Transcription
Bona, how is everyone doing? It's uh 8:00 p.m. here in Italy. I am in, in uh Pienza, a little town in the Tuscany region of Italy. Uh, I'll zoom out and see if you can see that. And uh, yeah, just thought I'd. All of my friends and my wife are still out in Florence. They might be back in a half hour or so. Um, and thought I'd make it a work day. So, all of you theoretically should own a copy of the Jut Way of Travel. And thought I'd just be here for any questions you have. I see that, that some people already asked some questions, so I'll kind of get to those in the order received. And if any more of you have questions, I can get to those as well. Um, let me just check and make sure that we're doing okay on sound. Sorry folks, got a weak signal out here in the country. Um, I'm doing my best. Looks like I don't see any complaints, so I'm going to assume that's a good thing. Um, feel free to pop in your questions or any feedback about the quality of this webinar, and I'll deal with it. Uh, so, hey Sherman, good to see you. Um, I know you are celebrating with family out in Vancouver. That's awesome. Congratulations on getting the family together. That's always difficult.
Um, Maria or Mario, looking for advice on renting in Italy for one to three months. Um, unfortunately, I don't have a whole lot of advice for you there. Uh, we focus on two things, and primarily two things: how to find free or close to free flights, and how to find free hotels. Um, those, according to the Jag Way of the of Travel, are the two things that can save you the most. And everything else becomes, who cares money. So, hopefully, you can, you know, offset your current living expenses here in the States and find a good deal, uh, in Italy. But unfortunately, I'm not the one to have advice for long-term rentals.
Let's see. Uh, Sheree, sorry, I do apologize. I, uh, I've changed time zones quite a few times, and I just plain messed up on the time of today's webinar. Uh, but you're, hopefully, you're here now, and, and, um, I can answer any questions you have.
Let's see. Uh, Mudon KAC, looking for best business class flights from Seattle to Italy. Um, so, uh, Italy is basically east of the United States. So, typically, you should be looking for what are called positioning flights off of the East Coast. You may find something out of Seattle. You may find something out of LA or, uh, San Francisco. Um, but odds are, uh, you know, I always say, um, coach flights are 10 times as hard to find as free hotels. Business class flights are 10 times as hard as coach flights, and first class is 10 times as hard as business class. So, if you're looking for business class, you've got an exponentially more difficult task. Ask the key is to just be patient, look at a lot of different options. Um, you know, unless you want to fork out thousands of dollars, if not over 10 grand, for, uh, business class flights that are, uh, you know, nine or 10 hours. Um, positioning flights are going to be the key. That we cover that in the hedging, the point hedging section of the book. Let me just look for that real quick. Um, Point Hedging 301, uh, that starts page 79 for the redemption side. So, page 79 of the book, and you can find our point hedging information on how to find those best deals on flights.
Let's see. Robert asks a very common question that gets asked quite a bit. Robert says, after, after you've selected Rakuten points to be credited to your MX card, you have to make the purchase on the MX card to get the points, or will any card work? So, that's a very, excuse me, that's a very common question. Uh, and so it's, it's kind of a two-part question. You do need an AMX card to initially hook up to your Rakuten account, that way you collect your Membership Rewards points. Once you do that, you are correct that you can use any card that you load into the system and will collect AMX Membership Rewards points. Um, I walked downtown today, uh, to grab a bite because it's our first night here, we didn't have much in our kitchen. And, um, I carried two cards with me, my AMX, my Chase Sapphire, and my AMX Platinum. Those get 70% of my spend. Um, I have a couple others that are more advanced uses, but, uh, yeah, hopefully that answers your question, Robert.
Let's see. Um, quite a few people who were here earlier. Again, apologies for that mix-up on the time. Uh, Bevonne says, would I give more details on the Tuscan Villa where we're staying? Um, excuse me. Uh, this was, uh, a place called Erini. Um, beautiful place, four bedrooms plus, uh, a guest house that's by the pool. Um, my wife gets to stay there because we're here for, uh, my wife's birthday, along with some other friends who are celebrating as well. Um, and it's just outside of a town called Pienza. Beautiful little town. I was just walking there this afternoon. I saw six or eight people taking wedding photographs, so I didn't get to see a whole lot of the town. I was just there to get a quick bite. Uh, but beautiful little town. Um, and lots and lots of big, typical, um, Tuscan Villa estates on five, 10 acres with beautiful views. Hopefully, you saw a picture on our Facebook account.
