If you want to see how some of these cards can fit into a more powerful travel credit card setup, watch this playlist next: spencerjohnsonofficial.com/cardsetups 🎥 Which of these credit cards best fit your overall setup? 👇🏼
Great overview Spencer! For sure, the Bilt Mastercard is the most powerful one on this list, and like everyone, I'm looking forward to seeing what WF does with the Autograph card as this would, IMO, effectively make the Citi Premier card not as valuable. I'm torn between the Autograph having better transfer partners + AF vs. weaker transfer partners vs. no annual fee so we'll see what happens. The ball is in WF's court if they want to be a true contender with their credit cards!
Thank you Stan! I agree with you here. Bilt is definitely making strides in the no-annual-fee travel card space and the fact that they work closely with WF makes me hopeful that WF will become a travel card contender. But we'll just have to see!
Absolutely love the ability to use my Bilt Card to capitalize on the fact that I already have to make Rent payments and can build points that way. Bill's ecosystem is honestly super underrated with the travel partner upside, including Hyatt & Aeroplan like you mentioned. Totally agree that the Wells Fargo Autograph would be soooo valuable if travel partners were added as well. Great video Spencer!
I'm jealous man! I feel like I need to just go ahead and add the card so I stop thinking about it 🤣 I'm excited to see what WF does with those transfer partners too though! Thanks for watching brotha!
Also, the PenFed Pathfinder card has a TSA precheck and a travel incidental credit for no annual fee. If you are a veteran or have a checking account with them.
Good recommendation once again! That was another card on my list to talk about in this video, but considering there are a couple more hoops to jump through with it, I decided to leave it out. If and when I do make a credit union card video, that would have to be one in there.
You can actually transfer rewards from active cash to autograph now. It has been added already. There are a lot of DoC and Reddit data points. So, with the upcoming travel partners, active cash and autograph already will behave as a travel duo (assuming WF will still allow the point transfer between active cash/autograph). I hope there will be some common transfer partner between autograph and Bilt; so it will be a kind of ‘trifecta’. Awesome video as always, Spencer!
Good note man!! I didn't specify that too clearly in this video because I wasn't sure how substantiated all those DPs were, but with the amount of people saying they do that in the comments here, it definitely seems like something they're already allowing which is great! We'll see what those WF transfer partners look like... it should be exciting no matter what way they go! Thanks so much for the support man.
Good point! If the Autograph added partners like the Bilt already has, I’d Venture to say I would jump on the Autograph, currently getting nothing but 1x on EV charging at the moment. I’m missing out! Interesting video idea! You’re right, it’s possible, but slim pickings for the no annual fee travel cards haha. Great Spencer!
Thanks Tony!! I feel like the Autograph will become a really solid card for a lot of folks like yourself once they add travel partners, but it depends on if they add and annual fee and such. We'll see! And this video idea actually came from a past comment that requested it. It was a lot more challenging that I thought it would be lol.
Wells starts with 2/3 of a trifecta...and a strong $0 AF Duo if they keep the Autograph no annual fee. I like the Autograph, and will probably be tempted to get back to using it more when transfer partners happen. Wells would probably be prudent to start small; but that will be disappointing to some. I don't know the right answer there. It's Travel category is also WAY more flexible than Bilts, and that should be taken into consideration. I remain curious to see what Wells has planned.
I have the same thoughts as you exactly! Something is likely gonna have to give when they do add partners to the Autograph and I imagine some folks are gonna be disappointed. It remains to be seen how good the partners will even be though, but if they execute it well, they could really become a good travel card contender! Thanks for sharing your thoughts as always Matt 👊🏼
Time will tell! I think the WF hate is a bit outdated at this point personally, so if they make some solid changes to their cards in the travel department, I'll be picking them up.
Great video. I've held back on redeeming on my Autograph card to see what the transfer partners will be like. Having that with the Citi Custom Cash card works well and on a recent stay at a Hilton they had no problem splitting the cost between the cards. So I put 500 on the citi card and then 400 on the Autograph to maximize what I was getting back. Also what's good with adding a double cash card is that you can product change into a custom cash after a year of use for an additional 5X card.
Thanks so much Juan! I like your strategy of saving up those points that you want to use for travel down the road. I do the same thing! Good point on the Double Cash as well. 2 Custom Cash cards is pretty legit!!
If the Autograph card gets the same transfer partners as Bilt and still enables the transferability of points from the Active Cash that’ll be a disrupter…..it’ll greatly devalue the CSU and CSP.
Ya i think the sweet spot is low AF or 0 EAF cards: CSP, Citi Premier, Amex Green, Cap1 Venture. All of those have transfer partners & low AFs or Zero EAFs.
Good notes!! I didn't include the BBP because it's a business card, and even though people can get it without a business, some folks really don't want to do that. The Amex Everyday is one I forget about a lot though so good catch!
