Originally Posted by
trvlr70
Hi there. Would someone please recommend what is the best credit card to accrue and redeem Mileage Plus points for flights on United. I recently bought a condo in Aspen and United operates 75% of all flights into the area and at some times in the year, the only flights.
The best credit card pretty much always depends on your personal financials and spending patterns.
For what I would consider the standard FT blend, I think the best cards to carry here for bulk spend would be the Chase Sapphire Reserve coupled with the Chase Freedom Unlimited. This allows 1.5x UR as a baseline for all spend, with 3x UR on both all travel and all restaurants. UR points are transferrable 1:1 to UA miles, and can also be used at a rate of 1:$0.015 to book revenue travel on any airline. If you spend at least $300 on travel annually, the effective annual fee is only $150.
If you do not plan to achieve any United status, the Chase MileagePlus Explorer card grants most of the benefits of Silver status (including significantly enhanced access to Economy Saver awards) while offering 1x UA miles on all purchases. For higher elites, it also can be used for domestic upgrades on Economy awards. It has a $95 AF.
If you want United Club membership, then the Club card is the most cost-effective way to do this, and also gives a flat 1.5x miles back as well as granting all the benefits of the Explorer card.