More Money Podcast - 189 Credit Card Reward & Travel Tips for Canadians - Barry Choi, Personal Finance & Travel Expert

Episode Date: March 20, 2019

Can you believe it’s been almost 4 years since Barry Choi from Money We Have on the show? We’ve been friends for years now, and he was guest number 7! Since so much has happened in our lives since that interview, I needed to have him back on the show now that he works full-time for himself as a personal finance & travel expert. As I mentioned at the beginning of this episode, I’ve done a few unofficial meetups with podcast listeners the past few months, and the feedback I got was to have someone on the show to talk about credit card reward programs and travel tips specifically for Canadians. Well, of course I thought of Barry who is always in the news or on TV sharing his wisdom on how to get the most value out of your credit cards and how to travel on a budget without it feeling like you’re doing budget travel. Here are some great tips and resources he shared on the show. Include Travel in Your Budget If travel is one of your big values in life (it is for me!), then you need to add it as a line item in your budget. Don’t just book a trip and figure out how to pay for it later. Research where you want to go, price out the cost, then start putting away amounts every month until you can afford it. It’s what both Barry and I do, and honestly it’s the only way to afford travel without getting into debt. For me, I put away money every month for trips I take with my husband and trips I do on my own (usually work-related like conferences or retreats). In terms of how much to save, it depends on where you plan on going. As long as you’re saving a good amount for your emergency fund, retirement and your other financial goals, it’s up to you how much to save for travel. Use Deal Sites to Save Big I’ve used deal sites for years, like Kayak, Booking.com, Expedia, Trivago (you get the picture), and to me it’s the best way to get the best price for flights, car rentals and accommodation. Yes, it can take some time and effort to really figure out the best time, place and dates to travel, but it’s worth it if you can save hundreds if not thousands of dollars! Just think, that savings can be used for excursions, food or shopping to make your trip even better! Travel in the Off-Season You’ve heard this tip before, but it’s true. If you want to save big, travel during that location’s off-season. I’m so used to doing this, I don’t even know what it’s like to go somewhere during the on-season. And I don’t want to! It’s actually really nice to avoid the hordes of tourists, even if it means going somewhere during spring or fall.  Best No-fee Credit Cards Here are Barry’s picks for the best no-fee credit cards in Canada. Just remember, even though it’s no fun paying an annual fee for a credit card, you usually get better benefits with those cards than no-fee cards. American Express SimplyCash Preferred Card Rogers World Elite Mastercard Tangerine Money-Back Card For full episode show notes, visit https://jessicamoorhouse.com/189 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Hello, hello, hello, and welcome to episode 189 of the Mominy Podcast. I'm your host, Jessica Morehouse. Welcome back to the show. And this show, I'm very excited for two reasons. First, repeat guest again. I have my pal, Barry Choi, on the show. He was on my show literally almost three years ago. He was guest number seven. He was my guest for episode number seven. This was back when he lived in my old apartment that I rented. And I actually got all my guests to come over and we did it live. But I wasn't as tech savvy as I am now. And so while we were recording it, I kind of, I just didn't do, you know, it wasn't the best recording. So I felt totally bad.

It's still a great episode to listen to. It was totally fine. I got Josh, my husband slash engineer to fix it. But anyways, I told Barry after that, I'm like, oh, we'll do another episode together and I'll make sure it's all good and all that stuff. And bam, it's like three years later. I'm like, shoot, I should have Barry back on the show. But also, um, I had, you know, been doing a couple meetups, like just like unofficial meetups. Like

one I did in Vancouver when I was visiting a family for Christmas time. And one, when I was in Ottawa over the fall and I asked, you know, the, my new friends, the podcast listeners that joined me for a little meetup, what they wanted to hear on the show. And one of the things they said they want to learn more about how to kind of optimize, you know, rewards and points through credit cards. But for Canadians, because a lot of the information out there is for Americans, no offense, Americans, it's just, you know, there's a different ballgame in Canada, there's different rules, there's different credit cards, there's different point systems. And so of course, I thought Barry needs to be on the show. He's always, he has the best resources on his website, moneywehave.com. And he's always on like TV talking about this. So yep, I had to call my

friend Barry to get him back on the show. So that's what we're going to be talking about in this episode. Before we get to that interview, who's just a few words about this episode's sponsor. This episode of the Mo Money podcast is supported by Sonnet Insurance. How much are you paying for home, auto, or tenant insurance? Better yet, do you know what's in your insurance policy? If you don't know, you're not alone. In Sonnet's recent survey, they discovered that one in three Canadians haven't read their home and auto insurance policies either. Which is why Sonnet stands out from other insurance companies. They've rewritten all their policy documents so you can actually understand how you're being protected, without the needless jargon.

And if you have questions, they're on standby via live chat, email, or give their award-winning customer service team a call to speak to a real human. Sonnet's aim isn't just to protect its clients, but to make the whole insurance process easy. Don't believe me? Visit sonnet.ca to get a quote online in just five minutes. It's really that easy, and one of the reasons I switched over to Sonnet myself. Try it out yourself by visiting sonnet.ca. Once again, that's sonnet.ca. Thanks, Barry, for joining me on the show. I mean, it's only taken three and a half years for you to come back. I can't believe it's taken that long.

I know, and I promise I won't mess this up because, as you know, the first time you came over to my house, I actually had people come over to my home. And I forgot to hit the record button. My mic was not really on. So even though that was a great episode about DIY investing, and honestly, I feel like it was one of the first conversations I've had with someone about DIY investing, because it was such a noob at that time. It, you know, we needed a we needed another episode in the camp, don't you think? That's what we're doing now. That's what we're doing now. And also, yeah, so that was like three and a half years ago, which is insane. And since then, a lot has changed. At that time, you were obviously still blogging, but you still worked full-time. You worked in the news.

And now you're a full-time money slash travel expert, which is pretty cool. It's crazy when you think about it, right? It is kind of crazy. It is crazy. And honestly, I don't know. I think you know this. I think I've told you this, you are a big reason why I decided to really just kind of double down on this idea of like me rebranding for Mo Money Mo houses to me as a personal brand. And just like, let's do this,

let's see if I can make this into a legit business, because you're one of the first people to really, you invited me to there was like this brand dinner, like this one company had a dinner for influencers. And I'd never, I didn't even know you could really make real money or influencers were really a group of people. And so when you invite me, I'm like, whoa, this is a whole new world. This is interesting.

