The Other Half

I got a very interesting response in the comments section of my post “philosophy of miles.”

Reader Mark shared his perspective on the miles game as a working-class individual living in a rural area who endeavors to collect miles as well.

He expressed frustration with the lack of a working-class perspective in the blogosphere, and a lack of understanding of the challenges facing this group of miles game players.

His comment is worth reading and I would encourage you to check it out.

What follows is my attempt (as an admittedly privileged individual) to imagine what my miles game strategy would be if my salary were near the poverty line, and I lived in a rural environment.

This is purely a thought exercise, so please correct me on any mistakes I make out of my lack of real-world experience, or 1%er arrogance.

Step one: Evaluate my credit score. 

I would check my free FAKO scores on creditsesame.com and creditkarma.com, as well as pull my free annual credit report.

If my credit score was above 700, there were no major errors on my credit report, and I was not planning a major loan application in the next couple of years I would proceed to step 2.

If my credit score was under 700, I would focus on raising my credit score first. This would benefit me not only in my ability to play the miles game in the future, but also in terms of gaining future access to capital, and cheap loans for housing, and business opportunities.

Step two: Build up some financial reserves.

I would not consider playing the miles game until I had a couple of months (minimum) living expenses saved up.

Travel is a luxury, but a rainy day fund is a necessity.

Furthermore, manufactured spending does come with the risk of a temporary loss of access to your money. You should always be able to get it back, but the money leveraged in manufactured spending must always be something you can afford to be without for a few months. The rainy day fund would give me this crucial cushion.

Now obviously with my yearly salary of $20,000 a year, saving money would be incredibly difficult.

But miles game skills could be useful here, too.

I would probably start by applying for a cashback credit card and putting all the spending I could on it.

If my take home was $20,000, and I wasn’t saving any money, then if I put every cent of my $20,000 on a 5% cashback card, I would be able to harvest $1000 at the end of the year. Not chump change.

Step three: Eliminate all high interest debt.

The miles game only works if you do not carry any credit card debt, otherwise the value’s just not there.

Step four: Research my miles habitat.

I would visit every drugstore, gas station, and grocery store in my area to find out what gift cards were available.

If there are CVS drugstores with Vanilla Reloads, score! I can now manufacture as much spending as needed without ever visiting a Walmart. I would simply order a Bluebird Card by mail, Load it up with vanilla reloads, and pay my bills from my Bluebird account.

If not and there is a store selling the Green Dot MoneyPaks, I would order a GoBank card, or an Account Now card, or a RushCard, and manufacture spend by Buying Green Dot MoneyPacks and loading them electronically onto my chosen card and paying my bills from that card account.

Since my margin is so low, I would always offset the activation fee on the reload cards buy buying a proportion of them with a cashback card.

The Miles Game Player’s habitat is as cruel as it is beautiful…

Step five: I would focus on applying for cards with the most value for economy travel.

The Southwest cards (business and personal) with a companion pass come to mind, as does the British Airways card which has some incredibly cheap short distance fares due to its distance-based award chart.

Step six: Low hanging fruit.

I would set up an Amazon Payments accounts for both me and my wife and manufacture $ 1-2000 every month for free using this method of spending.

Step seven: Take a hard and honest look at my own financial situation. 

Am I high interest debt free?

Am I socking away enough money for my retirement?

Am I saving any money?

Am I taking advantage of the fact that my low tax marginal rate means that any investment income I make will not be taxed at all?

Is the miles game where I want to continue focusing my energy? Or would I be better off switching my priorities temporarily to cutting my spending further, and accumulating some wealth via the cashback game, and investment?

If I wished to proceed, then I would simply rinse, churn, and repeat.  If I wasn’t sure, I’d look into the early retirement game.

So what do you think? Is this realistic? Have I overlooked any challenges?  Am I being a condescending classist?

If you are lower income, does the strategy seem realistic?

What have I missed? What can you add?  Don’t hold back, I can take it.

Your comments, as always, are appreciated.