You don't have to be an influencer to fly for free!
Angel Trinh is the founder of @pennywisetraveler, where she teaches travel hacking to her audience of over 70,000 travellers. To date, she has been to 36 countries and all 7 continents. Her most recent redemption was a $30K trip to Japan for $109.
Key Takeaways:
Discover the alchemy of converting loyalty programs into first-class experiences and the truth behind booking flights at the right moment – all while keeping your credit score as pristine as untouched snow.
Resources:
Support the show:
☕️buymeacoffee.com/whatsyourfree
About the show:
Sam Laliberte - entrepreneur, digital nomad and freedom seeker, hosts the Freedom Lifestyle Podcast to expose people to the many ways you can design your dream life and unlock your own version of the freedom lifestyle. Her guests have empowered themselves through flexible work as a way to “have it all” - financial, location AND schedule freedom.
You don't have to be an influencer to fly for free!
Angel Trinh is the founder of @pennywisetraveler, where she teaches travel hacking to her audience of over 70,000 travellers. To date, she has been to 36 countries and all 7 continents. Her most recent redemption was a $30K trip to Japan for $109.
Key Takeaways:
Discover the alchemy of converting loyalty programs into first-class experiences and the truth behind booking flights at the right moment – all while keeping your credit score as pristine as untouched snow.
Resources:
Support the show:
☕️buymeacoffee.com/whatsyourfree
About the show:
Sam Laliberte - entrepreneur, digital nomad and freedom seeker, hosts the Freedom Lifestyle Podcast to expose people to the many ways you can design your dream life and unlock your own version of the freedom lifestyle. Her guests have empowered themselves through flexible work as a way to “have it all” - financial, location AND schedule freedom.
Travel hacking is taking advantage of all the different current rules in place, from credit card programs, airline programs and hotel programs, and seeing what different loyalty programs you can use to maximize your points to books that's as cheap as possible, so it doesn't matter if you're flying economy or flying business or staying in a lecture hotel. Find a cheapest way to get there, either on points or on cash.
Speaker 2:You're listening to the Freedom Lifestyle podcast series. I'm sharing relatable stories of freedom seekers who ditched conventional office life and courageously asked for more the energy just completely shifted my entire being just felt so free. My business was still generating income while I was on the beach. I decided to quit and just stay at home. I really can't work for anyone but me.
Speaker 1:It's literally just doing whatever the hell you want to do.
Speaker 2:As for me, I'm your host, sam, and I've spent the last four years creating a business that allows me to work from anywhere. The Freedom Lifestyle looks different for everyone. What's your free? You're listening to a new episode of the Freedom Lifestyle podcast, where I introduce you to relatable people who have found a way to leverage flexible work arrangements, alternative ways of living, in order to design their lifestyles based on how they want to live and show up every day. And today you're going to meet Angel, who is the founder of Pennywise Traveler. If you're not following her on Instagram yet, you should. She is already attracted an audience of almost 100,000 people based on her content around travel hacking.
Speaker 2:Angel has hacked her way to 36 countries and counting. She has been to all seven continents, and this year she traveled via business class eight times, so she knows a thing or two about how to leverage credit card points, loyalty programs, stacking which is a new term I learned about and various cashback programs in order to get things for free. Angel's journey here started when she was in college, when she actually got herself a bunch of scholarships and grants in order to get free housing, free tuition and $7,000 of spending money when she wanted to study abroad in Rome. Nowadays she is doing this regularly. She is traveling once a month. You will see her flying in business class yes, definitely, but she's not afraid to fly economy and even spirit airlines.
Speaker 2:She answered a lot of my questions around. One is the best time to book a flight. Is there any truth to certain days of the week being better than others? What types of loyalty programs should we be signing up for? Do credit cards and signing up for a bunch of credit cards really impact our credit scores? And many other myths around that. I've included links in the show notes to a freebie she's giving our audience about travel hacking one-on-one, creating your blueprint to get started, as well as her course and her own podcast on this topic. There was no further delay. Meet Angel Angel. Welcome to the Freedom Lifestyle podcast. How is your day going today?
Speaker 1:My day has been pretty great. I just finished a travel hacking challenge today, so this is day two of my travel hacking challenge, where I taught people how to use different types of credit cards and how to maximize and get more points for their purchases.
Speaker 2:I was actually in your private Facebook group and I joined that and I already learned so much about stacking and gift cards and cash back, so I'm really excited about what the audience can learn from you today. But before we get into those hacks, I really want to know you and the person behind all of this content and all of these amazing resources, and so one of the first couple of questions I like to ask is where in the world are you joining from and what would you normally be doing if you didn't have a podcast interview right now?
