The problem with the 3-5% cards is that they max you out. So its a big hassle for those of us who spend 5-10k or more a month. Citi Dividend is a $300 cap and others are close. So I could cap out the card is 1 or 2 months. Its too much of a hassle to then switch cards and then switch back after a year.

Ken in Phx

You can use two or three such cards with 3-5% discounts. Two for yourself and one may be for your wife? Switching each card after maxing out should not be a hassle if you are used to the game of earning and using miles. I am sure it is not a bigger hasle than that.

I appreciate that but think I do understand what it is about. I was only interested in it for the conversion bonus of 25%. I have a Hilton honors card which I use for the free hotel nights and own 2 timeshares. I was interested in the card because of the bonus but wanted to know how difficult it was to redeem those miles or if I should just stick with my cash rebates from my other cc.I guess I was just asking generally how is it getting a seat with miles since I do not have any experience with it currently. Owning a timeshare I do not have flexiblability with my travel dates so I did not have the option of "fooling around" trying to get seats on an airplane using miles.

The Costco AMEX is 1% cash, 2% cash for travel, and 3% for dining. If you do a lot of eating out, it's nice. With your situation, maxing your cash seems like the best way to go.

The Fidelity Investment Rewards MBNA card is a FLAT 1.5% cashback on everything.

(You must be a Fidelity account holder, but it doesn't cost anything to open an account there)

see: http://personal.fidelity.com/product...platplus.shtml

Here is some interesting math:

- Charge $20,000 on Starwood card, and that is enough for a free trip in the USA. Or charge $40,000 on the card and that is enough for a free trip to Europe. (This is based on the fact that 20k SPG points translates to 25k miles with most airlines. And, most airlines are 25k for a free trip in USA or 50k for a free trip to Europe).

- Charge $20,000 on the Fidelity card, and you will get $300 (or charge $40k and you will get $600).

Since I can usually get tickets for travel in the USA for under $300, and my travel to Europe is usually around $600 to $700, I opt for the cash option. This way, when I buy tickets, I earn more miles by actually flying. I also don't have problems trying to get extremely hard to find award tickets. For those destinations which regularly cost more than $300 to fly to (say Boston to Anchorage), I just use my miles I earned from flying (rather than miles earned from charging on my credit card) to get an award ticket.

Honestly, the Fidelity 1.5% card posted here looks like the best cash-back offer going - unless you have the diligence to closely manage a larger collection of targeted-purpose cards in your wallet. A 5% gas card, a 5% groceries card, the Costco dining-out card, etc.

I find that all of those categories end up being such a small percentage of my spending that it doesn't matter. The exception would be if I decided to do my own "extreme makeover", in which case I'm make sure to get a good card that provided 2x benefits on hardware purchases.

Of course, for my needs, I remain a big fan of the hotel cards. I carry all three of them - SPG is my primary, MR is my backup, and HH is in my wallet because I do a few HH stays from time to time, and about once a year it goes through a big double-points cycle.

I get about 3 cents per point out of my Starpoints. That's without even trying - booking a lot of Cat 1 & 2 hotels for weekend getaways when I'd otherwise spend $75-100/nt. to get a comparable room. I earn and burn the points quickly, so I'm realizing those 3 cents within 6-9 months of earning them. The "no blackout" feature makes them potentially worth more if you happen to be in a situation where an entire city is totally booked out of cheap rooms.

I get about 2/3rds of a cent per point from HH, so 3 per dollar is a decent card. The enhanced 5/$ on select purchases is nice, too.

True, but a large conversion of Starpoints to air miles is about the worst possible redemption option you can make, except as a last resort. That's why Starwood is more than happy to give you 1.25 miles/point on large conversions!

SPG to miles is a valuable feature of the card - a main reason I use it as a primary. But it's most valuable when you are moving as few miles as possible to liberate orphaned FF miles.

I would argue that 20,000 Starpoints represents about $600 in free hotel rooms, conservatively. If you have a use for free hotel nights, then you can't best SPG. If you don't have a use for free hotel nights (which the OP might not, because of those timeshares...), then cashback is probably better.

Timeshares are often a Saturday-to-Saturday proposition. Saturday-to-Saturday tickets to popular timeshare detinations can be hard to get at standard rates. Take it from someone who had to rulebust in order to get to Florida last winter! Of course, if your timeshare is in Minneapolis in January, this may not be an issue

But I was thinking that to use it for ff miles is a good option because of the conversion bonus only because you can go anywhere with it. Couldn't you fly to the Caribbean with the miles and get the advantage of a $700 ticket for 20,000 points, or is it limited to domestic travel only?

The amount of miles required for an award is dependent on the airline program you transfer your starpoints into. For most programs, it's 30K-35K miles for Caribbean destinations.

If you don't have the flexibility required to use awards, I think you're better off with your cash rebate cards.