Let's maybe see what we can do here. Yeah, and it's not about just being an influencer. It's just really more about selling yourself. So yeah, you have a certain amount of influence, but more importantly, you have a lot of skills that you don't even realize. I remember your old marketing days, what you did with the podcast,

or even things that relate back to your university days and studying film. And it's not just you. It's so many people out there who listen. They forget that they have all these marketable skills because they might be stuck doing the same job over and over again. But when we really start to think about it, you can sell your skills. You can do other things. You just got to know how to market yourself and talk to other

like-minded individuals who can help support you in your dreams. Absolutely. And that's something, it's a learned skill. Like I feel like I used to have the mindset where I'm like, well, I'm not a salesman, even though I totally worked in sales. I mean, not like on the front lines exactly, but I worked in like advertising sales for like four years. I'm like, I don't know anything about sales, but it's a learned skill. And I think any, anyone could do that. And, you know, I always have guests on the show talking about side hustles. And I mean, you and me are like, we were super into side hustling and sometimes when I think about how much I worked and when I know I know how much you work on top of your day job like I don't know how we did and it can turn into something beautiful it's kind of weird like that sometimes because we met like

pretty early we both had full-time jobs and our side hustles they weren't even side hustles back then they were more like oh we're doing this for fun. We just have similar interests. And then like you said, oh, we can develop things. And then we kind of grew together. So we got lucky in the sense that we kind of met at the same time where our side hustles were growing. And even though we had similar things, we were also doing different things, which is, again, a good thing.

Yeah, we could help each other. And it was nice to have you. I mean, we were still friends, obviously. It's nice to have someone to talk to about this weird world that's so new, like this online entrepreneur in the finance space. And what's interesting, too, like you mentioned, we're kind of doing different things. We have kind of different, a little bit of different audiences and different expertises. Your expertise is obviously like,

you've got that travel thing, which I, we're going to talk a little about a bit about, cause I know lots of my listeners want to know how to just all the, all the things that we need to know in terms of like traveling and saving money. But also for me, you're that guy that I talk to. I'm like, Hey, what, what's the best credit card round or how to optimize credit card rewards? Cause you always seem to be on top of that stuff. And when I was actually recently, I did a couple kind of mini meetups with some of my followers in Ottawa and Vancouver. One of the things that they want to know is they want more information about how to optimize their credit card rewards because a lot of the information out there is for the states. I see all the time all these Americans are like, I got this free amazing trip on points. I'm like,

I've never been able to save up enough points to buy anything. I don't know if I'm doing it wrong. I probably am, but I don't even know where to start with that. It seems like a lot of work, so I don't even try. Let's start there. Let's start with the credit card reward program optimization. How the hell do you get started with that is it actually that much is it a lot of effort like is it let's be real um it's kind of weird right so it's it's not a lot of effort but it is at the same time in the sense that to really maximize your points so let's just talk about the u.s a little bit first and why people see those um there's obviously more people in the u.s I think they have 10 times the population of Canada.

There's more banks, there's more airlines, there's more everything. But as a result, that means they can make better offers because there's more competition. They got to have a generous offer or you're not going to sign up. So they might have a, I'm making this up, an offer of a hundred thousand points, but in Canada, it might be half of that. I see. There's just less competition. So it's really actually really easy to get these rewards in the U.S. Now, to flip things to Canada, is it easy?

It depends on how you look at it, right? So anyone can sign up for a credit card, obviously, right? Yeah. But the really good credit cards usually have a high income requirement, like 60,000, 80,000 dollars. Right. And those sign up bonuses usually have a bare minimum. To me, it's like if the sign up bonus is worth at least two hundred and fifty dollars, it's probably worth signing up for. Right. OK. And of course, the problem with the sign up bonuses is you usually need to have to spend a minimal amount to get that bonus. That could be one thousand dollars000, $1,500, $3,000.

One really generous bonus is actually a $7,000 spent. And for most normal people, it's like, I would never spend that much money in three months, blah, blah, blah, right? No. Which may be true, but a lot of times, like, I spend like, you know, $1,500 a month on my credit card because I charge everything to my credit card. And it's actually not that hard when you think about it. Um, but at the same time,

I totally understand that credit cards can be a trap. Yeah. Cause you wouldn't believe how many people I talked to and the reason they're in credit card debts. They're like, well, I use my credit card because of points. And I know that's just an excuse. I'm like, and how much, how many points do you have? And what have you used them for? They're like, just silence. Yeah, yeah. So that's exactly it.

You want to make sure you're actually doing natural spend. So a couple of things. Look for the big ones right away. Home insurance, car insurance, down payment for a car. Not that you buy a car every year. But the point is, whenever you're about to spend a lot of money things like can I maybe sign up for a credit card just to take advantage of this so I can reach that minimum spend again a lot of people don't like to apply for credit cards and I certainly respect that and I have no problem with that for people who are

comfortable with it it's an opportunity for them, right? Another big worry for Canadians with signing up for credit cards is obviously we talked about how you can spend more. There's no doubt about that, but also how it affects your credit score. And it's true. Every single time you apply for a new credit card, your credit score takes a hit of 10 points. But if you pay it off within a few months, it goes back up to where it was. So what I'm getting at is applying for a new credit card once every two months, once every three months is perfectly fine. Not that you would necessarily do that, but some people are more aggressive than others. So if you want to get into this game, sure, you can do it.

But I wouldn't recommend applying for five credit cards and then trying to get a mortgage shortly after because that could affect how home lenders view your credit history because they want to be like, why are you getting so much credit? But if you're responsible for your spending, always paying your bills off on time, in full, there's nothing wrong with it. So that's the first part, right? Like just understanding the set of bonuses. I write about this on my website all the time. Yeah, I know you got some great stuff. But it's not as simple as just signing up for a big bonus. It's also understanding how the different credit cards, what benefits you get. So if you're signing up for a credit card, maybe it comes with lounge access, maybe it comes with mobile device insurance, but something as obvious as this. If you don't travel, why are you using a travel rewards credit

card? Yeah, like it's like, say you don't like taking planes, you don't like flights. Why are you just using a cashback card? Like it makes no sense. But also a lot of the different credit card programs have travel partners. And that's where you really start to maximize your points. So American Express, you can transfer your points

to Marriott Rewards. You can transfer your points to Aeroplan. But at the same time, you also really need to understand theott Rewards. You can transfer your points to Aeroplan. But at the same time, you also really need to understand the value of things. So yeah, you can transfer your points to Aeroplan. So here's a good example. The American Express Gold Rewards Card comes with a signup bonus of 25,000 points. Now, if you were to use it at the base value, it's worth at least $250, right? But American Express also has a fixed travel system, points reward system. So you can actually get more value for those points.

