Originally Posted by
HonkyChateau
Hi all,
I am a complete beginner trying to accumulate miles in pursuit of a particular goal: a year (or so) of work/travel before gradschool. I have some savings and am working on developing internet-based income sources. Still, money is tight. I'll be traveling coach and staying in hostels. I'm a lot less interested in hotel miles than flight miles.
I currently work full time and I'm going to keep my job for the next 7-10 months. This is what I think I know so far. Please let me know where I'm wrong:
Miles usually do not expire within 2 years so I should start racking them up as soon as possible. Some cards award miles after spending for a number of months, which is further reason to start while I still have a job.
Ideally I'd like to be able to take three intercontinental flights (South America, Europe/ME, and Asia). One way flights are generally not possible so it will most likely be three roundtrip flights from the US. These three flights will cost in the range of 40-60k miles. I should aim for a minimum of 150k miles.
Credit cards with 50k mile signup bonuses are rare and a good deal. If possible I should sign up for a couple of those.
Questions that I have:
Is there a good resource for how miles can be converted between companies/understanding if some miles are worth more than others?
Is there maybe a cheaper type of ticket (RTW or some other deal) that would let me pull this off with fewer miles?
When applying for multiple credit cards, is there a particular strategy that increases chances of being accepted or minimizes any credit score hit?
If you are planning 3 separate trips then you will need about 150k miles, as you said. Some things to think about if doing this are:
AA offers "off-peak" specials to Europe, Asia (Zone 1: Japan, Mongolia, Korea), and South America (zone 2, basically southern SA). Off-peak seasons are:
Europe: Oct 15-May 15 (40k roundtrip instead of 60k)
Asia: Oct 1-April 30 (50k roundtrip instead of 62.5k)
South America: March 1-May 31, Aug 16-Nov 30 (40k roundtrip instead of 60k)
Just by traveling in off-peak times, you could save yourself 52.5K on those three trips...which would be good for another trip altogether!
However, if you want to combine the trips, say go North America to Europe, then go Europe to Asia, and then Asia to South America and finally back to North America, you can look at AA's distance based chart. Basically, this is a possible RTW ticket and allows you up to 16 stopovers. The ticket is good for a year. The mileage you pay is based on the distance you fly.
You can use milecalc.com to check how many miles you'd be flying by putting in an itinerary.
Then, use the
AA OneWorld chart to determine how many miles it would cost.
As for credit card signups, I'd definitely recommend the Citi/AA Visa and Citi/AA Amex, which will earn you a quick 100k AA miles. Just make sure you sign up at the same time for these! And the Chase Sapphire Preferred is the best everyday card spend out there, especially when traveling since it has no foreign transaction fee. The 50k Chase points don't hurt either!