Matthew

January: Chase Ink Business Unlimited 

Knowing the 90,000 sign-up bonus would not last forever, we took another stab at getting the card to increase our Chase points bank. With this card approved, Sarah also got 40,000 for the referral bonus.  Business cards don't increase our 5/24 count and this ink specifically had an introductory 0% APR promo for a year, which allowed us to pay the card of minimally while saving our funds. 

Sarah

January: Chase Ink Business Unlimited 

For the exact same reason as Matthew on the left, Sarah got another 90,000 sign-up bonus and gave Matthew the 40,000 referral bonus. 

March: Citi AAdvantage Platinum Select 

We needed to build up a stash for AA points for an upcoming trip. Since Matthew already got the business version in 2023, he continued to build the stash by getting this personal version for 60,000 points. It helped that the annual fee was waived the first year to make this a no brainer. 

April: American Express Blue Business Plus

With taxes due, Matthew got this card to get 2x back to overcome the 1.87% fee for paying taxes by card. Plus the 0% APR promotion for a year allows us to keep more money in our pockets over time. The bonus was just 15,000 points. 

May: Capital One Venture X

Capital One is inquiry sensitive, so Matthew wanted to get this card sooner rather than when they'd lock him out. Plus, this card is very lucrative if you travel each year since then the card basically pays you $5/year to keep it. With upcoming Airbnb purchases to be made, this was a good time to get the 75,000 points and use the $300 travel credit to pay for our upcoming Hawaii trip car rental. 

May: American Express Blue Business Plus

It was soon time to pay for property taxes so we used this card like Matthew's version to get the 2x back and 0% APR for the year. With Sarah also having her own Amex now she could access more Amex offers and build her own stash for Amex points. The bonus was 15,000 points and Matthew got 10,000 points for the referral.

June: Synchrony Dick's Sporting Goods

Purely for the memes and to appease the Instagram following, Matthew applied for the store credit card of the most-liked comment. Turns out it was Dick's - bringing him to 4/24, but at least he got Sarah a free Stanley mug. 

July: American Express Business Platinum

Matthew found a lucrative offer of 250,000 Membership Reward points for $20,000 spend. With a couple large purchases coming up and a greater handle on buying groups, this seemed feasible and rewarding. As you will notice, this took the 3 month limit to complete. 

October: Capital One Spark Cash Plus

You may notice that his card is not points earning at all - it is technically cash back. With enough travel points banked up and not enough travel planned in the future, we decided to put some more cash back in our own pocket. Even though the annual fee is $150, if we spend $30,000 within the 3 months, we will get $2,000 as the bonus and the 2% back will net us another $600. This will likely take us the rest of the year to complete, so we won't be getting any more cards. Technically, we can convert the $2,000 into 200,000 miles, which would have the minimum same conversion, so we'll total the points. 

Finally, this card needed to be a business card so Matthew didn't go over 5/24 - and therefore can be eligible for Chase cards in the future. So this card is like a placeholder. American Express business cards could have been another option, but those would be strictly travel points and we would rather have more cash. 

October: Citi AAdvatnage Platinum Select

We still needed AA points, so it was time to get Sarah on the AA train. Intitially she was going to apply for the business version, but at this time, the personal card had an elevated bonus of 75,000 points, so it made more sense to get this card.