Alternatively, you could also transfer those points to, say, Aeroplane at a one-to-one ratio. Again, so that means you now have 25,000 Aeroplane points. What a lot of people don't realize with 25,000 Aeroplane points is enough points for a round-trip ticket to anywhere in the continental US and Canada. Really? That's right. I'm doing it wrong. Well, that's the thing. I feel like that's a lot of math you have to do.

But maybe once you kind of are familiar with it, it's not that hard to figure out. That's exactly it. You nailed it. Once you actually know what the actual value is and what you can do with those points, that's where you really start to see the value of it. Like once you actually know what the actual value is and what you can do with those points, that's where you really start to see the value of it. And then more importantly, like, you know, I talked about how you could transfer your points. That's where you start signing up for multiple cars to get those points. You can quickly accumulate like, you know, 100,000 points, no problem.

So yeah, it requires a little bit of math, but it's just to me, it's kind of a system where you kind of just need to know what's going on. How, so how do you know what's going on? Like, how do you like stay on top of all this like stuff besides reading your wonderful blog? Well, to me, I think a lot of people need to ask themselves, what are their standard travel habits? So, so one good example is this, like, I know you're from Vancouver, right? And every single time you have the option to fly home, do you have a preference of an airline? Do you choose Air, Air Canada or WestJet or vice versa? Or do you just go for what's cheapest? Whatever's cheapest. Um, but we do like talking about credit cards. We have, uh, me and my

husband, the RBC WestJet. Um, I forgot what type of card. Yeah, the WestJet RBC World Elite MasterCard. Yeah, that's the one. And we got that specifically because we fly home to Vancouver at least once a year for Christmas. And so it allows us to have that $99 companion flight that saves us so much money every year. See, you got it. We have the one credit card that we have

that pays for itself 10 times over and it's perfect. But outside of that we don't really i think optimize lots of our points but in terms of like flights to kind of anywhere or whatever usually we just look at some comparisons i find what i like i don't actually care what airline it is whatever's cheap it is but that being said you know right away you recognize hey i fly west jet on a regular basis this companion voucher alone makes it worthwhile for sending a car right but a lot of people alone makes it worthwhile for sending out your card. But a lot of people also forget it.

It's like, hey, you know what? It also comes with your first bag checked. So for you and your husband, each time you're flying, that's $120 you guys are saving. So how much it costs to check a bag? Oh, my gosh. $30 each way, right? Dang. For a person.

So one return flight, that's $120, right? So that one flight, and the card does come with an annual fee of $119. So again, one flight, you've made your money back. So that's one way you can kind of look at it. It's like, hey, where am I traveling? Or think about like a business traveler, someone who travels to work on a regular basis.

If you were to sign up for Marriott Rewards and you booked all your hotels at Marriott, you would just quickly accumulate points in elite status. So in a sense, you should be loyal to a certain extent. The lowest price obviously is attractive for a lot of people, but sometimes being loyal because you get the additional perks, you know, free Wi-Fi, sometimes you get a free breakfast or whatever, it can be worth your trouble. But sometimes you also got the annoying part, and I admit this is annoying,

is you need to understand the programs too. So every single bank has their own credit card loyalty program, but you need to understand how can you redeem your points? Is it easy to redeem your points? Can you use it for taxes? But to me, that's no different from any loyalty program. You know, we could be talking about PC Altamont. I happen to shop at a lot of Loblaws on the store.

So obviously I have a PC Altamont account. I used a credit card because it maximizes points. So to me, it's always like, look at where you're spending, where you're using your dean of most spending. Can you maximize your loyalty? Do they have a loyalty program? And if they do, can you use a credit card to earn even more points and quite often the answer is yes so then you kind of start planning your spending um around it so you don't need to go

into too hard because you know we're talking about some pretty hardcore stuff but even like the casual traveler you know there's a couple of good all-in-one travel credit cards you know the scotia bank passport reads infinite it is a nice card. It gives you six. That's another card I have. Yeah. It's, and honestly, I'll be honest, like the points and that like, that's all nice. And there's lots of great perks.

Like I do like that. I get like six passes to the airport lounge. But the main reason I got that one was, it was like one of the few credit cards out there that doesn't charge you a foreign exchange fee. And I use it for my business. And most of my business expenses are charged to me in USD. Yeah. When you look at it that way, like it's, oh, I can take advantage of this, right? It's like you don't necessarily need to really know the ins and outs. But at the same time, you should really understand how loyalty programs work. Even if it's something as simple as say,

like, you know, the gap has gap dollars, but they're very specific of how when you use it. And like my, my wife quickly realized it's like, Hey, wait a minute, these gap dollars, I can't use them all the time. If I just wait for a sale, it's actually cheaper. So it's like, do you know what I mean? Like, it's kind of bizarre sometimes. But you know, or even going back to pc optimum sometimes they'll say hey if you spend 40 this day we'll give you 7500 points but when you do the math that's like a 20 return so it's in your best interest to spend more like they're obviously doing it for reason trying to get you to spend things but so you never want to spend buy things that you weren't

planning to spend but if you can kind of plan around it, it's a good thing. I know. It just reminds me of the other day I was at, um, the Bay to return some stuff. And, uh, I was at the cashier and there's a girl in front of me and she had like a dress that she was going to buy. And of course, you know, with the Bay, they're always going to try to sell you on this credit card. And what really irritates me is just how they kind of say it. It sounds like, because apparently what I learned is they have their Bay credit card, but they also have this Bay points card that is free and it is not a credit card. They never really talk about that. They really only focus on the credit card. So this girl was in front of me. Cashier was like, Hey, do you want to save 15%

