180 | Now, is this as good a deal as using the Built card?

00:54:11.520 | No, but if for whatever reason you don't have or want the Built card and you need to pay rent,

00:54:15.960 | this could be a good way to earn more points if you're willing to pay that fee.

00:54:20.260 | And if you think about it from the perspective of there are cards like the Capital One Venture

00:54:23.960 | or Venture X cards that earn 2x on everything, you're going to get an extra point from Built

00:54:27.740 | on paying your rent.

00:54:29.160 | So you're kind of getting 3x points.

00:54:30.880 | You're paying a 3% fee.

00:54:32.760 | There are cases where that might make sense.

00:54:35.300 | You're effectively going to be buying points at a penny a point.

00:54:38.660 | Depending on the program, maybe that's worth it.

00:54:41.180 | Now, I'm not usually one to suggest paying a fee to use your credit card to earn points.

00:54:46.900 | But in the case where you're going to not only get your points, but you're also getting

00:54:50.800 | another set of points.

00:54:51.820 | In this case, 1x points from Built.

00:54:53.640 | I think it can make sense in some cases.

00:54:55.640 | Note that if it is an Amex card, you only get half a point from Built.

00:54:58.900 | So much less appealing.

00:55:00.320 | Now, another circumstance where paying a fee might make sense is with services for your business

00:55:05.920 | to turn business expenses into credit card charges.

00:55:08.800 | There's two companies out there, Melio and Plastique, that allow you to basically turn

00:55:12.720 | any of your business expenses into things you can put on a credit card.

00:55:15.860 | And then they will send an ACH, send a check, send a wire, even internationally.

00:55:20.240 | Now, they do charge a fee.

00:55:21.900 | And that fee is 2.9%.

00:55:24.120 | But what's super interesting, obviously, if you have a signup bonus to hit, this can be helpful

00:55:28.680 | if you don't have the spend.

00:55:30.220 | But when I started thinking about the fact that those credit card fees are expenses as

00:55:35.580 | well, and so depending on your tax bracket, your marginal tax bracket, if your business

00:55:42.540 | is profitable and any dollar you're no longer taking out as profit because you have more

00:55:47.060 | expenses would be taxed at a pretty high rate if you took that money out instead, you can

00:55:55.720 | kind of tax adjust the cost of using a service like Melio or Plastique.

00:56:00.980 | So depending on your tax bracket, that could bring that 2.9% fee down to a maybe more effective

00:56:07.440 | 1.6%, which is all of a sudden really interesting.

00:56:10.720 | And there are unlimited numbers of cards that earn more than 1.6%.

00:56:16.000 | Now, if you don't have any state income taxes or you're in a really low federal tax bracket,

00:56:19.900 | maybe this isn't interesting at all.

00:56:21.800 | But if you're in a higher tax bracket, it could be pretty interesting.

00:56:25.640 | There's even another company called Zill Money that will let you put your payroll for your

00:56:29.380 | business on your credit card.

00:56:30.720 | So recently, I've been looking at this as a way to have more credit card spend on things

00:56:36.720 | that don't normally accept a credit card.

00:56:38.760 | I don't think it is as easy to do as a consumer.

00:56:42.340 | I have not tested how this works for non-business things.

00:56:46.280 | Let's say you need to pay your contractor and your contractor doesn't accept a credit card,

00:56:49.440 | but you want to, this could be an option.

00:56:53.740 | I haven't looked into how that would work.

00:56:55.560 | It's primarily targeted for businesses to use.

00:56:59.660 | I will try to put some links to any deals I can get.

00:57:02.300 | I don't know them.

00:57:03.060 | They're not paying me to talk about them, but I'm going to see what I can do.

00:57:05.500 | And I'll put links to those in the show notes if I can find anything.

00:57:07.840 | Speaking of large business expenses that you might be able to turn into a credit card,

00:57:12.180 | there is a really lucrative business credit card deal that if you have a ton of spend,

00:57:18.240 | could be really valuable.

