Frequent Miler on the Air - Predicting the next credit card collectibles | Coffee Break Ep35 | 12-3-24

Episode Date: December 3, 2024

There are credit cards out there which are not available new, but are still supported for those who already have them. In this episode, we have a prediction about a few cards that will soon be this kind of "collectible" card. (00:26) - What is a credit card collectible? (01:20) - Chase IHG Rewards Club Select Credit Card Learn more about the Chase IHG Rewards Club Select Card here. (02:15) - Citi Prestige Learn more about the Citi Prestige card here. (04:43) - Capital One Venture One card (08:02) - Ritz Card Learn more about the Ritz Card here. (09:57) - US Bank Altitude Reserve Learn more about the US Bank Altitude Reserve card here. Read about updates to the US Bank Altitude Reserve applications here. (13:05) - Barclays Aviator Silver? Learn more about the Barclays Aviator Silver card here: https://frequentmiler.com/aviatorsilver/

Here we go. This is not your typical Frequent Miler on the Air episode. This is a standalone segment we're calling Coffee Break. Each Coffee Break segment will cover a single topic related to miles and points. And each Coffee Break is limited to 20 minutes or your money back. Enjoy. Today's coffee break, predicting the next credit card collectibles. There are credit cards out there that are no longer available to get new if you don't already have them. But some of these are still supported and have really good perks that you'll be really happy that you have if you have this old card.

And between Nick and I, we have a few of these. And we'll talk about the ones we already have. But more importantly, we'll talk about a set of three cards that we think have a high chance of becoming collectibles in the near future and so are worth considering getting now while it's possible. That's right. You got to be a collector. You got to collect sooner rather than later because eventually you'll be in a situation like we are with these next couple of cards where they're still supported, but you can't get them anymore. And so for instance, we have the Chase IHG Rewards Club Select Credit Card. This is the old $49 annual fee card. If you had it before it went away and you still have it now, then you still have that $49 annual fee. Both Greg and I have this card. And the card comes with an annual 40K free night certificate, which is worth easily well more than the $49 annual fee. It also comes with a 10% rebate on rewards. So when you book a reward with points, you get 10% back.

And so that's a great deal too. And it stacks if you have one of the newer cards. Also, it stacks with the fourth night frame and it gives you platinum status. So for 49 bucks, platinum status, 40K free night, start 10% back and awards, great deal. The card you can't get anymore, but it was worth collecting while it was available. Sure was. And it still amazes me that this card is still only $49 for

those of us that have it. It's a ridiculous value. Okay. Next up is the City Prestige card, which also no longer available from Citi, but it's still supported. $495 annual fee, which sounds a lot, but there's some opportunities to get a lot of that back. So first up, it comes with $250 of travel rebate credit per year. So use the card for any travel purchases and you get $250 of that back. So if you just do that, that brings the net cost of the card down to $245 per year, which isn't too bad.

And if you have city gold status, which I'm not going to get in how you get that, but if you have that, there's a $145 relationship credit you get for having the city prestige card. So between the travel rebate and that relationship credit, the net cost of the card comes down to $100 per year. That's a great deal.

Yeah, it's a great deal. What I love about this card primarily is it offers five points per dollar for dining. City points are getting more and more valuable over time as they add more transfer partners. And, um, so, and if you're, if you dine out a lot as I do, um, getting five X for dining everywhere is, is great. Also gives you five X for airfare and travel agencies and three X for hotels and cruise lines. Um, I really liked that three X for hotels because sometimes if you eat at a restaurant that's in a hotel or next to a hotel, it codes as a hotel rather than a restaurant.

So at least I'll get a minimum of 3X when I use my prestige card in those situations and often 5X. The card also has priority pass select, which is one of the rare ones that includes restaurants still as a benefit, Priority Pass Restaurants. And it has a fourth night free benefit, which you have to book travel through Citi's Thank You Portal. Prices are often not great. So I've had situations where the fourth night free benefit was a good discount, but not often. So I don't think much about that benefit, but, but still the other benefits are well worth the fee to me. Yeah. I regret not hanging onto that. I had it and, and didn't hang onto it. And I wish I had because, uh, the five X certainly would have been nice to, to have these days. All right.