on your thing by getting this bay card? Like she was kind of a bit vague by it. And so I'm like me being this personal finance nerd, I'm just like, I'm sorry, is that a credit card you're talking about? Cause I just wanted the girl to understand what was going on right now. Cause I'm like, do you know that she's trying to send you up, sign you up for a credit card? And, uh, and she's like, Oh no, I meant the, the points card. I'm like, Oh, okay, great. That's fine. But then, then, then I saw the girl like sign up for the credit card. Maybe she was aware that she was signing up for a credit card, but I really, and then the girl's like, so this means I say 15% like on all my purchases and ladies like, no, just on purchases

that you do today. I'm like, that is not a very good incentive. What if you're just going to buy like a few other things? Now you have this big credit card. I don't know. Yeah. So it's funny that you say that because there are sometimes like you can take advantage of it. If you're like, you know, spending $2,000 to get 15% off is maybe worth your trouble, right? For me, I'm like, 15% is not that good of a deal. you know it just depends how much you're spending right um but you hit it a very good point in sense that a lot of these salespeople they're not always telling you the full truth and i don't know if it's just a lack of training or if they're under constant pressure to you know promote credit cards because like you

know it's the same thing we talked about um, um, PC financial for a little while, not that they were caught and it wasn't necessarily their fault, but a couple of their, um, employees who were pushing the credit cards were like, Hey, you, you get extra points. And they weren't telling people that it was a credit card. And this happens that many, many retailers, like, you know, the same thing happened that Canadian tire. Um, there's always things going on. And I don't know if it's, like I said, the pressure of being in sales. They have to sell X amount or whatever. Or they're just not trained properly.

But yeah, this is why, to me, you always really need to know these things. And in my writing, I talk about how you always got to read a fine print. You got to read your insurance policies. Exactly. And usually, you don't have enough time when you're at the teller and they're trying to sell you. Like in my opinion, it's like if you're buying something and then someone's trying to sell you a credit card to save you money in that moment, I'd say, oh, not this time.

I'll think about it and then go home and do your research because you're not staying there for like 20 minutes to read the pamphlet and the fine print and guaranteed that girl did not. But I'm like, you know what? It's not my place to be like, do you know what you're doing? That's annoying. So I'm not going to do that. She can make her own mistake. Yeah, exactly. And that's, that's also the weird thing about like, um, you know, working in this, this personal finance space, you kind of want to correct people and you want to inform them, it's like it's not really my place like i was having i was at a meeting yesterday downtown and the table beside me these two guys were talking about investments and one guy was clearly an investment advisor and he was and his client was worried about the dips recently yeah and you

probably already know where the story is going. And you're like, yeah, that's why you got someone like me who can manage your money and knows what's going on. It's like, you don't know what you're going on. You just got an initial funds. Yeah, it's like, no, like, so many things wrong with that. But that is 100% how they get you when something goes, you know, there's a market correction or crash or something like that. People panic. And then the sale, you know, the investment advisors, you know advisors you know air quotes um will say well that's why you have me it's like um they can't protect your investments they're trying to do the best they can but they can't guarantee you anything they can't guarantee you no one can if they could they wouldn't be like

you know managing your money they i mean guaranteed they're using a robo advisor for their own money you know what i mean like it just drives me crazy one thing to go back on like um that we didn't really discuss about credit cards and travel credit cards and people really got to understand is a lot of people get turned off by an annual fee and i and i 100 yeah that's yeah that's i was going to bring that up because i used to be um this person well you know throughout my all my 20s i I wasn't like rich. Understatement. And so I couldn't understand why anyone would get a credit card with an annual fee because I'm like, I'm sorry, I don't want to pay to use a credit card. Those credit card companies are making money off their clients

without that annual fee. Hell no, I'm not kidding. Yeah, yeah. So a lot of people say that. So we use the Scotiabank card as a good example. It's got a fee of $139, right? So we use the Scotiabank card as a good example. It's got a fee of $139, right? So we will ignore the sign-up bonus for now, right? Let's just ignore it, doesn't it? Well, if you look at just lounge access memberships, right, they're worth about $350 Canadian, right? Because it's a $99 US fee for the membership. And then each lounge access is $27 US,

right? But what you're also getting is a tangible one that you get a comprehensive travel insurance package. So that is probably worth a minimum of $120 a year also. So you're basically paying for these benefits. And people don't realize like, this is actually going to save you money in the long run. Because if you're traveling without travel insurance, you're crazy, right? Like, you should not travel without travel insurance. So the fact that your credit card already gives to you, perfect, great. Like there, that's what my annual fee is for. So people who get obsessed with not paying the annual fee, it's like, it is what it is. And again, you know, I think you understand as a personal finance blogger.

Yeah. When you look at the fine print and the benefits, like actually doing an analysis of like, how much would this cost if I were to buy it myself? I think that's smart. And also recognizing would you actually use that benefit? Because there's a lot of credit cards out there that have lots of great benefits. I'm like, I would never use that. So it's not a value to me. So right, making sure that I would like for the lounge access, I'm surprised that I did actually really like that benefit because I never once you get it,'re like I don't want to sit with the cattle in the common area ever again it sounds awful but it's it's 100% true like I hate sitting in a regular when you go in there depending on like what time of day it's like you can basically get a free meal yeah I don't even drink but the point is like you know you

think about how much like I bought a coke at the like the New York airport and it cost me four dollars us I was like are you kidding me right and i know it's like it's obviously not as expensive as 27 us but the free lounge access does make a difference but you know what i tell people is yeah you're getting value i think about all your regular day services like like how much do you pay for your cell phone plan some people pay 90 hundred dollars for a cell phone plan they say hey that's what they get and they get x amount of data where they're happy with it, your credit card is the same thing, but for whatever reason, people just, they see that fee,

and they get turned off. And you know, if you don't want to pay a fee, that's fine, and most of the credit cards with fees have a higher income requirement anyways. There are a lot of good no-fee cards, too, out there. Do you know what I mean? What are some of the best ones you know of?

You know, there's a few good no-fee cards. It just depends on what you're looking for. If you're looking for a straight cash-back card, you know, American Express has one. There's a Simply Cash one. The Rogers has one. Even Tangerine's money-back card is pretty good for what it is, right? But people got to realize if you're not paying a fee, you're just not getting as many benefits. It's that simple.