00:57:20.820 | But when I say a ton of spend, maybe the most I've ever seen in a signup bonus.

00:57:24.680 | So the VentureX business card is offering 350,000 points in the form of 150,000 points after spending $30,000 and then an additional 200,000 points after spending $200,000 all within the first six months.

00:57:39.700 | Now, obviously, if you don't have $200,000 that you need to spend on a card in the next six months,

00:57:45.340 | you know, this is not as exciting of a bonus.

00:57:47.960 | But if you run a business and you have tons of expenses that you're always putting on a credit card,

00:57:51.860 | it works out to an effective 3.75% back on $200,000 of spend.

00:57:57.780 | After that $200,000 of spend, you're getting 750,000 points, which is a pretty good return for that spend.

00:58:04.700 | And there aren't a lot of other cards that can match, you know, 3.75% back on that much spend.

00:58:11.300 | Finally, it is last call on the Chase Sapphire Preferred 100,000 point bonus offer after spending $5,000 in three months.

00:58:18.140 | There is some nuance to how you're eligible for it.

00:58:22.280 | To be eligible, you can't currently hold a Chase Sapphire Preferred or Reserve card,

00:58:25.680 | and you can't have gotten a bonus on either of those cards in the last 48 months.

00:58:29.420 | That said, if it's been longer than that, or you've never had the card, there are ways to make sure you're eligible.

00:58:36.580 | I'll link to a post that I wrote in the show notes that walks through some of that.

00:58:40.640 | I know it's been a great offer for a lot of you, so I just want to flag that it is kind of last call for that.

00:58:44.480 | That offer will probably be gone for, I don't know how long.

00:58:47.560 | Sometimes they come back a year or two later, sometimes you never see them again.

00:58:50.940 | A couple quick last things.

00:58:52.200 | First, Mother's Day is this weekend.

00:58:54.420 | Congratulations to all you moms.

00:58:56.140 | You're awesome.

00:58:56.700 | You power the world.

00:58:57.660 | Shout out to my wife, Amy, and my mom, and my mother-in-law.

00:59:00.900 | You guys are all amazing.

00:59:02.060 | I just wanted to share a couple quick gift ideas for any people who have waited this long and need a last-minute suggestion.

00:59:08.980 | One that we recently got in our home, which I've talked about in the past before, saying I wish I had it, is the Ratio Coffee.

00:59:16.800 | It is a coffee maker that's basically like a pour-over coffee machine.

00:59:22.000 | It's incredible.

00:59:23.140 | I don't even love coffee that much, and it just makes a perfect, delicious cup of coffee.

00:59:29.220 | My wife uses it literally every day.

00:59:31.760 | It is an amazing device.

00:59:33.180 | It's a little on the pricey side, but it's also beautiful.

00:59:36.420 | And if you compare it to the cost of actually having coffee at a coffee shop, it's probably a steal.

00:59:45.000 | Next is StoryWorth, which basically it sends your loved one an email throughout the year collecting stories.

00:59:52.360 | When did you grow up?

00:59:53.400 | What was your childhood like?

00:59:54.780 | And builds them all into a book at the end of the year.

00:59:57.340 | Really cool.

00:59:58.820 | I've done this with my parents.

01:00:00.120 | It's awesome.

01:00:01.520 | They are a sponsor of the show, not of this episode.

01:00:04.040 | So I do have a discount in the show notes.

01:00:06.760 | Another company that we've actually used for many years is called AuraFrame.

01:00:12.020 | They're this great digital picture frame.

01:00:14.740 | We have one in every family member's house.

01:00:16.820 | And you can send photos to them from your phone to all of the picture frames in your family.

01:00:21.580 | And it kind of is a really great UI UX for sharing photos to anyone, but in this particular case, mothers.

01:00:29.960 | They are also, after many years of pitching them to sponsor the podcast, have become a sponsor.

