Success Story: How Corinne Saved Nearly 50% on a Trip to Florida

In this Travel Miles 101 success story, Corinne describes how she saved nearly 50% of the cost of her trip from California to Florida just months after taking our Travel Miles 101 course!

This is the perfect example of how you can succeed with rewards points even if you’re just getting started.

Corinne’s Travel Miles 101 Success Story

I am writing a story of my recent travels as a thank you to Brad & Alexi for introducing me to the hobby of travel credit card travel rewards through their free internet course called Travel Miles 101. I came across travel rewards by accident; I was researching online because I knew my family had travel coming up and I hoped to make it less expensive and that’s when I found Brad & Alexi.

They explained things in bite-sized chunks that I could understand. I liked how they didn’t scoff at people who go for the low-hanging fruit. I emailed them with what I thought was a stupid question, and I was pleasantly surprised when a real person (Brad) answered with a real answer, and very quickly, too.

My husband and I knew we would be travelling to Florida soon to visit loved ones. Brad advised me to get the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card with what’s called the ‘purchase eraser.’ It was just right for our situation.

I opted for the Capital One VentureOne Rewards Credit Card with the lower spending requirements.

I also opened a Citi Hilton HHonors credit card at that time since I know I could use the points at the Hampton Inn in Pensacola, FL.  This was a Category 4 hotel which costs 30,000 points per night and we received more than 60,000 points from the credit card signup bonus, so we had two free nights from those points.

I started the Travel Miles 101 course in January 2016, and we travelled in April 2016 so we were able to realize savings very quickly. I especially liked how the Travel Miles 101 course was free, and how the daily emails contained enough information to digest each day without it getting overwhelming.

As an aside, I appreciate Brad’s long-term plan for getting rich that he writes about on his personal finance site RichmondSavers.com. I’d describe it as hard work and spending less than you make. This and the fact that he’s a CPA and Alexi is a cardiologist helped me persuade my husband that I was using legitimate means to lower our travel costs.

My husband was leery of my new hobby, so he had various guidelines.

1. I could not spend any money on my hobby. Translation: no applying for credit cards with an annual fee. This cut out many airline credit cards.
2. I could not alter my spending habits, for instance, buy something just to get more points.
3. We would not do anything out of the ordinary for the sake of saving money, for instance, fly out of an airport like LAX, when we prefer the Bob Hope Airport in Burbank.

So here is a breakdown of our trip to Pensacola, FL:

What we paid for ourselves:

• $40.00  – Airport Parking for 4 days
• $485.20 — 2 plane tickets Burbank to Atlanta
• $242.60 – 1 return plane ticket Atlanta to Burbank (my husband came back after some business travel)
• $25.00 – 1 checked bag
• $792.80 total

Things paid for with Credit Card Rewards points

• $139.22 Hertz car rental – Capital One Purchase Eraser
• $93.48 La Quinta Inn in Union City, GA – Capital One Purchase Eraser
• $50.00 checked baggage fee – Capital One Purchase Eraser
• $320.00 — 2 nights at Hampton Inn Pensacola, FL Citi HHilton Honors
• $602.70 total

As you can see, travel credit card rewards saved us almost half of what we were going to spend, anyway.

So, thank you, and here I go, spending wisely, and garnering more points for future use!