Speaker 1:Okay, so I'm based out of Los Angeles, california. Usually I travel at least once a month, so today you have hit me at my house. Last weekend I was in Asheville, north Carolina, and the week before I was in Bali. So, like I usually travel at least once a month. If I wasn't doing this podcast right now, I would be actually going to the gym. My gym is usually around this time, but I will go to the gym after this podcast interview because I need to have like my routine in place. So for me, it's like going to the gym. It's not really about the physical aspect, it's more of the mental aspect for me, where I have to, like get the mental detox out of like cause I actually go crazy.
Speaker 2:I'm so with you. I would actually also be working out at this time. I've just been following you now for a couple of weeks. Someone nominated you to be on my podcast after I put out a reel saying I was looking to meet people like you because I see you on my Instagram feeds all the time flying business class free hotels, la la la, la la champagne at the airport and I'm like who are these people and how are they doing it? So we're going to get into this, but I'm curious how did this all start? In your bio you wrote I studied abroad in Rome after getting free housing, free tuition and $7,000 and spending money. Take the picture of this time of your life.
Speaker 1:So I was like a broke, 22 year old, right. So, like in college, you have like no money. So I was like, okay, I need to figure out a way for me to study abroad, because I have no money. I don't want to get more college loans. What can I do? So what I did was I literally applied for a bunch of scholarships and everything. Like your college has a scholarship website. There's also like a bunch of other scholarship websites you can find, like college board, fasa, there's like a bunch of ones. You can just Google them as well.
Speaker 1:I literally did that. I was like, okay, I need to find a way to pay for this. And my school financial office was like, yeah, your college scholarships can go towards your study abroad program. So I was like I knew that was legal. So I was like, okay, well, I'm going to do that. Then I'm going to apply to a bunch of scholarships and grants and everything and see what I can get. And then what ended up happening was I was able to compile a bunch of scholarships to save for the money. So I had financial aid and then I had the scholarships to pay for the housing, the tuition and then the spending money. So that's what I literally did when I was in undergrad, because I was like I need to figure out a way to do this, because I don't have any money. My parents don't have any money. What is the way that I can do this? And that was through scholarships.
Speaker 2:And back then, were you also sharing what you were learning with others? Because right now, not only are you benefiting from travel, hacking and stacking and credit card points and all the things, but you've also built this amazing community around this and you're sharing everything you've learned. Were you even kind of doing that back then, or were you keeping those secrets for yourself?
Speaker 1:So it's so funny back then. I haven't dated myself, so I graduated college in 2012, but we didn't really have like Instagram. It wasn't until like the spring semester, when I was finishing my program, where it actually, like, launched for Android users. So it wasn't even until then. So before that it was for iPhone and I didn't get an iPhone until the year after. So, like when they launched it for the Android, that's when I got my Instagram account. So this wasn't really like a thing back then. Like it's so funny because that's like a dinosaur, like you couldn't get Instagram if you were an Android user until, like I think it was like May or April 2012. So before that was exclusive to iPhone users. It's so funny because it's like, if you think back to it, like if you started posting immediately since the get go, you would have probably built a way more followers back then. But then for me it wasn't really like a business idea concept just yet, because, just because I didn't really know anyone that was doing it just yet in that sense, so I didn't really have that. So, like in my program I was the only one that I met Like, so there was about, like I would say, maybe 60 people.
Speaker 1:So I did a UC program. I went to UC Berkeley for undergrad. So this UC program was at UC center Rome. So only the UC students from UCLA, uc Irvine, uc San Diego, uc Santa Cruz all the different UC campuses can only go to this program. It wasn't open to like the public and stuff. It was only specifically for University of college students. So I was only one in my program who applied to a bunch of scholarships and everything and I went traveling up pretty much almost every single weekend because the school was like if you don't use up all this money, you might have to give it back. And I was like, I'm not giving it back to the university, I'm going to go use some money. So, like, I just did that.
Speaker 2:So that's what I did Amazing and did you tell your friends that you were doing it? Because it sounds like okay. You didn't even know about a career as a content creator, because Instagram had not gone mainstream. And if you're a dinosaur, I'm a dinosaur because I graduated in 2011, right around the same time as you. But when you were in Rome and you were on these experiences for you sharing, like, hey, I have this free money to spend while.
Speaker 1:I'm here. So I did share with my friends and stuff. But at that point it was too late, because you're already in the program, because it really depends on the scholarship. But a lot of my scholarships I got either like six months or beforehand, so it was kind of too late for them. And then some of them they were kind of like jealous, because they're like, well, like, you get to go every single weekend because you have money, but I don't have any money.
Speaker 1:So what I did was I just traveled by myself. I was like, okay, well, if you can't go, I'm going to the hostels in this different country. I'm going to find a flight on Ryanair, easyjet or a train somewhere to go and just experience the place, because I have no one else to go with me. So that's what I'm going to do. And then back in my campus I would print out guides from that blog about stuff to do there and my my map in itinerary, because back then T-Mobile did not have free Wi-Fi to roam around so I didn't have free internet to use in a different country. So I would have to print out the guides of like a map and everything and then right on the map of where I'm going and stuff, because back then I didn't have free roaming and internet. But nowadays, when I have T-Mobile, I can just use it anywhere that's on T-Mobile for the Wi-Fi to roam for free.