Yet, a lot of people out there know um i don't i don't want to pay for it or even like again we joked about the lounge access like before people would never care about it but once you've actually gone into a lounge and they don't get me wrong it's not like some kind of magical experience but i don't know some lounges are downright dodgy yeah yeah it's true but like i've been to some lounges like i remember once in portugal i was like i was been to some lounges like i remember once once in portugal i was like i was ready to miss my flight i just didn't want to leave the lounge it was so comfortable right yeah it's like but do you know what i mean it's like i like being comfortable before a flight like i travel more than an average person i think uh yeah so these

things spoil me and then when i get to an airport that doesn't have a lounge, I'm actually upset. It's silly, but I get mad. I'm just like, come on. And it's ridiculous for me to expect that, but I do. But yeah, once you get used to it, it's hard to go back. Now I hear you. I want to talk because you have mentioned that you travel a lot um and so obviously as you know a ton about credit cards you know just as much about travel and how to basically have a great experience for not a lot of money what are some like just like easy things that people can think about or try out to kind of lower their costs when it comes to travel. Obviously, like it's, you know, comes down to organization and preparation. Right, so some easy things right away, I would say it's like, you know,

travel during the off season. If you don't have kids, you know, avoid July, August right away, right? September, October will obviously be cheaper. Same with the spring. April, May, great times to travel, right? That'll save you a few hundred dollars right away, not just on flights, but also on hotels.

Speaking about accommodations, it's pretty easy to compare different hotel sites. One website I like is booking.com just because you can literally compare tree houses to apartments to hotels, right? Oh, neat. So it's just basically whatever is in the most options is always good and you know if you think about it everyone knows new york staying in

manhattan is obviously expensive so if you're willing to travel outside you know maybe upper east side maybe not there that's actually a really fancy area but maybe say brooklyn yeah right yeah yeah it'd probably be cheaper or even somewhere in in London, England, it goes by zones. If you're in zone one or two, all the hotels are always going to be expensive. So if you stay in zones three or four, they tend to be cheaper. Yes, you need to spend a little bit of time traveling to get into the core, but it's not a big deal. And it's funny. It's like one of those things, again, most people, they're like, oh, I don't want to waste time taking transit.

I want to be able to walk everywhere. And I get that, but I'm not telling you to say 45 minutes or an hour outside of the city, right? If it's like a 15 minute train ride into the city, that's not a very long time. And if you can save you a significant amount of money, it's worth it. And to me, it's not about trying to save as much money as possible. It's like that money you save can be used for other things on your trip. Maybe, maybe seeing that attraction, maybe seeing a show, right. Or having a nice meal and other simple things like, you know, always check to see if there's some kind of museum pass or like a city pass. And, and even if they do have one, you got to do the math, like, you know, okay, if it's 40% off, how many of these attractions am I actually going to do? It's going to be worth my while. Right. And if it adds up and like, you just do it or, you know, okay, if it's 40% off, how many of these attractions am I actually going to do? It's going to be worth my while, right? And if it adds up, then you just do it. Or, you know,

something simple, we talked about public transportation, like, yeah, Uber is cheaper than taxis, but public transportation will always be the cheapest option, right? Yeah, if you're traveling with a family of four or five, yeah, it might make more sense to take an Uber, but public transportation, people get a lot afraid to use it because they're in a different country. But you know what? I've been around in almost every single country I've been in. You're basically going in the direction of the last stop. I mean,

it's like, it doesn't matter where you are. Look for the last, like the train will say the last stop is going to. And if you're going that direction, you're pretty good. And it doesn't take very long to figure out like oops i've gone on the wrong train and to backtrack is not a big deal like you'll know right away right yeah and there's always a

map and i mean we took the subway around bangkok and thailand and let me tell you like we do not speak to speak thai but we figured it out and it wasn't like a very straightforward system but it was fine and it's part of the trap for me, at least, uh, going on public transit and kind of like trying to be like a local is part of the travel experience. You want to see, like I actually was so excited to go on like the subway in New York city. Cause I'm like, Oh my gosh, I've seen this in movies. I want to see how it is in real life.

Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, what else I can say? It's like, you know, also think about the destination. Obviously there's, you know, what else I can say? It's like, you know, also think about the destination. Obviously there's, there's so many cheaper destinations out there if you want to go to, um, you know, you talk about Bangkok and Thailand that you've been there. Yes, it's expensive to get there, but you could easily spend less than $40 a day all in if you want it. Right. Yeah. It's so cheap. I spent more on lunch when I was in New York a few weeks ago. What do you, what do you think about, cause now we're in winter time. What do you think about? Cause every, I feel like every travel site is pushing, like, you know, go to someplace hot for the winter. Is this the time to go? Or is this like actually not the good time to go? Like

this is an off season. Yeah. For, for winter destinations, this is actually the peak season for a lot of them. Right. But like, you're kind of all like february march april but if you weren't able to travel in like say december and january uh that's still technically considered a low season for a lot of these hotter destinations i was in bermuda in december and it was a low season so less people the prices were a little bit lower um and it may not be as warm but it's still like warmer than home warmer than canada is what i'm getting at right oh oh my gosh that bermuda was only 15 degrees right like what am i complaining about like it makes no sense and um it's so you always got to look at the time of where you're going um and you think about it like like sometimes going to

south america there's obviously different seasons it's worth investigating what's going. And you think about it like sometimes going to South America, there's obviously different seasons. It's worth investigating what's going on. But you also kind of need to look at what's going on locally, right? Is there a big festival or celebration going on at that time? So even though it might be technically low season in North America, that specific destination you're going to, it might be their peak season. You're like, uh-oh.

And, you know, other things too you can easily save on like food you don't need to eat out every single meal like first thing i do when i go to any country is like i find the closest grocery store and i load up on uh drinks and snacks like just water alone you know how much money you can save instead of buying like that one bottle of water every single time um you could easily save like $100 across your trip just by going to the grocery store, like minimum, right away. And again, like I said, that money I save, I spend it on something else instead. Yeah. No, yeah, that's exactly what I do. I tend to try to always find if there's a way that I can save on my flight and especially accommodation too, because I feel like as I get older obviously I do like a nicer place

but I also try to remind myself that if I'm traveling somewhere I'm probably not hanging out in my hotel or my Airbnb like I'm just not I'm out and about so who cares I'm not hanging out at the hotels I still like a little bit nicer place and sometimes you just kind of look at your budget so um I personally my wife and I we have like an overall travel budget. Every single month we put an X amount of dollars and it grows. And the way we look at it is as long as we've got money in the account, we don't care. Right. So if we want to spend a little bit more on accommodations, that's fine. I'm not one of like, I'm, I'm in my mid thirties.

