How to book your European vacation for Almost FREE

Family cooking class in Cuzco, Peru

Travelling does not have to be expensive! With a little advance planning and strategy, your entire family can travel for almost free. You can even travel to Europe, Asia or South America OR anywhere else you want to go.
I just booked my family on flights to Europe for next summer for about $350. We paid just taxes and fees for all of our flights.
So how did I do it? That's what I want to share here because you can do it too.
I picked Europe because my daughter says we have traveled to lots of exotic places and she would really like to see London and Paris. I had enough miles on United for 3 one way tickets to Europe, but we are family of 5. Now my husband will actually join us halfway into the trip so I will book his flight a bit later.
United is part of the Star Alliance so I checked out who else is part of that alliance and would allow me to book one way tickets. Singapore Air seemed like the best fit. I can book one way tickets using miles. Their mileage program is called Krisflyer. So then I looked at the 4 big general mileage clubs - Chase Ultimate Rewards, Citi Thank You Points, Starwood Preferred Guest and American Express Membership Rewards to figure out how I could get 165,000 Krisflyer miles.
Unfortunately due to the 5/24 Chase rule, I am not eligible for the Chase United Explorer card or any other Chase cards. I already have a few Starwood cards so I focused my research on American Express Membership Rewards. 
My husband and I each signed up for the Premier card with a bonus of 40,000 points with a minimum spend of $2,000. Then I could transfer Starwood points to Krisflyer directly to flush out the remaining points. Because Starwood gives you a 5,000 bonus for every 20,000 you transfer, I needed just 70,000 Starwood points to reach 165,000 Krisflyer miles.
As soon as the American Express Membership Rewards posted, I started to transfer all the miles/points into my Krisflyer account and book flights.
Yesterday I booked 4.5 round trip flights to Europe for $350. Woohoo!

Here are the simple steps I follow:

1. Where do you want to go?
2. Which airlines and partners fly there?
3. What mileage programs do they use and who do they partner with?
4. How many miles do you need?
5. How can you get those miles?

Then put your plan in action and cross your fingers.

Get A FREE $10 Towards Holiday Shopping!

One of the easiest ways to save money on your holiday shopping is to use the cash back portal Ebates.com. And if you join for FREE by 12/31/2016, you will get $10 cash back just for joining. And if you use the portal when you do your online shopping, you will get a big fat check. 

I got a check last month for $41.57. 

Now that's not going to buy me a round trip flight anywhere, but it paid for my dinner out last night. A friend of mine says she has received $16,000 cash back so far this year! Wow. she is a big online shopper. And the more you shop, the more you earn. Better yet, this is money you would have left on the table. So make your money work harder for you! You can use any discount codes, coupons or promo codes too!

The only time I don't use the cash back portal is when I need to reset or accumulate airline miles and then I'll use that airlines portal. 

To get the $10 bonus, you need to use my link to Ebates.com. 

Happy Shopping! 

How To Get FREE Airline Gift Cards

One of the benefits is a $100 airline credit each calendar year! 

Okay, here's one to put on your to do list before the end of the year. If you have the American Express Premier Rewards Credit Card, you can get FREE gift cards on the airline of your choice. One of the benefits of the Premier Rewards card is $100 airline fee credit each calendar year.
This fee can be used for incidentals like baggage and other fees. However, you may be able to get credit for buying gift cards online.
So it may be worth a try.
Here's how you do it. Before you buy anything, you need to log into your American Express account, click on benefits and link the card to the airline of your choice.
I picked Southwest Airlines, but there are dozens of airlines to choose from.
Then wait a few days for the link to go through.
This is important. The first gift card I bought did not credit. The second one though posted a credit within a few days.
Then log into your chosen airline account and buy the gift card using your Premier Rewards Credit Card. I recommend buying the gift cards in small amounts i.e. $25, $40. Then within a few days, you should see a credit posted to your account.
Nice!

Book A European Vacation For Almost FREE!

Here's the dilemma: You want to take a European vacation next summer with your family of 5. BUT you have maxed out your 5/24 rule on Chase, you have enough miles for 3 one way tickets on United, and lots of Starwood points, but those have a terrible transfer ratio to United.
So what do you do?

Here's my plan:

1. My husband and I each applied for the American Express Premier Gold card for a bonus of 40,000 miles for a $2000 spend. He added me as an authorized user.
2. Transfer those American Express membership rewards to Krisflyer (The frequent flier club for Singapore Airlines). I chose Krisflyer because they will let you book one way tickets on Star Alliance partner airlines including United. Since I'm an authorized user on my husband's Amex, he can transfer his rewards to my Krisflyer account.
3. Top off my KrisFlyer account with Starwood points which transfer 1:1 with a 5,000 bonus for every 20,000 Starwood points, Spouses can share Starwood points so to maximize the bonus, my husband transferred 35,000 Starwood points to my account. Then I transferred those to my Krisflyer account.

And fingers crossed, if all works out and the transfers go through, we will have 9 one way tickets on Star Alliance partner airlines booked with points.

So did it work? YES! BAM! 4.5 round trip flights from LAX to Europe for almost FREE! We paid taxes and fees plus a $25 booking fee from United because I booked 2 tickets by phone to make sure we were all on the same flights. Did it take a little bit of work, yes. Was it worth it? Of course, we are headed to Europe for almost FREE. If we had paid for these flights, they would have cost us at least $5000 probably more. Woohoo!

Point Break IHG Hotels List Is Out!

Every quarter IHG releases a list of hotels you can book for just 5,000 points. It's called the point break list. The new list was just released today and you can start booking these hotels on Monday.
Sometimes you can get a great deal, but other times the list is just plain strange in my opinion.
But here's the link  so you can check out the whole list. If there is something that interests you, book it fast because they do sell out quickly.