Speaker 2:Well, I remember my Euro trips back then. It was always the McDonald's. You'd go to McDonald's because they would have the free Wi-Fi and you'd have all these young backpackers just hanging out in the McDonald's loading maps, texting people checking in with their family.
Speaker 1:It was the McDonald's for the free bathroom and the free Wi-Fi. It was both. It actually was People because, like in Europe, certain places they charge you if they use the bathroom, but if you go to McDonald's it's free. I was actually in Europe in September and I had to use the restroom because I was going to a tour and the nearest place I saw was a McDonald's. So I literally went inside, asked the person who was sitting down, can I just have the receipt for the restroom? And they gave it to me in a code to use for the bathrooms. I didn't have to pay for it.
Speaker 2:I know.
Speaker 1:It's the fact, your backpacker days. What stuff you would do.
Speaker 2:Yeah, your hacking extends far beyond credit card points. It seems we're hearing T-Mobile hacks how to get a receipt at McDonald's so you can just pee for free. You heard it here first. Okay, so first experience, it sounds like, was this study to roam abroad, where you had your first encounter, first big encounter, with free money being able to hack your way into getting something you want. The next big moment on your resume is around what you call the biggest financial mistake of your life, where you took your first adult job in advertising and basically you just took the first job you were offered. You didn't apply around, you didn't negotiate and you felt really uncomfortable about how it ended up, and it's one of your regrets. Tell us more about this.
Speaker 1:So I felt like for me when I was graduating from college, I didn't have that financial background, so I had a lot of different friends from Berkeley that had parents that had a lot of money, so they had time to think about what job they wanted, because they weren't stressed, they were still on their parents' healthcare plan and everything, but my parents. I couldn't do that with them, so I felt like I had to find a job ASAP, versus a lot of my peers that I went to college with. They had the flexibility because their parents paid for their stuff, but I didn't have that. So literally I got a job offer to work as an assistant media planner in New York and it was like $35,000 a year that they paid me for. They worked me so hard. They literally I had to stay so many late hours there.
Speaker 1:It was one of the scenarios where I felt like I was really pressured to take this job because I felt like I needed money ASAP versus getting to know what I wanted to do.
Speaker 1:I feel like it's very fortunate for some people that they have the time flexibility, but when you're pressed on benefits, healthcare insurance and paying off your college loans and you have no money, you just take whatever you can get first. And I wish I had more money back then to say, actually this isn't for me and actually I can stand up for myself, because I feel like the person I was back then, when I was 23 years old, I didn't know how to say certain things because you're still your first job out of college. But now I feel like I'm more evolved and I just wish I had the skill sets back then. But I think, younger Angel, she was just so lost and she just wanted to get a job soon out of college because there was just so much pressure to find a job that she took whatever she can get instead of get to know what she really wanted to do.
Speaker 2:I mean I can relate to that. I took the first job offer I received after university and didn't negotiate at all. I didn't even know that I could ask for more money or to ask for more perks, or I didn't feel like I had any negotiating power whatsoever and I felt a lot of shame around that because once you accept the terms, that's your job now and those are the conditions and maybe you can renegotiate for a raise. But there's typically standards and procedures around that when you're not an entrepreneur and you are following that traditional career path.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I definitely agree with that. Also, back then there wasn't as much resources. Now there's a bunch of different podcasts about finding jobs and whatnot, but back then there wasn't really that much resources. Just yet, again, instagram wasn't a thing. But you go to Instagram now there's a coach for everything. There's a coach for human resources, there's a coach for finding a job, there's a travel hacking person like me. There's a bunch of different people you can find on the internet now for different types of career advice and different advice about different things, but that wasn't really a thing back then. Not that I'm trying to blame, because I do take accountability in that. I wish I did know better back then, but I just didn't have someone to tell me that back then.
Speaker 2:Well, let's catch up to where we are now, because it starts with this amazing trip and study abroad to Rome, to then getting your first job and feeling like you made the biggest financial mistake of your life, to a number of exciting, windy roads in between that. But now you have been to 36 countries, all seven continents. How did the travel hacking start entering your radar? Did you have a mentor or a content creator in the space who inspired you, or were you naturally investigating this stuff on your own?
Speaker 1:So it was a combination of both. So one of my good friends, sean I met him in undergrad at Berkeley. He told me about travel hacking. So I got my first credit card was like well, I got a credit card when I was an undergrad for a Capital One so that one didn't charge for foreign transaction fees when I was studying abroad in Rome. But my first actual, like real travel credit card was a Chase Sapphire preferred, so that one you can use to transfer out to a different airline and hotel partners.
