Free(ish) flights (hack)

Lifehack/Protip time:

I calculated my trip so far: 9897$ for everything. This includes 4500$ for flights/travel expenses. The rest was living/tours/food/etc. Not too Shabby considering everything I did- but I can do better. Like get more free flights!

So I checked out a bunch of books/resources and one I have successfully done that I’m going to share.

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EDIT: (march3, 2016)

The vanilla card doesn’t work. BUT! you can completely cut out the middle man and just buy “paypal cards” with your credit card. (select CVS’s).

Buy paypal money. Load paypal money into your paypal account. Withdraw paypal money to your bank account. Pay your credit card.

Bam.

 

 

The nice thing about Bluebird is that you can pay your mortgage with it (and other bills). So it’s still a nice thing to know.

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Things you need:
-a credit card that gives you points (whatever points you want to accumulate… I use the chase sapphire card, but I also got a united card (gives me 30,000 miles after I spend 1k in the first 90 days….) the united card is what I did this trick with.

-a bluebird account. Go to Walmart or apply online at bluebird.com

-some flex money on your credit card. (1,000$ is good.)

– a cvs pharmacy store.

– about 5-10 minutes.

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“OK. I got all those. Now what?”

Step 1) go to cvs and buy vanilla reload cards. (see pic) I got 2 cards and loaded on 500$.
(note: your credit card may email you saying “wtf? How much Viagra are you buying??!?”)

Step 2) Goto vanillareload.com and enter in your bluebird account number and the scratch-off pin number from the vanilla card.

Step 3) goto bluebird.com and enter in your bills/credit card payment info. (your account and whatnot.)

Step 4) pay your credit card off.

Note:
-It costs 3.95$ to buy/activate the cards… So it’s not a completely perfect system.
-With this system, you can load 4,000$ per month. With your bluebird account you can pay ANY bill. Including your mortgage/car/cell phone/etc.

Step 5) get your 30,000 miles without having to spend any real money. #winning

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For reference:
A 1-way ticket from Sydney to Seattle is 40,000 points. I’m pretty sure domestic flights are half that… I could be wrong.

Chase sapphire rewards will give you cash back/hotel points/frequent fliers/all sorts of things. The United card is (obviously) just for united frequent flier points.

Other hacks:
If you have a chase freedom rewards card- make note of the places that you get 5% off. This quarter is Lowes/restaurants/movies. So I went to Lowes and got 150$ in visa gift cards. (If you have the time and the patience, this is great. Otherwise it’s a pain.)

Another amazing surprise was that I could pay my taxes this year with my credit card! (turbo tax let me… So I’m going with it.) Bonus miles!

What is your favorite mileage/point hack?