Here are the North American hotels:

ARIZONA CANDLEWOOD SUITES SIERRA VISTA ARKANSAS HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS & SUITES MAGNOLIA-LAKE COLUMBIA CALIFORNIA HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS CALEXICO COLORADO CANDLEWOOD SUITES CRAIG-NORTHWEST MISSOURI HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS KIRKSVILLE

NEBRASKA HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS & SUITES NORFOLK NEW JERSEY HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS HASKELL-WAYNE AREA SOUTH CAROLINA CANDLEWOOD SUITES SUMTER SOUTH DAKOTA HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS & SUITES ABERDEEN TEXAS CANDLEWOOD SUITES MOUNT PLEASANT WEST VIRGINIA HOLIDAY INN EXPRESS & SUITES LOGAN

The Secret To Taking An Almost FREE Family Summer Vacation

Washing elephants in Thailand. Once in a lifetime experience! 

So you want to take a big family vacation next summer? And of course, you want to take that trip for almost FREE, right? Well, the secret is planning early.

Here are the things you need to figure out now.

1. Where do you want to go? Europe, South America, Hawaii, Asia?
2. Which airlines fly there? Who are their partner airlines? And what points can you use to get miles on those airlines?
3. How many miles do you need for free tickets? And how can you gather the rest of the miles quickly?
4. Put the plan in action

The plan takes a bit of research. For example, we would like to go to Europe next summer. We are a family of 5. Currently, I have 3 one way tickets on United. So the question is how can we get the rest of the tickets we need to get all of us to Europe for FREE.
Since we want to fly together, I am targeting United Airlines which is part of the Star Alliance. Starwood Points can be transferred to United, but the ratio is 2:1 so it's not a good option. BUT Starwood Points can be transferred to Singapore Airlines at a 1:1 ratio with a 5,000 point bonus for every 20,000 points you transfer. You can also book one way tickets and use less points than United charges for the same flights. Hmmm, now we are getting somewhere.
If you want to go to South America, American Airlines will probably be your best bet. Starwood points transfer at a ratio of 1:1 with the 5,000 point bonus. Plus British Airways is a partner with LAN Airlines and offers ridiculously cheap flights for Avios points within South America.
If you want to go to Asia, you may need to look at United or American who partners with Japan Airlines.
Sometimes you have to act like a detective to try and figure out the best scenario and then just go for it. Be flexible, reach your minimum spend quickly and transfer the points and book your flights.

Maui With Kids For Almost FREE!

Road To Hana - Amazing!

Think you can't travel to Maui on the cheap with kids? Think again. We spent more than a week in Maui for almost FREE. That's right. Here's how we did it and what we did while we were there. We are a family of 5, but for this trip we just took our 8 year old.

The other two kids went on separate trips, one went to Sweden with her cousin and one went on a baseball trip with his grandpa. 

So when we asked our 8 year old where do you want to go? She said Maui. We booked 3 round trip tickets on American Airlines with miles. 25,000 points each. Easy. 

Then we booked an airbnb.com for 3 nights in Kihei. There are tons of available rentals and since there were only 3 of us, we booked a one bedroom, one bathroom with full kitchen across from the beach. The unit had a pool too. Very convenient. Safeway was down the street so we ate most of our meals at home. We did dine at Coconut's Fish Cafe in Kihei and had probably the best fish tacos ever. And we are from San Diego so that says a lot.

Coconut's in Kihei, Maui - Yummy fish tacos

We took a full day and drove the Road To Hana. This is something we would never do with all 3 kids, but with just 1 it was totally doable. My advice start early like 6am. It is a long drive and day. Think like 12 hours long kind of a day. Bring changes of clothes, towels, snacks, couple pairs of shoes and check out the app tours on itunes or android. They will talk you through the drive and tell you exactly where to stop and where to skip. Be sure to pick up some banana bread along the way.

While in Kihei, we took a one day snorkeling trip to Molokini. We like to spend money on experiences and then use miles/points for travel and hotels. Snorkeling was a bit cloudy as it was very windy that day, but enjoyable. 

Snorkeling in Molokini

After a few nights in Kihei, we moved to Kanapali. Both my husband and I opened Chase Hyatt credit cards so we each had 2 FREE nights at any Hyatt. We cashed them in for 4 nights at the Hyatt Kanapali. Usually you have to pay for parking, but the machine was broken so Hyatt comped our parking for all 4 nights too. Nice. 

Hotels at Kanapali

While staying at the Hyatt, we drove to Lahaina for breakfast, a bit farther north is a nice hike to the geyser and of course, Ululani's for shaved ice. 

Great breakfast place in Lahaina

Nice walk in northern Maui to see the geyser

Otherwise, we just hung at the Hyatt, enjoyed the activities and the beach. The problem with the big hotels is that you are captive to the high prices in the restaurants. We utilized the happy hour at the Hyatt for dinner one night and stocked the in room fridge with sandwich makings and breakfast items. We also attended the luau one night which included dinner. Expensive, but our daughter had never attended a luau so it was totally worth it.

Hyatt Kanapali offers bird visits, daily crafts, penguin and koi feeding

Our favorite, shaved ice at Ulelanis

So total cost of the trip:
Flights 75,000 miles on American for 3 round trip flights LAX-Maui
Hotel   3 nights in airbnb for $100 each night, 4 nights at the Hyatt FREE
Car - rented from Budget for $350 for the week
Food/Activities $1000

We rent out our home while we are on vacation so we probably made money on this trip. Not too bad.