Speaker 1:So my friend, sean from college, told me about this and he was like you have to go to this conference called Chicago seminars. And for me back then I was like I barely making enough money, like I'm not going to pay to go to a conference learn about travel hacking. So then I'm like I'm just going to Google whatever I can get. And you know how that goes Sometimes when you don't invest in learning a specific course, you can just get whatever it's on the internet. It's not organized, it's whatever you can find on the internet.
Speaker 1:And I think back then I was able to get some redemptions, some different airline and hotel redemptions that were okay, but I wasn't getting the maximum value out of them. And it's funny because I actually spoke at Chicago seminars this year and last year. So I got invited to the conference that I went to back in 2019, where I felt like I didn't know anything, like I felt like I knew stuff. But I went into the conference. I was like I don't know anything All these people are way smarter than me and then I got invited back last year, this year, to speak at the conference.
Speaker 1:Wow, full circle moment that's pretty cool yeah, with a full circle moment, like I should have paid a long time to go to this conference because everything would have made more sense. I would have done my redemptions better. We can talk a little bit more about this too, about how, like, if you book certain things, if you book it through a bank portal, you're getting a set rate. So like a set rate might be one cent versus if you book a different way, where you can transfer out to different airline and hotel partners, you might get seven cents per dollar. So you could have technically booked that trip seven times versus one time for the redemption value.
Speaker 1:So I think the full circle moment was that, like my friend Sean told me about this, about travel hacking, and then I got myself into it but I didn't like dabble as much as I should have, just because I felt like I was also restricted by the income I was getting from the advertising job. So I did a little bit, but once I started getting to tech, when I made more money, that's when I started really getting to it, because then I had more like means and stuff where I paid off my college loans. That was a financial barrier for me where I was like no, I can't do this travel hacking stuff I will like once I pay off my college loans, then I'll dive deeper into it. And that was should have been the reversal, because you ended up fluce call. We learned from the fluce call. Today you can actually buy gift cards to pay for your college loans. So it's funny how, like, you think you know something but you actually don't.
Speaker 2:And so I guess let's break it down for people who are listening to this episode, because they were like me. They saw an Instagram reel and they saw someone flying business class who looked young, who wasn't like royalty or celebrity, somebody who seemed relatable, and they had something that they were curious how they got. How do you define travel hacking?
Speaker 1:First of all, so travel hacking is taking advantage of all the different current rules in place from credit card programs, airline programs and hotel programs, and seeing what different loyalty programs you can use to maximize your points to book the trip as cheap as possible. So it doesn't matter if you're flying economy or flying business, or staying at a luxury hotel or just a normal hotel. Find a cheapest way to get there, whether on points or on cash, okay.
Speaker 2:And what do you mean by on cash?
Speaker 1:Okay. So let's say you're trying to buy something on Macy's. There's this thing called shopping portal. So before you can go to Macy's, if you go to American Airlines website for the American Airlines shopping portal or you go through Rakuten, you can earn cash back or miles on that purchase. So that's additional miles you can add up.
Speaker 2:I just got a Dyson Airwrap and it was seven times the point. So, for I bought like a $700 Dyson Airwrap and it was seven times the points. And so is that what we're talking about here, where I purchased it through my AeroPlan tech, bought it online and then I got more points on my AeroPlan card. Yes, Cool.
Speaker 1:So last week when I was in Asheville there was a Chase offer on my Chase Sapphire Reserve to save 10% I think 10% or 15% on Marriott at that town sweets that I was staying at. So that was an extra coupon that I went through and I used a Rakuten to get extra points as well. So it's like you're layering on the discounts so you have to do the math sometimes. Is it cheaper for me to book with points or do I pay cash and that's actually cheaper because I can save my points for something?
Speaker 2:else, and that's a question I wanted to ask you about because my husband and I had this debate last night. Aeroplan is having a big Black Friday points deal right now where you can actually pay to buy points, where the more money you invest, the more points you get, and usually it's like a dollar per point kind of thing. If you're purely spending your credit card, when does it make sense to pay for points? Would you have a recommend?
Speaker 1:I don't really buy points just because I feel like it's more useful to get them through a credit card signup bonus. But there are situations where it might make sense for you to buy points. If you're very short on a redemption and you bought points and it'll get you that redemption that you wanted because you don't have time to make a signup bonus, then that's perfect for you because it's relevant to you, because you would rather let's say that you bought points it was $100. But you redeem a flight that's worth $7,000 but you're just 100 points short. That makes sense to buy the points because the flights were $7,000. So I think it kind of depends on your situation.
