More Remodeling Credit Cards
I underestimated the cost of the kitchen cabinets by quite a bit, so I needed to open a few more cards to cover the cost.
I have the Bilt Palladium, and will use it for any remaining costs after meeting the Sign-Up Bonuses on the new cards. As I explained in my post on Bilt, it has something called “Accelerators,” which gets you 3X points per dollar on $5,000 in spend, instead of 2X. You can only do 5 of these per calendar year, and they cost $200 in Bilt Cash to Activate. But the math is simple: $5K in spend gets you $200 in Bilt Cash at 4% on your spend. So the $5,000 spend pays for an Accelerator.
On to the new cards…
I wanted to spread my applications around and ideally get a business card. We have our primary checking account at Wells Fargo, so I thought that would be a good option. Wells Fargo has a “Signify” Business card that has a $750 sign-up bonus after $5K spend, and is a 2% cash back card with zero annual fee. I don’t have a 2% cash back card, so that’s a nice addition.
One negative is that our cabinet vendor is going to charge 3% for using a credit card, so 2% is a losing proposition. But the Sign-Up Bonuses far exceed 3% in value, so that’s been my focus.
As I mentioned in my Amex Love/Hate Post, Amex loves my wife. They love her so much they approved her for a 2nd Business Gold Card with 175K Membership Rewards points after $15K spend. The Gold is easier to live with than the Platinum, since the Gold has only a couple of “coupons”. The easiest to use is the monthly $20 credit at Office Supply stores. I simply buy $20 of Chipotle Gift Cards at Staples, and I’m done. The Gold also has a $150 annual Squarespace credit, and that’s where this blog is hosted. So I’ll use that too, and come out ahead of the $375 Annual Fee.
I really wanted P3 to get one of the Chase Ink Business cards with 100K points and zero Annual Fee. But she wasn’t approved. She was approved for the United Explorer card. I’m thinking that we get a little more time with Chase with Personal cards, and then try again for a Business card for her.
We have 3 Amex Hilton Surpass cards that earn a Free Night Certificate when you spend $15K in a calendar year. We love the Carneros Resort (see Post), and get great value there. So I plan to spend the $15K total to get the FNCs. Theoretically, you can upgrade a Surpass that you’ve held for more than one year to a Hilton Aspire (see my Post on Amex Hilton cards). With the Aspire card, you can spend $30K in a calendar year and get an FNC. But if you upgrade a Surpass to an Aspire, the spend you put on the Surpass counts towards the Aspire’s $30K. I really like the Aspire card, and would like to upgrade after I get the Surpass FNC. But I already have an Aspire, and beginning to doubt if Amex will let me upgrade to get a 2nd Aspire, but we’ll see.
In summary, the cards I’ll use for the remodel:
P2 Biz Plat (she has 3 open!)
2x P2 Biz Gold
2X Summits (Me + P2)
Wells Fargo Signify Business
3X Surpass FNCs at $15K spend
Bilt for the leftover
P3’s United Explorer will be used for our regular spend.
Don’t be surprised if I get yet another card. I ended up canceling one of my Amex credit cards to try to get approved for a 2nd Aspire, but Amex wouldn’t give me any Sign-Up Bonus since I already had an Aspire. But that open credit card slot is begging to be filled!