Let's see. Deborah asks, I would like help looking for tickets to Manchester, England, May 2024, from Phoenix. Looking for ideas for positioning flights, likely from the East Coast. You're definitely on the right track. Europe, get to the East Coast. Asia, Australia, get to the West Coast. Um, we aren't travel agents. We're not on commission. Uh, we do have a service that you can check out. Um, you can go, go to jut.com/travel. That's not a site that we advertise publicly. Typically, that's only available to people who buy the book because they kind of have an idea about the jut philosophies and hopefully we're in alignment with that. Um, so, if you're uncomfortable with doing this on your own with the tips in the book, that can be a good way to kind of test out our services without joining our high-end coaching program, which is thousands of dollars. Our, um, our trip research service is hundreds of dollars. And when you're looking for flights that are thousands of dollars a piece, for as few points as possible, that's a, that's a pretty good way to go about it.
Let me just scroll down. Okay. Uh, good, lots of questions. I'm going to keep going in the order received, so keep them coming. And forgive my sniffles. Uh, like I said, I, the reason I'm home here in our Tuscan Villa is because I've got the sniffles, got a scratchy throat. Didn't want to be in a closed-up car with my friends and get them sick too. So, uh, Bevonne asks, do you have any tips for flights for a family of six besides rule one? No, I don't. Nothing more important than, uh, rule one and rule two. That's, I guess I do have, uh, rule two. Um, but the pickier you are, the more people in your family, the, the more specific your dates, the more specific your travel goals, if you want to go to a specific place, the, the more important rule one and rule two is. There is, and most people overcomplicate this. They say, oh, I have kids in school. Oh, I have a big family. Yes, that's why rule one and rule two are so important. Um, whether you want to fly six or eight people, whether you want to fly six or eight people in business class, whether you just want to get them from A to B, rule one are what I like to call bonus trips. I had a conversation with our friends, and I'll be honest, two of our friends are kind of on board with the Jigu Way of Travel. Two of our friends who are here with us aren't. And I kind of had a talk while watching the sunset with one of them, and I said, man, I got to say it, it just kills me to watch you use that AMX card for all of your expenses here because you could do so much more with a travel card. And he said, yeah, but, you know, we just don't travel like you. We, you know, we want to go where we want to go, when we want to go. We have four people, college schedules, all that stuff. It's just too complicated. But the funny thing is, the reason they're on this trip is because they got a deal so good that they couldn't pass it up. So, um, you know, I know there are a lot of tips and tricks in this book. The, the point hedging 101 stuff, really powerful. The 2011 stuff, more powerful. The 301 builds on that and is even more powerful. But there's one chapter before that that most people breeze through, and that's the mindset. It's the very beginning of the book, second chapter, I guess, after how to read this book, removing shiny objects. So, so important. This is the foundation of why I started this company. And we have all of these assumptions that we can't travel that way. But like I said, my friends, four of my eight friends who are here, or four of my six friends, not counting us, are here because of the Jut Way of Travel. They weren't planning on coming to Italy, but it was my wife's birthday, it was her best friend's birthday, it was her best friend's husband's birthday. We all collaborated and got together and got the other four out here for next to nothing. Um, they weren't planning on it, but it was such a good deal, they made it happen. So, for everyone who thinks, I don't travel that way, you can always travel that way. Um, I like to say, you know, if you, if you're given an all-expense, all-expense-paid trip in six months from now, but you had to go exactly six months from now, could you make it happen? And most people think that answer is no. But when you're actually presented with that opportunity, you'd be surprised at how often you can make those trips happen. Hey Corki, we're neighbors. Good to see you. And you guys, I'm sorry, I'm going to go excuse myself real quick and just grab a Kleenex. I'll be right back. Sorry about that, got the sniffles.