01:00:35.980 | So I think we have another discount in the show notes.

01:00:38.420 | A couple years ago, I got my wife this really cool puzzle on Etsy where they basically took pictures of her and our kids.

01:00:49.300 | Really more just described height, hair color, age.

01:00:52.260 | And created this kind of really cool superhero best mom puzzle that she didn't really know what it was until she put it together.

01:00:58.700 | So looking for cool Mother's Day puzzles on Etsy is awesome.

01:01:03.640 | Though I realize that by the time you hear this, that will be too late.

01:01:06.800 | One year, I used an app called Zeal to schedule an in-home massage for Amy.

01:01:14.860 | And she said it was amazing.

01:01:16.440 | I'll put a link in the show notes.

01:01:18.220 | It's totally my referral link.

01:01:19.680 | But I think you get $25 off.

01:01:21.840 | So that's a cool last minute idea.

01:01:23.660 | And then finally, I asked Amy for her suggestions.

01:01:26.780 | And there's these 2 necklaces she loves that are initial necklaces.

01:01:31.300 | And I'll put some links in the show notes there.

01:01:33.120 | She has some with her initials.

01:01:35.240 | You could do it with your kids' initials.

01:01:38.400 | But she really loves it.

01:01:39.980 | Wears it all the time.

01:01:40.860 | And so that's another one that I think is a good suggestion.

01:01:43.680 | Finally, I believe this episode is coming out on May 7th, which is the deadline for real ID to be the requirement at TSA for traveling in the US.

01:01:55.300 | And so if you don't have a real ID, remember that starting today, you will need one at the airport.

01:02:01.020 | So if you don't have either a black or a gold star or, in California, a bear with a star in it, you probably don't have a real ID.

01:02:09.000 | And you may not be able to board a flight or go through security without it.

01:02:13.140 | And so you can bring your passport instead.

01:02:15.640 | You can bring a passport card instead.

01:02:18.300 | Some states have enhanced driver's licenses, which are also acceptable.

01:02:21.800 | If you have your global entry and you've got a global entry card, you can use that.

01:02:27.020 | I'll link to the TSA page that says all of the different things that are eligible.

01:02:30.980 | But just know that, as of today, if you don't have a real ID, you need one to go through security.

01:02:36.740 | This episode is brought to you by Element.

01:02:38.740 | Now, I love Element and I use it all the time because it helps anyone stay hydrated without the sugar and other dodgy ingredients in popular electrolyte and sports drinks.

01:02:49.060 | And that's important because electrolyte deficiency or imbalance can cause headaches, cramps, fatigue, brain fog, and weakness.

01:02:55.660 | In fact, Element is a zero-sugar electrolyte drink mix and sparkling electrolyte water born from the growing body of research,

01:03:03.560 | revealing that optimal health outcomes occur at sodium levels two to three times government recommendations.

01:03:08.800 | Element is formulated for anyone on a mission to restore their health through hydration

01:03:13.700 | and is perfectly suited for everyone from athletes to regular people like me

01:03:18.500 | and works if you're fasting on a keto, low-carb, or paleo diet.

01:03:22.440 | And if you're not sure if it's for you, don't worry because Element offers a no-questions-asked refund policy

01:03:28.160 | so you can try it totally risk-free.

01:03:30.120 | Get your free sample pack with any Element purchase at chrishutchins.com slash LMNT.

01:03:35.900 | This deal is only available through that link, so support the show and go to chrishutchins.com slash Element

01:03:41.920 | or click the link in the description and get hydrated.

01:03:44.980 | Last thing I want to mention before I wrap, I got a few messages from listeners about last week's episode on oral health with Dr. Mark.

01:03:53.080 | And they really came in two flavors and I just thought the nature of my personality and this show, I thought I'd address them.

01:03:59.500 | So one is about guests who pitch products and the other is about fluoride and his opinions of that and fears that the show was getting a little political.

