I will be the first to admit, I am a noob when it comes to travel hacking. For the last year I’ve been trying to find ways to go on adventures without paying out the nose for accommodations and flights. So far, I have had several successful weekend beach getaways within driving distance of my current home base in MS, but my first “real” adventure with flights and everything’s coming up next month. Actually, I take that back, I did book one way tickets to see my family on the west coast for Christmas this year, so this won’t be my first free flight. However, my upcoming trip to Orlando will be the first I’ve had to coordinate both flights and hotel with travel points. Despite my relative newness to the world of travel hacking, I have learned a lot this last year and I hope you can avoid some of my mistakes so far.
First, it feels prudent to explain what the concept of travel hacking is. For those who have never heard the term, no it doesn’t involve technical computer skills to “hack” into companies’ mainframes and steal free flights and accommodations. The reality is no nowhere near that complicated, but it is still rather exciting and it feels like you’re getting away with something illegal (but it’s totally legit!). Travel hacking simply involves utilizing hotel and airline loyalty programs to earn free stuff. For example, on my upcoming Orlando trip, the flights were booked through Southwest airlines for 22,000 points and $11 taxes. For two people, round trip! Like my favorite Spanish teacher always used to say “!¡Qué buena ganga!” What a bargain!
Rewards points can be earned in a few different ways. The most straightforward– but less efficient– way is through maintaining brand loyalty and booking trips and earning points for money spent with that brand. Usually this works best for those who travel for work and can accumulate points through trips their company pays for.
The most lucrative method is by utilizing credit cards. How many times have you gotten a letter in the mail offering 40,000 or 60,000 points for opening a new credit card and spending $3,000 in the first three months? I bet you threw it straight into the trash/shred bin. What if I told you you just threw away hundreds of dollars worth of travel?! While it seems like a lot of money to spend for a couple thousand travel points, I bet you would be surprised how easy it is to meet the spend requirements. I just put all my normal everyday spending on the card and pay it off every month. Its honestly kind of scary to know how easy it is to spend $1,000 a month on gas, groceries, utilities, gym membership and other common stuff. The biggest thing to remember is to not overspend! The only way travel hacking is profitable is if you never carry a balance (that accrues interest charges) month to month. If you can do that responsibly, you’re getting rewarded just for living your normal life!
It’s obvious why travel hacking is worth it. “Free trips” has a nice ring to it. Going back to my first paragraph way up there, I want to help others enjoy this newfound hobby and so I’m going to share some of my biggest mistakes, so far.
- Not researching the brand before signing up for the card.
The first travel credit card I applied for was the American Express Hilton Honors card. I mainly picked it because I had stayed at Hiltons before and the card had a low minimum spend of $1,000 at the time. When I first got the card, I thought that surely the 80,000 bonus points would get me a lot of free travel. However, had I done some research and checked out what other travel hackers were saying, I would have found out that Hilton points do not go as far as some other brands. It takes more points per stay than other brands like Hyatt or Marriott. Overall, it wasn’t a disastrous mistake. I still got three free nights in beach-towns with my points from the bonus and got to spend quality time with my mom on one trip and with my boyfriend on the other. Also, the dopamine rush that came from getting my first ever free night drove me down the rabbit hole that is travel hacking, and now I’m getting my taste of wonderland.
2. Not following other travel hackers on social media
Maybe this should have been my number one, it totally changed the game for me once I did. Seeing how other people were taking dream trips for cheap gave me so much insight and inspiration. There are so many ways to earn and spend travel rewards that it can be overwhelming at first, but seeing real people, real families do it makes it seem much more attainable. I learned a lot of great tricks, like how to book domestic round trip flights on United for 15K points through their partner airline Turkish airlines! Additionally, Hyatt properties typically have better bang-for-your-buck point redemption than Hilton or Marriott. Probably the best information was how to get BOGO tickets through SouthWest airlines. Yes, you read that correctly, buy one flight and get one free. This isn’t the best article to go further into that little golden nugget, so be on the lookout for a follow up article with a detailed explanation. The main point I want you to remember here is that surrounding yourself, even virtually, with people who do this kind of magic rubs off on you. At first it will be confusing, but you will take in a little more information each time a post pops up on your screen; until finally, something will click and you will be better prepared to move forward.
3. Not starting sooner
There were a lot of things that held me back from starting. Some of them were even legitimate concerns! However, lurking behind every one of them was fear. Fear that I would mess up and somehow ruin everything. What I’ve learned since starting is that there really aren’t any “bad ” free trips (In the financial sense–yes you can have a bad time on a trip but that’s not what I’m talking about here). As long as you aren’t putting yourself into debt to get points and paying off your bill in-full each month you’re winning. Why wouldn’t I want to get free trips for buying things I would have anyway?