I'm closer to 40 than I am to 30. There's just no way I'm staying in a hostel. Yes, it's the cheapest option possible. And yes, I didn't pass, but I'm just to 40 than I am to 30. There's just no way I'm staying in a hostel. Yes, it's the cheapest option possible. And yes, I didn't pass. But I'm just not doing it. I don't care if it's cheaper than Airbnb, right? I've stayed in tons of hostels. But I can afford to stay in a nicer place.

I can afford to have my own room. So it's just like, yeah, you want me. It's one of those things, especially in the personal finance world. Sometimes you get judged or whatever. But why am I staying in a hostel when I'm pushing 40? It makes no sense. Right. Right. There's so many other options out there. Yeah, exactly. And like you said, it's like, if you can afford it and you're like actively saving for this travel budget, like why, like it's no, there's no point in my mind, like this kind of comes down to like, you know, some of the things that irritate me about the personal finance world. It's like

no point in being, um, frugal for no specific purpose. It makes sense if you want to be able to afford like this, you know, finally go to this one, um, excursion or something like that. But if you're just trying to make it the cheapest, um, trip possible, just because, well, believe me, I've done that before. And you come home and you're like, Oh, it would have been nice if we actually spent the extra like $300 and went on this extra excursion. That would have been amazing. Cause I'll tell you like the first, um, you know, real kind of trip me and Josh did, which was like maybe seven or eight years ago. Now we went to Mexico and, you know, we got

a deal, you know, at this, you know, uh, resort. I think we were there for seven days and like, we kind of spent most of our money like on the actual like flight and accommodation, like the, you know, all that stuff. I'm like, Oh, we're probably just hanging out in the hotel and just like relax after a few days, you're going to go crazy and get bored and you're going to want to go on an excursion. So we did spend a little bit of money going on one. And so that was good. But then we went back to Mexico last winter. And we did three excursions.

Again, we found a deal. We talked to the consultant. And she had a deal, like a package deal of like, if you do three, you get a certain discount. I'm like, all right. And I'm really glad that we did do that. Again, we did have a travel budget. We had money saved throughout the year to afford that. But for me, it's like, I will always kind of, you know, I'll, I'll be frugal in other ways so I can afford those experiences. Cause, um, that's why you're on the trail. Yeah. Yeah. It's,

it's a great point because, um, I had a similar experience when I was younger. Mind you, this is my early 20s. I did this trip to Europe and I did it with my cousin who lived in England. And the goal was to do it as cheap as possible. And I don't recall why. Maybe it's just naturally frugal. But we went to Barcelona and yeah, we went to the grocery stores. But we basically went to the grocery store for just about every single meal. So we didn't have tapas. And in hindsight, I regretted that so much because it's like, why would I go to Spain and just not have a nice meal?

Like, yeah, I'm in my early twenties, but like I could have splurged on one meal. It wouldn't have been a big deal. Right? Yeah. Like that's part of the experience of travel is eating the local cuisine. A hundred percent. And that was a huge mistake I made back in the day. It's like, how difficult would it have been for me to find, you know, to save $50 anywhere else that entire year? Like, like, like a trip for a second,

but like back home, it's like, I tell people, it's like, don't cheap out on the food when you're traveling, cheap out on food when you're home. Don't go to the restaurants at home. You can do that whenever you want. It's just like, like when you're on vacation, like I actually don't care if you eat out every single meal. Yeah. It'll cost you more. But if you tell me, hey, you know what, I didn't eat out for a month at home. So I can spend all my money on my on my trip. I'm like, hey, man, that's, that's impressive. Right? That makes sense. Yeah. So what are besides, I guess, what you mentioned that you and your wife contribute, you know, to kind of a travel fund every single month? How did you figure out

what kind of percentage of your budget or how much to contribute? Like, how do you kind of determine that? Do you know what kind of trip you're going to go on that year? Or do you just have kind of a, this is the amount and then we'll figure out the trip later? For us, it was kind of like, we always felt like travel was important to us. So we had the set amount. And admittedly, I'm not a big fan of lifestyle inflation, but I do admit that as we made more money, we increased our travel fund a little bit more just because we like to travel. Like I said, we don't spend more on anything else really, with the exception of our daughter now. But the travel was a little bit. So we just have a generic amount that we are comfortable with.

But we came to that amount after we realized like, okay, you know what? We're saving mortgage, savings, everything else. Are we still good for the travel fund? Yes. But don't get me wrong. Let's just say some crazy expense came up that we didn't account for. We would cut travel fund right away, right? Like when my daughter was born, we were we were like okay we'll probably have to

cut the travel fund uh but things worked out in a sense where we didn't it worked out but for the first year when my wife was off we didn't really add to it if you know what i mean we just left it where it was yeah yeah and once she went back to work then we're like okay we're back on track so to me like like the big and i don't really like to judge people when i used to work news you know we do these interviews and people and i I'm sure you know this also. It's like, oh, I had this great experience. I'm not worried about saving money. I worry about that when I'm 40.

I'm like, oh, so you're going to be a 40-year-old with no savings, but you've got these great life experiences. I know. It's like, yeah, that's cool, but yeah, good luck, right? I don't want to judge, but it's just more difficult to save for your retirement when you're 40. And I don't understand why people think it's like an either-or situation. It's like I think people sometimes think of personal finance in extremes. Like you either have to be extremely frugal in your 20s and then not have any fun going through your 30s going through your thirties and then, you know, whatever. Or it's like, then I have to buckle down in my fort. It's like, it doesn't actually

have to be extreme. Actually, if you start just being more responsible with your money as early as possible, you will never have to live in extreme. And I personally can't stand extremes because when I looked back in my early twenties, I was pretty extreme with my budget and being frugal because I thought that's what, I mean,s, I was pretty extreme with my budget and being frugal. Because I thought that's what, I mean, honestly, I got very influenced by the books or TV shows I was reading that seemed like that's what you had to do in order to be responsible with your money. As I'm older now and have more knowledge, that's not sustainable. You need more balance in your life.

And so you need to basically not wait until you're older to figure things out. Because if you're not doing any of the work in your 20s or 30s, it's going to be damn hard in your 40s to try to get on track. Also, you're very close to retirement. So, you know. Yeah, I hear you. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, you know, I always recommend people have a travel fund. But it's also you can work backwards, right? Let's just say you're planning a trip in one year and it's going to cost you $2,400. Well, simple math says you just need to save $200 a month.

