Another Vacation?

Weren't you just on vacation? You're going on another trip? How do you afford to travel so much? 

Yes, yes and credit card miles & points make it possible. 

We took our first real family vacation to Walt Disney World in October 2014 and haven't stopped traveling since then, but thanks to credit card points we've managed to take at least 4 trips a year since 2017. I am very grateful that we are fortunate to travel so much and since our first trip to Disney it has been my goal to visit Mickey every year, so I made it my mission to allow our finances to make that yearly trip possible. 

Look at these smiles, Mickey always makes us smile

Even when we were making less money we still set aside money for travel. We prioritize travel in our budget, every month we set a portion of our budget for travel expenses. Those expenses can be anything from hotel rooms, suitcases, passport renewals to credit card fees. Without miles and points I think we could afford 2 trips a year. 

I will start by saying that if you don't pay your credit cards in full every month credit card travel hacking isn't for you and I wouldn't recommend getting credit cards if you aren't good about sticking to a budget. Stick to what works for you, don't go into debt. Also, everyone NEEDS to have a household budget. 

We have lots of credit cards, some we close after a year and other are long-term keepers. We only open credit cards when they have a good sign up bonus (SUB). Our credit scores fluxuates between 780ish and 800ish, we've never been denied a loan, our mortgage interest is 2% and our car loan is 3%, credit cards don't negatively impact your credit score in the long run. The biggest impact to your credit score is utilization ratio. From the Chase website: Your total credit utilization ratio is the sum of all your balances, divided by the sum of your cards' credit limits. So, for example, if you have two credit cards, each with a $1,000 limit, and owe $500 on one and $250 on the other, your credit utilization ratio is $750 divided by $2,000, or 37.5 percent. Our utilization ratio fluctuates between 0% and 2%. Would it be cool to have a credit score of 820+, sure but what's the point of having a high score if you aren't using your credit to your advantage? Anything above a 760 gets you a loan at a great rate.