So that's the prestige third. And this one's really going to be one of those that's only going to be some people and you're not even going to know you have it if you have it. But if you have a really old Capital One Venture One card, it's worth going into the rewards options. So when you click on your account, you have your total number of miles. And if you click on rewards, brings you to another page with a bunch of different options. And some people have in there, in the various options, get hotel special offers. This is separate from the regular gift cards area. There's an area to get gift cards. That's not what I'm talking about, even though I'm going to talk about gift cards. You want to look for get hotel special offers. If you have that redemption,

then you have the ability to redeem 64,500 Capital One points for a $900 Marriott gift card. I think they also still have raffles in there or something. There's one other option other than the Marriott gift cards, I think. So this makes points worth 1.4 cents per point towards a $900 gift card. Now it's very specific. You have to get a $900 gift card for $64,500. There's no other options available to get that kind of value. Almost all other gift card options through the gift card tab are going to be one cent per mile. But this is 1.4. So it could be a pretty good deal for getting a Marriott gift card. Apparently, this was limited to people who opened their Venture One card during some specific

window of time like 10 years ago. So if you get a really old Capital One Venture One card, it's worth checking because that could be a good redemption. I do that periodically. I'll redeem for a $900 Marriott gift card and then just use it little by little as I travel for either paid rates that I've clicked through a shopping portal to earn something back and then pay at the hotel with a gift card or pay for breakfast if I have to pay for breakfast and that sort of thing. So anyway, that's one to look for if you get an old Capital One card. Yeah, yeah, that's really cool. I wish I had that.

So between the three we mentioned, now these aren't all the collectible cards out there, but these are the three that sort of came to mind as having really cool perks that you can't get any other way. It's interesting that between these three, Nick and I both have the IHG club card, but we each only have one of the other two that were mentioned. So we each have a little jealousy about the other. I should mention the Capital One card, by the way. You can combine rewards, and that's what makes that interesting. I should have mentioned that. I didn't even think to mention that. But if you've got other Capital One cards or other people in your household with Capital One card, by the way, you can combine rewards and that's what makes that interest. I should have mentioned that. I didn't even think to mention that. But if you've got other Capital

One cards or other people in your household with Capital One cards, they can move their Capital One rewards to your old Venture One card and then you can redeem for the $900 gift card. So that's what we do in my household. I'm not spending money at 1.25 miles per dollar. We're using my wife's Venture X card or Spark Cash card and converting those over to miles, moving them to my Venture One card to redeem for the gift card just for the record right all right but the point of this coffee break was not to make everybody jealous about the cards they don't have but rather to talk about cards that may become collectibles uh and so to inform you that you might want to think about um picking up one of these if it makes sense for you i, none of these are going to make sense for everybody. So really use your judgment about this. But if you, you know, these are cards where we

think there's a chance some of us are going to be regretting not having them when they become no longer available, if they become no longer available for new applicants. All right. So first of all, this is one we've talked about many times on the show, the Ritz Carlton card, the Ritz card from Chase. The only way to get it today is by upgrading from another Chase consumer Marriott card, and then you can get the Ritz card. We have no idea how long that avenue of getting it will last. Who knows what could happen that could close that path. But for now, that's available. It has a $450 annual fee.

In exchange for that, you get an 85K hotel certificate upon renewal each year. And so if you think about Marriott points, even know, even if they're worth half a cent each, I mean, they're worth a little bit more than that, but even if they were half a cent each, that means you could use that certificate for a hotel that would have cost over $400. And so, you know, you could think of that as maybe being worth the annual fee by itself. But you also get Priority Pass membership with unlimited guests. And that Priority Pass also gets you unlimited access to Chase Sapphire lounges for you and your guests. And the card also offers $300 in annual credit for airline incidental fees, which if you're creative about how to use that, that's $300 back each year. So for a $450 card, the combination of benefits really pays for itself.

Slamming deal. Slamming. I used an 85K cert over the weekend in New York City for what used to be the Conrad Midtown. Now it's a luxury collection. Standard rooms are one bedroom suites. Fantastic property. Cash rate would have been $700, $800 using an 85 K-Cert was a no brainer. So anyway, great deal there.