I got the AAA Travel Advantage that now 'sock drawers' my Citi Costco Anywhere Visa (which has a lower Gas reward, same Travel reward and no Groceries.. and the annoying 1 per year payout). I'm Team Hybrid, I'll be pairing my VX with the Savor One and AMEX Gold, next year, as I'm biding time waiting for a higher SUB on the CSP (at 4/24), or Chase BIP or BIC. The caveat on the AAA Travel Advantage is that is is backed by Comenity... no probs so far, just no app, and it isn't compatible with Max Rewards.
Does it consider gas at Costco to be in the gas category? Or does it consider gas purchased at Costco to be wharehouse store purchase? I buy all my gas when possible at Costco so I get my 2% cash back from the executive membership on top of the Costco visa gas cash back.
@@davidradtke160 For me it does code for Gas on the AAA Travel Advantage (Southern California) at Costco. 7-11 also codes for Gas, lol. YMMV, though, and I've heard that some locations may have AAA clubs that don't use this particular card, if you don't get the right card if you apply, use a zip code that will, like 90210 (Beverly Hills, lol).
Thanks for sharing your experience Ben! It sounds like the AAA Travel Advantage is a solid choice for your situation. I'm looking forward to hearing how your hybrid setup evolves over time. Keep me updated!
Timely vid! I just got approved for Autograph with $6000. I’m rebuilding credit and will try for something to earn Chase points next year, maybe product change my Slate Edge into a Freedom card.
I'm glad you enjoyed it!! Congrats on the new card btw! That's awesome. Keep up the good work and I'm excited to hear your success in rebuilding that credit soon!
I want the Bilt card pretty bad too! Even without paying rent, I think it'd be good for me to get it to get some experience with it for the channel, but that obviously isn't something everyone will or should do haha. Thanks for the support as always man!
The AF's have gotten out of control... Not to mention the MSR's to hit bonuses on the Gold and Platinum went up to $6000 and $8000. No AF is a must for me now.
Do you have a video on the 3x like what is the best way to use this? I would like to see how people plan when using this. Meaning do you pay the card right away?
Sounds like the BofA travel rewards wins for no foreign fee catch all with 1.5 on a no AF card. After I get the Alt Reserve I’ll downgrade my VX to a V1 and “settle” for 1.25 cap one miles since I need a no FTF catch all
The Travel Rewards card is good for no FTFs, but you can also get better earning categories and redemption options on card like the Bilt Mastercard so it all depends on what you're looking for. I can se why the VentureOne makes sense in your case though. Having a no annual fee downgrade option is definitely beneficial.
That AAA card has one of the better caps on is category for an no annual fee card. Even better on the daily advantage. Anybody tried getting both and if so how long did you wait between applications between the two AAA cards?
Hmm, I was with you until you got to the “combo” cards. You still have to get a card that has an annual fee to transfer out the points (minus autograph potentially), so I am not sure these would count. Overall solid info tho 👌🏿
That's fair! As I mentioned though, that's why they weren't considered true travel cards and I broke them out separately. They do give you some earnings through portals and such, but you'd need an annual fee card to really get value from them.
Great video Spencer! But correct me if I am wrong, doesn’t the WF active cash earn straight cashback % while the Autograph earns “points”? Which implies that you won’t be able to combine. The rewards between both cards. It would be interesting to see if Wells Fargo change their Active Cash into a points card once they come out with their transfer partners.
Thank you Amsi! I'm happy to see you in the YT comments. You're right though, right now they earn separate types of rewards, but I've read on Reddit (and DPs from this video) that people are already able to combine the points through the website (as mentioned above). I would assume when they introduce partners they would make both cards just earn points, but I could be wrong.
My first credit card was the WF active cash but I've been thinking of product switching to the autograph card do you think I'll get more value doing this switch?
Bilt is not getting that whole $1 in your formula; instead just a less than 3% merchant fee. So wouldn’t consider that a cunning annual fee for Bilt at all; maybe $1.80.
I can see where you're coming from, but if you have a hard time putting 5 charges on a card that you're applying for, then you may not need the card in the first place. I think for those that would get this card to use it as intended, that would not count towards any kind of effective annual fee, but again, I can see where you're coming from!
Because you'll pay through your Bilt account which acts as an ACH transfer as if you linked a bank account to it. You won't put in your credit card numbers at all with your landlord's portal. Bilt has solid articles about this on their website that I would check out! @@rocksolid6494
Can a bank just decide to put a anual fee on a card that didn’t have it before and it will be effective immediately? Can they change anything else just like that? (Rewards, etc)
In a sense, yes. As we just recently saw with the Hilton cards, they can change the terms, credits, rewards, etc on a card as they see fit, but in general, if you're a current cardholder they'll give you options that you can choose between as to what you want to do with the card. Sometimes they'll let you downgrade it to a different card, they may grandfather you in with the lower AF, give you a retention offer, etc, but they ultimately make the decision on what they do with their cards.