Speaker 1:If you're short on a redemption, I would buy the points just because it's so close versus just waiting for that deal to come back, because sometimes you find flash deals. Sometimes, like, I booked a flash deal what's it called Literally the other day. So this is back in March I was going to Japan for Cherry Blossom. Literally, I flashed for 80,000 points to book the AA flight I've been searching for the past few weeks and then flashed for 80,000 points for me to book the first class flight. So I booked it. But it doesn't happen all the time where you find a word availability to book your flight. So if you find a flight for the dates you need to travel, that's very helpful because that's part of the game. Like people think it's hard to get the points, but it's also hard to redeem the travel for the most maximized points possible to save the most money and points. So that's just part of it too. Like you also have to know how to use your points efficiently to get the most value out of them.
Speaker 2:And how did you get notified that the trip that you wanted to be on, that all of a sudden, it was this flash sale? What do you mean by that?
Speaker 1:Oh a flash. I was on the American Airlines website and I literally was refreshing the page and then I saw it flash for 80,000. I was like, oh my gosh, I have enough points. I need to book this ASAP because I was trying to find a flight to go home. So, just for perspective, for those that are new to travel hacking, you don't always have a word availability. Sometimes they're saver space and sometimes there's a normal price. So, like, sometimes a flight can be 80,000 points, but sometimes that flight is 400,000 points. So when it flashes and there's a saver space that you see on the website, you book it because you would rather pay 80,000 points versus 400,000 points for the same flight and I'm such a noob, like, when you say points, what are we talking about?
Speaker 2:Like I'm familiar with Aeroplan, but, chase, that's a whole different credit card with a whole different point system right.
Speaker 1:Think of points as this way. So you have your bank right. So the bank is Chase, chase. They have transfer partners where you can transfer your points out to different programs. So there's Air Canada, for example, there's Hyatt for hotels, there's Marriott for hotels, there's United Airlines, there's Southwest Airlines, there's British Airways. There's all these different transfer partners that you can use to book your flight or hotel. So you can use the points from your Chase account to transfer out to that program that you wanted. I did this two weeks ago when I was in Bali, so I booked a flight. This is going to cause people stress, but I'm going to explain it in a way. I booked my flight less than a week before departure because the business class seat opened up. There was no business class before that. I had to fly economy and I didn't want to fly economy for 11 hours to get to Asia. So when it opened up and I saw it for 75,000 points on Air Canada to fly United players, I transferred 75,000 points from my Chase account to Air Canada to book the flight.
Speaker 1:Okay, got it and it was less than a week out, so I know that causes people stress. It's also different for me because, like I work in tech, so I can bring my laptop anywhere, so I have a flexibility.
Speaker 2:How important is that flexibility? Because there's a couple of myths that I wanted to see if you could debunk or tell us if that's true or not related to getting travel for as affordable as possible, and one of them is how much advanced notice should you book your travel? I've heard about a month before your trip. That's the best time. Anything less than that it's going to be the worst time, but then 24 hours before is a good time. What have you learned about that?
Speaker 1:So you either have to book your flight way in advance almost a year out or you can book last minute when the award seats get released. So it depends on the airline whenever they release seats. So not every airline is going to have saver space all the time. Lufthansa is notorious for this, where they released the award space two weeks out. So you have to be very strategic of how you book your flights. So when I booked my flight from Bali, so I went from Bali to Taiwan and then Taiwan to SFO and SFO to LAX that Taiwan flight to SFO did not open until like four or five days before the flight for 75,000 points. Before it was like 200 or 300,000 points. So when the saver space opened up I booked it Okay. So it depends. It really depends on an airline and what kind of seat you want, because I could have booked economy but I won business. So it depends on what kind of flight you are.
Speaker 1:If you're fine, if economy, you have to remember a plane Right, an airplane has way more economy seats than a business class seat. If you don't care about what you're flying, then economy is pretty flexible. You can book economy pretty easily. But if you're trying to get business class and then when you want to lie flat seat so you could easily go to sleep and have a Blanket and everything and have nice food, then you're gonna have to see when that award seat opens up and it can really vary. It could be almost a year in advance, depending on the airline. Because when the airline releases it almost a year in advance you have first dibs when everybody's opened out to everyone, where you can book that seat ASAP.
Speaker 1:But if you don't book it, then you have to periodically watch it to see if it drops in price For you to get the price you want to book the flight, and it's not gonna be guaranteed that it will drop to the price you want. So for my Japan flight when I was going to Asia, I actually wanted the midnight flight for 12 am For 60k thousand points but never opened up. So I ended up booking the flight at 9 am Not that it's the end of the world, but still like. I booked at the flight at 9 am For 60 thousand points, but I wanted the one that was at 12 o'clock because I would have landed in Tokyo around 3 or 4 pm and then checked in my hotel and had more time to explore because I could have just slept on the airplane. But that flight never opened up for me on American airline miles, so I had to take 9 o'clock flight. So now every flight is gonna be guaranteed that they will open up for a world space.
