gumercindo

Agree. I am 18/24 and on AA citi #8 . Not planning to stop until they make me stop. My P2 is at 10/24 and I might ease off her AA citi personal gravy train and get her on the 1/90 biz card train and maybe get to 5/24. That said, chase is working HARD to make their churning much more difficult.

And what's the oppty cost in saving for 5/24? Losing out on 1MM AA miles for what - just so you can get 60K united miles or possibly a CP?

I'm lucky - I can use AA miles for DC-Miami trips, trips to South American (wife is from there), trips to Europe, etc. We're a family of 5 which means one Europe redemption for 5 in coach is 300k AA miles. Now that I'm starting to look at AA for hotel stays, those AA miles will go by quickly.

SeeBuyFly

Bears repeating. This is not a general chat thread.

bobert24

That's the real question that people aren't thinking about. If you're doing these cards 2/65 (or 62) for 2 years at 75k/card, that's 1.8 million miles you're giving up to get under 5/24. Even if you're only able to get 50k/card, you're still losing 1.2 million.

beltway

Posit a couple--let's call them Mr. & Mrs. Beltway--who already have >1.5MM AA miles between them. Suppose further that their preferred travel destinations are in western & central Europe; that they refuse to pay BA YQ; and that (generally speaking) they hate connecting through LHR for multiple reasons. Finally, add on top of that AA's limited number of European destinations, plus the increasing unavailability of SAAver J seats in the outbound direction.

You now have a good picture of why someone would dial back a formerly exuberant Citi AA churn pattern (except for the occasional Citi AA biz card applied for using a mailer code) and wait out 5/24. (Did I mention *A's vastly superior European route network and the UA policy of allowing an extra in-region segment at no extra cost?)

For some people, it is an entirely rational decision to stop chasing more AA miles via the Citi churn. My marginal utility for additional UA miles and UR points is so much higher that I'm perfectly happy to incur the opportunity cost of slowing down for ~1.3 years until older apps drop off the 24-month window.

YM (quite literally) MV. We're not all identically situated, and one person's situation can vary over time. Someday I may go back to hitting Citi AA cards hard; now is not that time.

wyogold

While I agree with you - nothing has really changed with Citi's Aadvantage in a while, so it's not unnatural for the banter to drift with no news from the front ..

wyogold

I'll let other slow down their churn to get some chase cards, thins the herd a little ...

bobert24

And you're 100% right. That's because you don't fall into that category of people who "aren't thinking about" the opportunity cost. You know what you want, what you need to get it, and why you need that. There are so many people out there that are "trying to get under 5/24", but they don't know why (I'll give you a hint for a lot of them - the bloggers get paid more per signup by Chase than Citi or Amex). They've heard it's the thing to do, so they pass up a lot of great opportunities for a chance at something good.

The only thing I didn't follow in your post was that you'd only slow down for ~1.3 years to get under 5/24. I'm sure I'm just missing a trick here - can you explain how you wouldn't have to slow down for the full 2?

beltway

I don’t need to get to 0/24, just back under 5/24.

So this isn’t entirely OT, let me add that apart from the signup bonus, I have no real use for a Citi AA card. Like any other holder of the Barclays Aviator Red, I get the key benefits (free domestic checked bag, 10% award rebate) regardless of whether I have the Citi counterpart.

gumercindo

You're 100% right - YMMV. I completely understand this situation especially with 1.5M miles socked away. It doesn't make much sense with this couple. Thankfully for me, my desired desintations of western europe (Spain, France, etc) are all on either AA metal or 1W partners such as Iberia. Central/Eastern Europe is a dead area for redemptions via AA especially if you don't want to pay BA fees or fly through LHR. That said, Middle east, Asia, South Pacific all seem to provide decent OW redemptions. Kind of sucks that Central/Eastern Europe is so bad for AA miles. UA excursionist perk is a great value.

All that said, Chase only has a couple of cards for *A that are worthwhile and Chase is clamping down on the churning of these cards. Again, is getting a 60k UA card worth it? I'm guessing you have all the UR generating cards already especially the ones with a high sign up bonus? I guess my point is - the chase alternative is very limited.

LWT3

Credit-card super users are searching for answers amid a string of shutdowns from Chase, as billions in costs on lavish rewards pile up (JPM)

beltway

I've reached the point where I'm unwilling to fly eastbound TATL in coach. It isn't about luxury or feeling DYKWIAish; I just need the sleep so I'm not dead on my feet on day of arrival & jet-lagged for a week. I'm willing (and just did earlier this month) to fly Y on the way home.

So what's the catch? It feels harder & harder to find SAAver J to the destinations you mention. For example have a look at May 9 forward to MAD/BCN/CDG (or MXP/VCE/ZRH, for that matter). There's plenty of AAnytime J (from 110K up to 180K) from WAS or PHL, but--last I checked--no SAAver space. At. All. And I've been checking regularly since the booking window opened.

Perhaps this is just the new AA way. If so, I'll plunk down 110K OW on occasion, but boy does that change the value proposition.

Nope. DW has one premium card (old Ink+) and the free/downgraded UA card; I have a couple of Freedom cards. We each got one or two of the original Sapphire card when it first came out, but all bonii were >4 years ago. We're also eligible to hit the UA cards again. So there's a good deal of headroom--not so much that I'm planning to retire on it, but worth cycling through to replenish our UR/UA store.

mia

Discussion HERE.

gumercindo

You're 100% right on AA. Looked at MAD, as an example, and while Y class is very attainable with sAAver, J is another story (my argument was only based on economy redemptions). Best I could find is a 57.5k with stops on the way out (while avoiding BA).

As for Chase, since you have so much to acquire, I see your point in staying under 5/24!

joe_miami

The "new AA way"? People here have collectively accumulated tens of millions of AA miles. Obviously, availability is going to be more constrained as more people jump on the gravy train.

LWT3

Just to check back and follow up on my original question, can those of you who (i) are at lol/24 due to the AA churn and (ii) have recently applied for Chase cards not subject to 5/24 confirm that you've had no problems since opening those cards? There are comments above saying that the # of new accounts alone shouldn't be a problem unless it is paired with activity that looks like break out fraud potential (e.g., adding and removing authorized users). I'd like to get the new IHG card for its sign up bonus, but Chase is my primary bank, and I really don't want to have a problem that would cause me to switch banks.