Another one that comes to mind is the U.S. Bank Altitude Reserve card. This is a card that is no longer, or at least currently, not taking applications. Now, we don't know whether that's a permanent thing or not. U.S. Bank does occasionally pull cards from applications without much explanation for a bit, and then they come back. And so we don't know for sure whether this has gone forever. We haven't heard anything one way or another. And at least as we record this, we've had readers continue to report success in product changing to it still. So we believe it's still available via product change, though, of course, that could change at any time. The features of this card. So it's got a $400 annual

fee, which sounds a little expensive until you look at the benefits. The first up is a $325 travel and dining credit per membership year. So all you have to do is use this card for restaurants or travel, and that gets automatically rebated. So $325 back. So really, it feels like a net cost of $75 because I easily spend the $325 between dining and travel in the first month each year. So that's a pretty easy win there. So $75 net. And of course, the key benefit of this card is that you earn three points per dollar when you're using mobile wallet. So if you use Apple Pay or Google Pay and just tap your phone or your smartwatch to

pay when you're out and about in person, you earn three points per dollar. And then you can redeem those points at one and a half cents per point towards travel. There's a couple of different ways to do it. But the key point to know is essentially this makes it effectively a four and a half percent cash back card on your in-person payments, as long as you're using your awards towards travel anyway, towards qualifying travel, then getting four and a half percent back, which is a great deal like Costco or even for grocery spend. It's a good deal. And certainly for all sorts of other stuff you might pay for in person, if you've got a bill to pay at a mechanic or you've got a big vet bill or whatever else,

it's a great deal when you're paying in person. And you get Priority Pass Select membership with restaurant access. You get eight visits per year. So it's unlike a lot of other cards in that you can't go again and again and again. But I keep this one as the digital card on my wallet that has restaurant access. So that if I need to go to a restaurant, A, the Priority Pass app will then see the restaurant. Because if you're logged into an account that doesn't have restaurant access so that if I need to go to a restaurant, A, the Priority Pass app will then see the restaurant because if you're logged into an account that doesn't have restaurant access, the restaurants just don't show up in the app. So I stay logged in on the Altitude Reserve card

on my phone and keep that as my digital card in case I want to go to a restaurant. So I love this card. I will have it and hold it as long as I can for the 3X mobile wallet payment. I use it all the time when I'm paying for stuff in person, especially abroad, because tap to pay is just so ubiquitous everywhere else. Great card to use. Yeah. Yeah. And you didn't mention, Nick, that it also earns 3x for travel. So even when you're not doing tap to pay, if you're paying, let's say you're paying for a rental car or any travel, it has a broad definition of travel you're getting 3x for that um so yeah i mean this card is hotels 3x yeah yeah this is a really valuable card and and so if you can get it i mean for a net cost of 75 a year it's not like it's a big investment if you're not sure that it's

right for you i i do think this is a good one to go for for sure the next one um is more uh more of a gamble um so the the aviator silver card from barclays um this one is a card that it's only available uh as an upgrade from the aviator red card. And the reason we think it might not be long in this world available new is that Citibank is trying to get an exclusive relationship with American Airlines. If they succeed with that, then Barclays will no longer be issuing American Airlines cards. We don't know at that point what will happen with the Aviator red and silver cards. Will you be converted to Citibank cards? There's actually a lot of possibilities, but one possibility is that Barclays will be allowed

to continue to service them but but not, you know, get any new customers to them. And, and so it's, it's a bit, it's a bit of a stretch that that would happen, I think. But it's, but it, but it's interesting because this card is interesting for those who, who want American Airlines elite status. So let me talk about this card a little bit. First, as I said before, you have to start with the red card. That's their $99 annual fee card,

which has one of the benefits of that card is a $25 annual inflate Wi-Fi credit. It has a few other benefits as well. But then if you upgrade to the silver card, that has $195 annual fee. So almost $100 more than the other one. It earns a 3x for American Airlines and 2x for hotel and car rental charges. And it gets $25 per day in-flight food and beverage credit. So whenever you're flying AA, you might as well buy some food on that flight. And you get a $50 annual in-flight Wi-Fi credit. You also get a companion certificate when you spend $20,000 in a year. But the real big benefit to this card for people