Obviously, expenses come up. Your flight might be the majority of the cost. But the idea is if I set aside $200 a month, I'm going to reach my goal, right? It's that simple. So that's why we were talking about earlier about how you got to research and waste the same money. I always tell people you should always be researching destinations right and so you have

roughly the cost and should always be researching multiple destinations you know before we started the podcast uh you were telling me about your husband how you guys are planning to go somewhere this year and you had talked about somewhere else and he was like oh no is that what we want to do well at the same time you you can still research both costs. And you'd be like, okay, this is going to cost, this is going to cost. And sometimes something happens, right? Like maybe all of a sudden you find a cheap flight to another destination. You'd be like, oh, wait, all of a sudden it's actually cheaper than we thought.

Because we already know all the additional costs, maybe it makes sense to change our itinerary. A good example of this is a couple years ago, my wife and I, we had originally planned to go to Europe. We're going to go to like, I think it was Vienna, Prague and Budapest at the time. And I had it all priced up. And I'm not even kidding you. We're 95% confirmed. We just had to book it. And then all of a sudden the prices to the Middle East fell dramatically. And the reason they fell was because it was the Middle East crisis but i as someone who works in news and i read about travel a lot i knew egypt had just elected a new president things were stable it actually was just fine but uh just the perception of the country was not safe but that wasn't true um so it was a really good opportunity for us to go and i told my wife like listen we had already kind of thought about going to egypt to see the pyramids

in the past uh and now i go to my wife was like it's cheaper than it's ever been it's safe if if you're worried we can join a tour for part of it so we have a guide the entire time uh and she's like let's do it and it was like it ended up being one of the best trips we've ever taken in our lives we met a great couple there we're still friends with so sometimes you kind of need to look at multiple places just to know what's going and know your options more than anything else and this applies to anything in life right if you know your options then you just kind of like pick the one that makes the most sense for you at that moment totally and yeah like you said so yeah i was telling barry that uh me and josh were planning on going to italy i voted on my bucket list we'll eventually go there

but an opportunity came that a friend wanted to do a house swap. She was going to stay at my place in Toronto. We were going to stay at her condo in Hawaii. And I'm like, we can't pass this up. Like this is an opportunity that did we, you know, want to go to, it's like Hawaii is on my bucket list. I've heard great, amazing things, but it's like, it wasn't like, you know, a go-to destination. I'm like, oh, we'll get there eventually. But I'm like, well, we can't say no for a free accommodation in Hawaii. Right now, flights are super cheap there, surprisingly. And it's just like, why not? And then when we did, like you said, we calculated what the difference is between having a, you know, one or two week stay in Hawaii compared to going to Italy. Like, oh, my gosh, Italy is so freaking expensive.

I think this is what we're going to do. Yeah, no, that's exactly what it is. Right. Like, I think each other wrote big points, like the house swap opportunity, it's just like, okay, this is a rare opportunity. It really is. Like, do we take advantage of it?

And you should, in my opinion. Like, there's always places you regret. It's like, you know, you're smart enough where it's not necessarily about the money. Like another good example is when I was younger, when I was just out of college, one of my best friends, she worked cruise ships um all over the world right she did it for about four or five years and at the time she always said hey you know barry come visit me

uh you pay for the flight and it's only 12 a day to be on this cruise right uh technically there was no guarantee that i would get a seat but you always did right right right? Yeah. But I was always like, you know, I don't know if I should leave work. You know, that's the kind of old school mentality. You know, I can't, I was part-time. I can't just leave. And you know, what will my bosses think? Like maybe they won't give me the hours when I come back.

And to this day, it's still the biggest regret that I make because I never ended up taking advantage of that opportunity. And she did it for five years. And then I said, no, because I was just like, I don't want to spend the money. And it would have cost me nothing, right? Yeah, the flight would have been quote unquote expensive in my 20s, but it would have been a great experience.

And I still talk to her about it all the time. It's like, man, I wish I hung out with you when you're still cruising, right? I know. So that's why I was like, you just got to just jump on these opportunities. Like if it's not going to destroy your budget and put you in a debt, just do it. Yeah, yeah, exactly. It's like first, so it sounds like to kind of recap some of the things we talked about, really focus on the destination, but also research multiple destinations to see which

one makes the most sense. And then have a travel fund. So when an opportunity does come up or a good deal comes up, you have the cash to pay for it. Because, I mean, I always, you know, pay for flights and accommodation on my credit card, but I have the cash to pay it off right away. And then, you know, make sure that you spend the money where it makes the most sense for you on your trip. And don't feel bad about splurging. That's why you've got the travel fund so you can afford it. And then cut back in your daily life. I really like how you mentioned that. It's like, wouldn't you

rather cut back when you get back home and just like do a no spend month instead of cut back on this trip that you saved all year for? Come on. Yeah. Yeah. That's, that's kind of the way you look at it. Like, that's why back at home, I'm just like, yeah, I don't need that. I really spend it somewhere else. And it's actually a really good feeling because when I do travel, my wife, my wife knows I'm a frugal person, right? But she also knows when I travel, I don't care, right? Because I'm like, the whole point of having this, you know, travel vacation fun and saving at home

is so we can really spend the money on things we enjoy. So we don't hesitate. Or even like the weird thing is like, hopefully my wife doesn't listen to this. Cause like, you know, I criticized her for like, you know, shopping. I was like, do you really need that extra pair of pants? Her joke is like, Oh, I need it for work. Right. It's like, um, yeah, yeah, yeah. I actually do not care how much money she spends on shopping because again,

it's like, no, we've come here for a reason. If you want to buy whatever here, go for it. Like it actually does not bother me whatsoever it's kind of weird even when i say it out loud because like normally i'm like do you need that but again on vacation it's like whatever just go like have your third coffee like or get the massage even though it's like twice the price because we're at we're at the hotel spot but it's like go for it yeah it's amazing well thanks so much barry for joining me on the show i feel like I could talk

to you for another two hours, but I won't do that. Where can I feel like on your website, don't you have a travel opt in or travel resource? Yeah, so I have a newsletter or if you sign up for a newsletter, I have like a an ebook on how to save on travel, but even like travel when credit cards or subsections on my on my website, moneywehave.com. Uh, so it's actually really easy to do research. If you want to learn about credit cards, I got a lot of resources, including like, you know, the best travel credit cards, best credit cards with no foreign exchange fees. Yeah. You're always on top of all like the new changes to any kind of credit card. So it's like, if you want to do some research, you've got, even when I start Googling

your stuff comes up. So, uh, your, yeah, good resources, your money. We have website. Awesome. Well, thanks again, Barry, for joining me on the show. I'll have you back again in another couple of years. Fantastic. If we're still doing this, hopefully we are, if we're still, Oh my gosh, who knows, who knows where we're going to be. And that was episode one 89 of the moment moment podcast with Barry Choi. Make sure to check his website out at money. We have.com basically such a great resource. If you're a, cause he's not only a money expert, he's also a travel expert. And so he knows all the things when it comes to like optimizing travel points and credit cards and all that stuff, stuff that I wish I was better at personally, but

