Originally Posted by
VegasGambler
Paying for those premium econ seats is so expensive though. F is certainly far from guarantee, but I get a premium seat on every AS flight I take.
SFO - NYC in premium class with one checked bag... $250 as an elite; $550 as a non elite. ($119 for a premium seat; $30 for a checked bag; each way). $300 of saved fees per round trip adds up fast.
I'm not sure where you're based, but if B6 or DL is a viable option, then you might want to seriously consider those. B6 Mosaic status gets you 38" seat pitch EMS seats for nearly free, and you can earn it with $50k spend on the JetBlue+ card. Even if you need another $20k of spend beyond organic spend, you can pay taxes at 2 cpd, which translates to ~1 EQM + 1 RDM for 2 cents,
without having to fly BIS miles. Put differently, after netting out the value of the RDMs, you're buying EQMs at the equivalent of 0.5 cents each (again, without having to actually fly). Good luck finding a MR that gets you that kind of value.
With DL, the AmEx Reserve card earns 0.5 EQM and 1 RDM per dollar, so effectively you can purchase 1 EQM + 2 RDM for 4 cents. This is cheaper than the MR strategies you initially posted, and it's a
way cheaper if you assign any non-trivial value at all to your time.