seeking elite status is that it has some boosts, loyalty point boosts. When you spend $20,000, you get a 5,000 loyalty point boost, so towards elite status. You get another 5K boost at 40K spend and another 5K at 50K spend. All this is during the status qualification period, which means American Airlines, their status qualification period is from March 1st to the end of february so as that spend has to happen during that time and uh yeah it also offers a global entry application fee credit um so i guess as i said we don't know that we don't know that this card's going away uh if it does go away we i don't know i'd say there's a fairly small chance that it's going away uh if it does go away we i don't know i'd say there's a fairly small chance that it's going to hang around as as it is uh yeah yeah i think so too yeah yeah this is probably

very limited opportunity here right right but anyway we felt like we needed to talk about this one um because it's it's one that there is some chance that it will and or that it would be i guess another possibility is that it'd be it will and or that it would be i guess another possibility is that it'd be converted to something interesting that city would would hold right like right there might be some kind of that city might have to create some kind of like um mid-tier yeah yeah yeah maybe they will maybe maybe it will convert into something i mean it's not there's a better chance that it converts into something than nothing and we just don't know what that's going to look like and so we're totally shooting from the hip but right probably i think we both think it's pretty likely that city will

eventually nail down this exclusive agreement i would say it's more than 50 likely that they will anyway and so it's more than 50 likely that at least you won't be able to get this specific card new anymore. Now, will you be able to get whatever it converts into new? Who knows? Who knows? Right, right, right. We don't know. Anyway, I did want to talk about my recent experience with it.

I had signed up for the Aviator card back in April. And about six months later, without putting any new spend on the card at all, I put about $500, less than $500 on the card when I first got it. It had a bonus that was after first purchase and just happened that there was a deal on something that was like 400 something dollars. So I used that.

I hadn't put a cent on it since then. A couple months ago, I saw in my account the upgrade offer. So that kind of answers a question I had a while ago. Like, do you have to put spend on the card to get that upgrade offer? The answer is no. And so that upgrade offer may have appeared sooner. I don't log into that account very often. I just don't know.

I do know that came about six months after I opened it. Data points have all been pretty consistent that it's at least six months after you open it. So yeah, I think they've been pretty consistent on that. So I don't think you'll see it much sooner than six months. But but where did you see it for people that don't know where to look? I logged into my account and there I think it was like under promotions or something like that. Perhaps there's usually there's a little tab that says offers that's right underneath the balance of points that you have. And usually there's like a little red dot or something there to indicate, hey, there's something new here to look at. And then you may find it there.

That's going to be the spot. You could also just try calling and asking and seeing whether or not it's an option. So, all right. We talked about that card, your experience getting it. Is it worth getting any of these cards now? Should people rush to get any of them? Which of them? What do you think?

I think that, so I did the Aviator upgrade this morning, but more because I'm like a credit card nerd. Like, I like collecting these collectibles. It's not, it's hard. This particular card, the Barclays Aviator, unless you're really, really into advantage status, it's hard to argue its value, I think. However, the Altitude Reserve, I think, is an easy one. I think if you already have a U.S. bank card that you're a personal one that you are happy getting rid of, I think calling to product change to that is almost a no-brainer.

Ritz card is somewhere in between. It's been available as an upgrade for a long time, so I wouldn't necessarily think you need to rush to do that one. Yeah, yeah. I think Greg is spot on. I think if you've got a US bank card, I'm not really sure why you wouldn't call

on product change to an altitude reserve. I guess the reason why you wouldn't is if you don't use any mobile payment. But if you use your phone to pay anywhere, it's a hard deal to beat for the price. So I definitely think that one's worth it because that's the one I have the least faith in sticking around. The Aviator Silver, I guess, probably isn't going to stick around. But at the same time, I don't necessarily feel like it's compelling for most people. I think the Altitude Reserve is probably compelling for the average person, even more so than the average person realizes how useful that card will be for them at 4.5% back, essentially. So there we go. Really quick, because we've got to end it.

If you had to sign up new for a U.S. bank card in order to hope for an upgrade to the Altitude Reserve, should you do it? Yes or no? Time's running out? No. Okay, there you go. Bye everybody.