Speaker 2:Got it, so you sometimes will see the flights, but then it won't be in your portal and won't allow you to use the points for that you had a thing about this way.
Speaker 1:So bank portal is like pretty much equal to cash. It's like one cent or 1.25 or 1.5 cents in the portal to book, so you can always pay with cash, but that's not always the smartest way to book. So, like my flight, I believe it was 200,000 points to book in the bank portal, but when I released saver space for me, it was only 75,000 points to book of air Canada, so I saved over 100,000 points. Wow.
Speaker 2:I, yeah, you'll be proud of me. This will be my second business class redemption flight that I'm doing in January. I'm going to I was going from Vancouver to Costa Rica and it was going to be like a terrible travel destination anyway, like one of the options was a 13 hour layover in Mexico City and the business class points was very similar to economy. If you are willing to do this 13 hour layover in Mexico City and because we're flexible, we're like we've never been to Mexico City let's do the business class flight, which is fun and experience, great way to kick off the year, and then we'll just do two nights in Mexico City and then we'll fly a cheap direct flight to Costa Rica two days later. So that's what we're doing. It's only my second time business class, but I'm super inspired by you and I want to do this more for sure.
Speaker 1:Also, I tell people all the time to start slow. Your first redemption doesn't have to be business class. Like I fly business class now but that's because I have enough points to fly business class. But if you're starting out, you're starting out from zero. You can't be with someone that like has over 20 credit cards and then like for you to have only one credit card.
Speaker 1:I assume that you're going to also fly business class. It's not the same level, you know. Like you have to think about that too. It's like it's okay to start slow, like I didn't start like this is the first year that I flew business class eight times. Like last year I flew business class three times, but like before that I never flew business class. Truth be told, if you think one credit card will get you that business class seat for you to keep flying each year, that's not gonna happen. The math don't make sense. The math makes sense when you get different credit card sign-in bonuses. You save up the points to build up enough points to redeem for the business class flight. But if you're thinking you could get away with just signing up for one credit card and never a credit card ever again, you're gonna either have to spend a lot of money on that credit card to get enough points to get there, because that the math doesn't make sense. So the sign-in bonuses are the way to go to get more points for the flights and hotels.
Speaker 2:A big concern I've heard from people is their worry about their credit score. If I am constantly signing up for different credit cards, signing up here, cancelling these credit cards, that's gonna screw me over when I want to go whatever get a mortgage, get a cell phone bill. What do you say to people who have that concern?
Speaker 1:So if you're trying to get a mortgage soon, I would prioritize that. Just because you want the best rate first. So maybe put off travel hacking the back burner for now, just because you want to get the best rate possible long-term wise for your house, right? So that's the main priority for yours. But if you're not, like me like I'm not buying a house anytime soon, so it's not a big concern for me, like I think.
Speaker 1:For me, you have to remember how credit scores work as well. So a credit score most of your credit score is mostly from the payment history. So the payment history and the amount of owed that makes up more than 60% of your credit score. So don't max out your credit card. So for me, I have a bunch of different credit cards but I don't max them out. I just continue to spend that like normal, like I treat my credit card like a debit card.
Speaker 1:So I'm disciplined. If you're not disciplined, this is not for you, because you can easily go crazy and buy a bunch of stuff just to make that sign-in bonus, and that's not how that's going to work, because then the bank is going to win. In that sense, the bank is going to make money off the interest that you're paying for and everything. But if you're responsible and you pay all your bills on time, the easiest way on a pay. So what I did to make some certain sign-in bonuses sometimes is that I would have friends pay me back. So then I make the sign-in bonus. I hope I explained that good enough. You did you did.
Speaker 2:You were inspiring me. I'm like, oh no, I only have one credit card. I have a really good travel credit card, but I need to get another one. You are inspiring me, I'm going to do that. You're saying that you're traveling once per month on average. How often are you flying business class? How often are these points? Can we talk about the scale? Like is this we're talking about once a year? We're getting this hookup. Is this happening like your regular travel experience? Now Tell us more about the scale.
Speaker 1:So I would say this past year I flew business class eight times. I also have status of an airline. So if I pay off cash sometimes they'll upgrade me to the higher class. So when I was going to Bahamas I booked a basic economy ticket, so that's the lowest of low to get to under seat right but I got upgraded. So when I was flying from LAX to Miami I was bumped up to first class. Miami to Bahamas was bumped up to business and then back home I was bumped from Bahamas to Miami in business and then Miami to LAX and premium economy. So they bumped me up because I had status. So some of them were because I had airline status as well.
Speaker 2:And can we talk a little bit about getting status? Because for me I had to work so hard to get even just the lowest status With Star Alliance on airplane and I feel like it's coming harder and harder to get status, like now you have to get basically premium economy or like a flexible economy ticket to even get it and then if you're using your points you aren't actually getting anything towards your status. So can you talk a little bit about how you made that happen for yourself?