I just, uh, I just don't have the knack like Barry does. So money we have.com is his website. So you can go check them out and also check out the show notes, Jessica morehouse.com slash one 89. I'm going to be, um, putting more information about stuff that we talked about in this episode in the show notes, plus including a lot of important, exciting things that I'm up to that you will want to know about that I will share with you in two seconds right after I share some words about this episode's sponsor. This episode of the Mo Money Podcast is supported by Sonnet Insurance. It can be pretty time consuming collecting insurance quotes to compare prices. What's great about Sonnet is that you can do it entirely online and get a quote in just minutes.

Even better, if you decide to buy Sonnet insurance, you can do that online too. It's so easy to use and understand, it really makes insurance simple. You can even see your quote update in real time if you add additional coverage or change your deductible, so you can confidently know what's in your policy and how the cost compares to competitors. Need to see it to believe it? Try it out yourself by visiting sonnet.ca. Once again, that's sonnet.ca. All right, first and foremost, super importante, which is the extent of my Spanish. I don't even know if that's Spanish. Super important. Tonight, March 20th at 7 p.m. Eastern time, I'm doing a free live webinar all

about investing. If you want to get your investing on, if you want to be motivated and have some action items and just get started with investing because you've been meaning to, but you're too afraid and you're too terrified. You don't know where to start. This is where to start. I'm telling you right now, it's a free webinar. All you have to do is literally show up, listen to me talk,

and you can ask any questions you want at the end. So you really, this is destiny. This is destiny talking to you through me okay maybe that's a bit much but anyways if you want to join me go to the show notes or go to jessicamorehouse.com slash webinar to sign up it is tonight 7 p.m eastern time you will not want to miss it and i hope to see you there it'll be a ton of fun and you'll learn a bunch of stuff so you know why not why not why not um another thing So last week on the podcast, I had Leslie and Scorgy on the show and I'm adding one of her books to my mega book giveaway. If you go to

JessicaMoorhouse.com slash contests or check out the show notes, of course, I'm doing a big, huge book giveaway of books, yeah, of the books by the authors I've had in my show. I don't know why that was so hard to say, but it was. It made more sense in my brain than it is hard to get out. So I've got, I'm giving away copies of Melissa Leong's new book, How We Go Money, Shannon Lee Simmons' Living Debt Free, Tanya Hester's Work Optional, Nathan Lotka's How to Be a Capitalist Without Any Capital, and I'm now also including giving away a copy of Leslie Ann Scorgi's book, The Modern Couple's Money Guide. So I think this is a very great book if you want to learn how to manage money as a couple, which is a very common

question I get. It is kind of a different ballgame when you're managing money on your own to managing it with someone else because there's another person involved with different money mindsets and habits and all that good stuff. So I'm going to give away a copy of her book, jessicamorehouse.com slash contest is where you can learn more information about all of my contests and enter them and hopefully win some free stuff. Don't go away. I'm going to do now some shout outs to a few more iTunes reviews that I got.

So stick around in case you may be one of them and hear your name. All right. First is from Courtney from Canada. She is hooked on the Mo Money podcast. She says, I started listening to Jessica Morehouse's podcast a year ago and have been hooked ever since. The topics she covers are very relatable as a millennial, and it's safe to say I've become a personal finance nerd who went from living paycheck to saving, or paycheck to paycheck, to saving, spending, and investing wisely. Keep the episodes coming, Jessica. And then it's like one of those like hands up, you know, yes, emojis. Thank you so much, Courtney. That makes me so

happy. I'm so, and I'm so glad to hear that you're a money nerd just like me and you're no longer living paycheck to paycheck. That makes me so, so happy. Okay. Next is from Chris Lego from Canada. I was recommended by a friend to start listening to some financial podcasts on my drives to work. And once I found this one, I don't want to stop driving. Oh my God. That is so nice. Jessica has so much information and wants to teach and show everyone the right way to handle their money. It's amazing. A hundred percent suggests listening. Thank you so, so much, Chris. Next I've got a review from youngling guitar boy and boys like B O I cause they're cool from Canada. Uh, they say this podcast is super amazing and informative. I'm super new to investing, but made it my goal this year to become more financially responsible and look forward to my future. Yeah. Look forward

to my future. Uh, the content runs so much in line with my values and I'm so happy to finally have, uh, some info, uh, resources for SRI. And there's like a little heart thing. Thanks for the great work. And SRI is socially responsible investing in case you don't know. Uh, last from Vancouver bomb from Canada. Uh, I started listening to Jessica's podcast about six months ago. I'll be honest. I didn't expect to enjoy it. I know I get it money. How could that be fun? Oh my gosh. I'm so ridiculous. Uh, I figured at my age, almost 50, 50, uh, I should understand money better. So I started trying to educate myself. I have learned so much and I've loved it. I now feel comfortable talking to others

about finances and getting my own money life in order. Thank you, Jessica, for making this information accessible and enjoyable to learn. I truly believe it is essential for everyone to understand money and how it works in our lives. I wish I had done this much sooner. Thank you so much, Vancouver mom. Oh my gosh, it'd be so funny if it was my mom. It's not my mom. Thanks so much everyone for sharing your views and your thoughts and your kind words. I really, really appreciate it. It makes me speaking into this microphone alone and then recording it and then, you know, giving it to you feel like we're all in this together. We're a community, like we're all, you know, virtually in this cool community. So it just makes me, you know, it gives me life.

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