Well this past year has been a busy one for me any my wife, Well mainly me doing all the work and a few phone calls for her to the different credit card companies.

So this past year I have gone on a mad credit card application spree and I think I am going to cool it for a while.

Amex Platnum 50k membership rewards.
Amex Business 75k membership rewards.
BA Visa 100k Me
BA Visa 100k Wife
Citi AA Visa 75k
Citi AA Amex 75k
Citi AA Business 75 wife
Citi AA Visa 75k wife
Citi AA Amex 75k wife
Citi Hilton honors wife 50k
Citi Hilton honors 50k
Amex Hilton 60k wife
Amex Surpass 60k + 20k in bonuses for stays when using the card
Amex SPG 30k
Amex Spg 30k Wife
BoA Virgin Atlantic 50k
Chase Southwest 50k
Chase Southwest 50k wife
Chase Continental 50k wife
Chase Sapphire Prefered 50k
Chase Bold ink 50k
Chase Bold ink new 50k
and I think i am missing one or two.

Total without spending being added in is 1,300,000 miles and or points in Since last March.

Credit score is the interesting thing. Through Amex it shows 790 still but on Credit Sesame and Credit Karma it has recently dropped to about 750.

Thanks to amazon and venmo for 6k a month in transfers. Had my venmo frozen but I showed it was legit transfers with receipts and bills. Just think the 6k spent on the right card can get you a lot of miles.

Time to plan a nice trip to Europe or Asia again and use some of these up.

Nice work! That's a great haul.

This I think was the easy part. The next thing is to get the flights and rooms booked. It takes a lot more time than people think, but most of the people on here know its well worth all the time that goes into reading all the posts and finding the best deals.

Agreed.

1M+ in a year is really awesome. I am going to go on a credit card app-o-rama soon too.

BTW, can you send me an invite to Venmo?

How does one get started in learning how to do stuff like this? I'd definitely like to give it a whirl!

That looks a typo. BA and Virgin Atlantic are competitors, so there's no one card for both!

1M+ for two people. Much less than 1M per person.

Marry. This and the other "THANK YOU THANK YOU" thread were started by people who counted both the stuff they got and the stuff their wife got and then added them together to make a bigger bragging amount.

You could theoritcally start a thread where you and you whole extended family just apply for one card each but you add them all up together and have a misleadingly huge number that way too.

But to get started? What is your credit history? Just because someone with a good credit history and good credit score can do this does not mean that absolutely everyone can. If you don't have a credit history, you can't do "this" (a huge number of card apps), because you'll be declined left and right for "insufficient credit history".

Try here:

http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/miles...er-thread.html

And study FT, and read everything, every thread, absorb as fast as humanly possible.

If you need credit scores, rating, worthiness type of advices, you have to also visit creditboards.com and get "educated."

Welcome to FT!

But this way, I can say, "Mine is bigger than yours."

Accumulating miles/points is easy if you have the creditworthiness to get the cards. I've learned and am still learning that the hard part is using them in such a way that gets the most bang for the point.

I definitely don't have the credit history to start churning cards...
My credit history started w/a Discover More Card in December 2010 and 6 months later I opened a Chase Freedom card.

Currently both card limits sit at 5k. I spent 50k on my Discover last year and another 50k on my discover in the past 3 months. Chase just set my limit to 5k so I haven't really been using it that much. I've been reading the board posts here and there while at the office but it looks like I'm going to have to start sifting through them with more diligence. I did apply for the Capital One Venture card...but got declined due to lack of history.

I know this may be a bit frustrating, but this is a long-term game. Seeing a thread like this has got to add to the frustration. It's like seeing someone living in a 10-bedroom oceanfront house and saying, "I want that, too!"

Well, you can get to it, but it'll take time. You have shown that you understand you need to build a credit history, and believe me, a good credit history will eventually put you in a better position in life than any amount of points you might get through the kinds of deals found on FT.

Nevertheless, you're here because of the possibilities offered. Here is a strategy I might consider. Most folks focus first on airline miles credit cards, and understandably so. On the other hand, because of the high benefits offered, these kinds of cards may be more difficult for you to get. Concentrate for the time being on fee-free cards that offer some travel benefit, such as hotel cards. Hilton has a couple through Citi, Barclay's offers a Choice Visa. You won't be able to fly anywhere yet (the transfer of hotel points earned through these offers will yield a miserable number of airline miles, I'm afraid), but you'll have some free hotel rooms that you can use on a driving trip. Check the forum here on bidding sites, like Priceline, to see how you could combine a low-cost bid room for a couple of nights with the rooms you earn through cards to string together a week someplace nice for perhaps no more than $100.

And, if you want to fly, I'd pay attention to the Mileage Run forum. There can be the occasional mistake fare that might get you on a plane somewhere you want to be.

Once you build a bit of credit history, consider fee cards with minimum spending requirements. Last year, I took the Chase CO Mastercard, Chase Southwest card, and Barclay's US Mastercard, each of which gave me a good chunk of miles without having to spend a lot of money.

Churning is out for you, and in fact, in what is undoubtedly FT heresy, I might encourage you to hold onto one or two of the fee cards, even paying an annual fee. Why? At this point, you need not just a credit history, but a history with a bank or two.

You're going to have to build a bit of a foundation for the future--not just for your travels, but for everything else credit can do for you, such as buying a car, buying a house, or getting a loan from the bank to fund that really great business idea you have.

This is all real good feedback, thanks lwildernorva. This makes it clear of the importance of building history with CC/Banks. I'm going to start looking into the HHonors card as I already have 200k pts accrued with them from spending time in hotels. I think it would be a good addition.

Thanks!

Typo - BoA, like the other snake.

Spend on the Chase freedom instead, but dont redeem the points. Later, in a year or two apply for the Chase Sapphire Preferred card. Then all your Ultimate Reward points collected through Chase Freedom will turn into gold..you can transfer them to United/ Hyatt/BA/Korean/PC/Marriott at 1:1