Speaker 1:Okay. So I had high globalists. So high globalists in American Airlines they have a partnership. So they were doing a promo where I got Platinum Pro status for a while. So I had Platinum Pro status for a while for American Airlines so I kept it that way. So for American Airlines it's very different than other programs. So American Airlines you can keep your status by buying stuff through the shopping portal, by doing simply miles. You can get your status from booking hotels through rock and miles or AA hotels. So there's a lot of ways to get points from American Airlines and as long as you have a certain amount and they had the instant status pass I was doing If you got enough points for that quarter, then you would have kept the status. So I'm going to go over to you about status. Until now, nice.
Speaker 2:Okay, another myth that people often say is that there's a better day of the week to travel. So you said, basically you need to be a year out or you have to just watch for it. If you're watching a certain flight, and generally last minute is going to be best for you, is there any truth to like Tuesday mornings was the best time to book a flight, or Thursday afternoon is where the flights are the cheapest? From what you've learned, is any of that statistically true?
Speaker 1:If you're doing points and miles deals. No, because it's based on whenever the airline releases the space. So it could be any time because you don't think about it this way. If an airline has only like 20 seats in business class but someone just canceled their flight and guess what, that business class seat might be opened up and you got an award alert because I get alerts from expert flyer. So if I got an award alert from expert flyer that the seat just opened up, I'm going to book it.
Speaker 1:Like you know, like there's a bunch of different websites to give you a word alerts, but I'm just giving one example. But like, let's just say, like that just opened up because before that seat wasn't open but someone just canceled their flight with points, so that seats now open for you to book. Or the airline didn't release the space yet because you didn't think from the airline's perspective, they're going to try to sell as much seats as possible, but closer towards a date, kind of like my Taiwan flight from Taiwan to SFO, I didn't book them to like a few days in advance because the airline didn't release it until then. So like they're trying to sell all the seats on cash as much as they can, before they release it out on points, because they make less money on the points versus they get flat out cash, got it.
Speaker 2:If someone's booking on cash. Do you know if there's any stats around the best day of the week to book a flight, or the best day from any of the events that you've been to or speakers you've gotten to meet and hear from?
Speaker 1:You can monitor the flight on Google flights to see if it drops, or so you can look at the history. So that's a good one. I have Kappa One Venture X. If you book the flight in the Kappa One portal, if you're using cash, you can actually get a partial refund if the price drops through Hopper. So it's powered by Hopper, so you can get a partial refund if it drops. So for me, I buy mixed, sometimes I buy cash flights, sometimes I buy flights with points. It really depends on what I'm doing.
Speaker 2:I'm assuming you've compiled a lot of this information somewhere your favorite credit cards, your favorite loyalty programs. If someone was just discovering your content for the first time, what are some of your favorite resources you've created that we should include in the show notes?
Speaker 1:Okay, so we do have some. I think I gave you a link for a freebie, so we do have a free travel hacking freebie that you can download for the Blueprints. You can get started from there. We lay out what travel hacking is, some different programs on there, so that's definitely a good way to get there. I do have a travel hacking course as well, so there's definitely a note in the show notes too Amazing.
Speaker 2:Okay, we'll include both of those. Absolutely, we're over time, but I do still want to ask you about how you got into content creation, because it's one thing to spend your time researching all of this and learning how this all works, because what's clear to me is you invest a lot of time and a lot of energy in doing this, and that's why you're so successful with it, and so you could have just kept these secrets for yourself. Or now you've figured out how you can actually pass on this knowledge so that I don't have to spend the X hours that you spend on it. I can take your resources, take your courses, be part of your programs. How did you transition into now being an educator and a content creator in this space?
Speaker 1:So it's so funny. So back in 2019, when I started, I got featured in today's show and that one of the editors were, like you need to make a blog about this because you know so much about this. So it wasn't until someone told me that I had to that I actually started making this stuff. They're like you're a wealth of knowledge, you know what you're talking about. So like it wasn't until then that I got into it of making different types of content and everything. And then, my friend, we met on Clubhouse during COVID but during WITS last year we decided to make a podcast, but we didn't do anything for a whole year almost, and finally this year we did the podcast.
Speaker 1:So we started launching our podcast through travel hacking challenges. So the one we did in June was about stacking. The one we just did in August was about travel hacking, and then the one we just did about like travel hacking in the sense of booking your flights and stuff I mean they're all travel hacking related, but like different parts of travel hacking. And then the one we did in October was about Southwest Companion Pass, about getting by one, getting free flights. And the one we just did now is the holiday shopping one that you just joined about how to stack and save more for your holiday purchases.