01:04:11.200 | Well, on guests pitching their own product, it seems like everyone has something to sell, whether it's their book, their blog, their Instagram, their toothpaste, their ideas.

01:04:17.300 | So there's no escaping the fact that if I have a guest on, there's probably a thing they want to promote and that's kind of the currency in which they're willing to give up their time to come on the show.

01:04:25.860 | But what I try incredibly hard to do is, first, pick guests that I want.

01:04:29.760 | I'm not just looking at who emails me and having them on the show.

01:04:32.780 | In fact, when we wanted to find someone to come on for oral health, I asked my dentist for a recommendation.

01:04:37.720 | I cold messaged him and I tried to get him to join.

01:04:40.900 | And then two, I ask all my guests not to spend their time pitching in the episode.

01:04:45.320 | And if they do, I remove it.

01:04:47.340 | And then I give them time at the end to say, where can people find more about whatever you're talking about?

01:04:51.640 | And I also try to make sure you all know if me or any of my guests have some kind of interest or bias in whatever is being discussed.

01:04:59.840 | So I did that for Dr. Mark last week.

01:05:02.180 | The funniest thing about Dr. Mark is that he didn't even mention the name of his toothpaste at all in the entire episode.

01:05:07.800 | And we did a retake of the outro of the last question because I was like, you've talked about it, but you didn't mention what it's called in case someone wants to find it.

01:05:16.260 | So I hope you know that this show is not a platform for people to pitch and sell things.

01:05:20.440 | That's not the purpose of me having a guest on.

01:05:22.380 | I don't accept money from guests to come on.

01:05:24.760 | And almost every guest is because we sought them out.

01:05:27.620 | So I just wanted to clear that up.

01:05:28.860 | Second, I wanted to talk a little bit about fluoride.

01:05:31.580 | I understand that for some people, this is a very controversial topic.

01:05:35.680 | I don't know if I knew the extent to that going into this, but I did try my best given the limited knowledge I have to kind of push back in the interview and challenge some of those opinions.

01:05:45.240 | At the end of the day, from all my interactions with all of you, whether it's an email or in the real world, I know that you all are incredibly smart.

01:05:52.720 | And I feel like I can trust you all to do your own thinking and research if you ever hear something you might not agree with.

01:05:58.540 | I also think it's healthy for all of us to hear things that challenge our own beliefs from time to time.

01:06:02.680 | And I get that that might mean that not everyone likes every guest or everything I say or everything a guest says.

01:06:08.920 | But even if you disagree with Mark on fluoride, I would be shocked if there wasn't actually something in that episode that was a valuable takeaway for you.

01:06:16.780 | Also, don't assume that if I bring a guest on and they say something you disagree with, that that's necessarily my position at all.

01:06:22.540 | As for being political, I honestly did not think fluoride was a very politically charged topic.

01:06:27.960 | I could see where people who feel that way are coming from.

01:06:31.400 | If you've listened to the show long enough, I think you know this show is about upgrading and optimizing your life, money, and travel.

01:06:37.260 | And while we all have political thoughts and opinions that might be different, I don't think they're relevant to the purpose of this show.

01:06:43.260 | And so I do my best to avoid politics on this show.

01:06:45.720 | There are tons of places, apps, shows, social media, where you can go to have that conversation.

01:06:50.160 | This just is not a place where I'm trying to make it a part of the show.

01:06:53.960 | I hope that the episode with Mark, whether you agree or disagree with him, at least was interesting to hear and brought to light some things about oral health that I think are really valuable.

01:07:02.940 | I know it was for me.

01:07:03.800 | That's all for this episode.

01:07:05.080 | If you have questions, topics, or anything you think would be good on another episode like this, I'll be doing them monthly.

01:07:10.940 | Please send them to podcast at allthehacks.com.

01:07:13.480 | Thank you so much for listening.

01:07:15.180 | I will see you next week.

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