So if you follow the simple A to B to C of the miles game, you will end up a few months later with a shockingly large and diverse collection of miles and points. After earning, It’s time for burning At that point if you keep up with the serial card applications, and manufactured spending […]
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Organic Miles
I’ve already admitted that I love manufactured spending. There’s something about the illicit combination of thinking outside of the box, breaking conventions, and bargain seeking that just speaks to me on a fundamental level. But even I will admit that manufactured spending is not for everyone. Which is fine. Because frankly, if your income is high […]
Everything you need to know to manufacture spending
I’ve discussed credit card churns and flexibility, and reconsideration calls and keeping your newly approved cards organized…. On to the fun world of spending lots of money without spending much money at all: otherwise known as manufactured spending. 1. What is Manufactured Spending? Before covering the specifics of how to manufacture spending, it’s probably useful to start with […]
Game Planning
Once you’ve decided to play the miles game, all you really have to do to get started on your journey is to take that all important first step. Dont freak out…I’ve got you covered… But where to begin? The array of Credit card choices out there (fortunately) can be overwhelming. Well I’d like to think […]
Credit Cards, Gift Cards, Money Orders, Manufactured Spending, And The Walmartization Of America
If you’ve read more than a post or two on this site, there’s one thing that you probably know about me.I am not a Walmart fan.Before taking up the miles game, I had never actually been in a Walmart.But since then I’ve become well acquainted with it. In fact in many ways I now consider […]
Sunshine and Lollipops
Do you have any friends who are a little bit too into their kids? You know the type, they constantly tell you amusing little stories about their kids brilliance and talent. They’re a bit too quick to whip out the iPhone in order to start showing you pictures of little Carleton with blueberries on his […]
Diversions
Smart investing is boring, plain-vanilla, milquetoast. One need only invest in well diversified portfolio of low-cost, passive index stock funds, and just enough bonds to match their own risk tolerance. (And rebalance once every year or two.) And yet here I am several hundred posts into my blog, still writing about investing. And the reason […]
Addition by Subtraction
Walmart. Yucko.I haven’t exactly made my feelings about Walmart secret.And let’s be honest, I open myself up to a lot of criticism with my anti-Walmart stance. (Most of it well-deserved.)Am I being elitist?Absolutely.I would definitely earn some Everyman points by nonchalantly walking by the recycle center, replete with meth addicts dumping crushed beer cans into […]
Manufactured Crisis
There are many interesting questions in personal-finance. And one of them is; how much cash does one need for an emergency fund? There are many schools of thought on this one. Conventional wisdom seems to be that you should have six months living expenses set aside in an FDIC bank account. Others argue that you […]
Pen Pals and payPal
The loyal3 experiment continues down a predictable path. When I first found out about this opportunity, my feeling was that it had to be a short-lived one. As I saw it, a financial/tech start up had decided to make a devil’s bargain along the lines of “We’ll allow you (read pay for you) to run […]
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