Speaker 1:So it's funny because, like my friend and I were like back when we first started, you had to read so many different types of blogs. You had to listen to different videos on YouTube. There was just information everywhere and when you don't have an organized format, it could get confusing quick because you can go down the rabbit hole and you can get confused by that rabbit hole because there's different rules for each program. So, like how I book airline flights it's very different than how I book Delta flights. So you have to be very strategic and know how the different programs work for your advantage.
Speaker 2:Okay, so it started with this podcast, these challenges that you were doing with your friends, but I now follow you on Instagram. You've attracted an amazing audience on there. I saw you have over 70,000 followers. Since you're all about hacks any hacks you can share with our audience about how you were able to build your following so quickly. It sounds like only a year. Is that what I'm hearing?
Speaker 1:I built my following mostly from Instagram Reels, so I had some Reels that went viral and it's always the ones are controversial, like it's whenever I fly Spirit. Whenever I post anything about Spirit, the budget airline, I tell them well, I don't know why, like I could be flying business class, but the Spirit Reel usually does better than the business class Reel.
Speaker 2:Because people just hate Spirit.
Speaker 1:I think it's because more people relate to spirit, because more people can afford a spirit flight than a business class flight. And it gets so controversial because some people are in the comments saying like eels, spirit, they're not even paying for my flight, and they're like EW and then like and I was like well, I also fly business class too. And then people got so angry and it was this real, I compiled together where I was flying spirit first and I transitioned over to a business class seat and I was like yeah, I'm irresponsible, I paid $200 for a spirit flight and only paid like 50 bucks for my business class seat. And that one went viral too.
Speaker 2:Okay, so controversial content, leaning on on Instagram reels and your podcast is really how it all started and just sharing this knowledge with people that it sounds like you just enjoy learning about.
Speaker 2:Like when you talk about it, you light up, like you're so excited to understand how it all works and how you've hacked the system and all of this and you know, not everybody gets that excited about this stuff, so I feel like it's just so authentic. It must really resonate with people. I want to ask you about something that you put on the form and you let me know if you want to go here, but I asked you about the impact that this lifestyle has had on your relationships and you mentioned that your parents think you're still a failure because you're not married. Can you go there?
Speaker 1:Oh my goodness. So like traditional immigrant parents, right, they're like you know you have to go to school, have a traditional job, be married and stuff. I'm not married. My parents, they were like they think it's weird. They're like why do you send them for something different? Credit cards, like isn't that a scam? Like and everything. And you're also like you're not married yet. You're in your thirties. You should be married by now. You should have kids, and I'm like, yeah, but that lifestyle is really not for me.
Speaker 2:And what do they say back to that? You're like I'm flying first class, mom, I'm doing something right Traveling once a month.
Speaker 1:I'm still a failure. I'm the black sheep in the family, like my sister has a house in San Francisco. My brother is buying a house and I'm not going to buy a house anytime soon, so I'm the outsider in this aspect.
Speaker 2:Yeah, no. I think a lot of people who come on the show can relate where the whole idea and concept of the show is people who have pursued some type of alternate way of living in order to live the lifestyle that they want to live and have figured out how to hack their way through life, and that often can. That can confront people with their own shit, right? Maybe people are wondering, well, what if I lived more authentically myself? And sometimes we can trigger people. Do you think that's at all going on with your parents?
Speaker 1:Yeah, I think they're kind of like they're just shocked about which level I got to, because they're like I can't believe she flew business class eight times already. Most people don't fly business class in their life, so like, right, I heard I go eight times. That's pretty pretty out of the ordinary, you know. And then I used to live in New York too, so it's like a lot of Asian communities you stay at home, so I left to go to New York. So like it's very different than the realm of things, of how things are run.
Speaker 2:Well, I think you're a huge success and I think some of these publications you've been featured in Forbes, morning Brew, buzzfeed, these conferences around the world would also say you're a success, angel. So I'm not sure how you weight those accolades versus your parents, but I think what you've done is super impressive and I'm so grateful you came on the show to share this with us.
Speaker 1:Oh, thank you so much.
Speaker 2:Thanks for tuning into another episode If this one inspired you to take action, but you could use some help on your plan, or perhaps you've got too many ideas bouncing around in that beautiful brain of yours. You'd love some clarity on your strategy, what you should pursue first and why. Well, I am now offering one-on-one freedom coaching sessions. You can book these at BuyMeacoffeecom slash what's your Free. This is our opportunity to have a virtual coffee together. Spend an hour getting clarity on how you can unlock more freedom and flexibility in your life. On these calls, you can ask me anything, but here are some things that I'm an expert in Creating a location, independent lifestyle, building service-based and freelance businesses, leveraging the gig economy and platforms like Fiverr, utilizing podcasts to build your personal brand and developing passive income streams. So book your freedom coaching session with me at BuyMeacoffeecom. Slash what's your Free. I would love to have a virtual coffee with you.