Okay, let's see who's next. Uh, Jay Noble, I'm assuming that's Joel Noble. Uh, good to see you, Joel or Jay. Um, what's the best way to stack points on Rakuten? You know, there are a lot of different people that have a lot of different philosophies. Some people really geek out on it. Some people, like me, just kind of check in once a week. And the big thing that I do is anytime I have an expense that I could buy online that's over $50 or $100, I make sure to check Rakuten first. I have the Rakuten plugin on my Chrome, on my Chrome extension. Um, I also have the Card Pointer app, and that gives me a lot of insight when those big purchases can, uh, make a big difference. I don't necessarily, I will admit, I don't necessarily geek out on, you know, five and $10 transactions. I don't worry a whole lot about it. But anytime I'm going to buy something that's more than $50 or $100, I see if I can leverage that and get five or 10 or 25 or 50 times as many points. Um, hopefully that answers that question.
Lean Jordan asks, hi, do I have to get removed as an AU on my husband's cards prior to applying for the same cards with me as the primary? Very good question, very common question. And the answer is no, you don't have to do that. But it will typically cause for an automatic rejection. All you have to do is call them and say, and let them know. You just call the Chase reconsideration line. I don't know it by heart, but you can just Google Chase reconsideration line or AMX reconsideration line. And, um, you probably will get declined because they'll say you already have that card, or you're above 524, or whatever. And, um, all you have to do is call and say, I'm actually an authorized user, or my husband is actually an authorized user on that account. So, it's, he's not responsible for that credit, and they'll just take it off and make the adjustment. Um, if that doesn't work, if they say that's not possible, if they say, oh, nope, it still counts, they're wrong. Uh, we have a saying called H.O.O.K.A.H. Hang up, call again. So, if you don't get the answer you're looking for, hang up, call again until you get the answer you are looking for.
Let's see. Um, Steve Murthy, hi, need to book a trip for the week after next. Not much flexibility. What sites for last-minute travel do you recommend? Typically, they're the same as what I recommend in the book. It's, it's just kind of a different order. Um, if assuming by "not much flexibility," you have not much flexibility on dates, and you have to be at a specific place, weddings, funerals, guys' trips, girls' trips, whatever. That is, you know, your, your Google Explorer, your Kayak Explorer isn't going to work as well for you. But, um, uh, you can still play around with those dates. Use that flexible dates feature. See if leaving a day earlier or two or three days earlier, or two or three days later, um, can help. That's kind of always my priority one. I always look at the cash price first because my job is to preserve those valuable points and find as best a deal as possible for cash, so that I can save my points for those long-haul flights that I do not want to fly in coach in. And by doing that, I got to fly here to Europe for five bucks and points that I earned passively. I'm flying home for $200 and points that I earned passively. And we, in lie-flat business class seats, both ways. We're bouncing around Europe. Those are a mix of of coach and first class because they're all under a couple hours. Um, but check rule, I mean, don't, don't really worry about rule one, but definitely use that flexible dates feature. Check out a couple days before or after. Um, my next option is points.me. Um, and then there's another service called seats.aero. AER O. seats.aero. Um, and that's also a good one. Uh, they, points.me and seats.aero both have, you know, different pros and cons. But if you have points, those are a great way to just, um, poke around and see what kind of a deal you can get. Remember, the J Way of Travel is, go where the deals are for both rule one and rule two. And then, yeah, you, you apply some of those philosophies, be flexible on dates, be flexible on positioning airports, and you can usually knock those prices down. But it's going to take some creativity. The more restrictive you are on your travel parameters, the harder it's going to be to find a good deal. The more open you are on those travel parameters, the better a deal you will find 80% of the time. And that 20% of the time, weddings, funerals, guys' trips, etc., not that big a deal. Sometimes you might end up paying market rate, but when 80% of your travels are way less, I call that who cares money.
Marcy says, do I use my CSR to pay $17,000 for Viking Cruises or pay cash for 3.3% discount? CSR benefits may be better. I think, um, I'm guessing that means CSR and that's a typo. Um, yes, so you, you get a 3% savings. You get three points for travel. So, you are essentially buying those points for a penny a piece. It's a little bit of an advanced maneuver. But once you get good at this, once we are pretty confident we can get two, three, five, 10, 15 cents per point, we'll buy Chase points or AMX points for a penny a piece all day and night. Buying them for two cents a piece, three cents a piece, that is not a good idea. But if you're paying 3% to get three points, you're, you're buying those for a penny a piece. As long as you follow the J Way and have the discipline to redeem those points for no less than two cents a piece, sure. Worst case, you're getting half off on a flight, buying points for a penny a piece, redeeming them for two cents a piece, you're getting half off. Buying points for a penny a piece, redeem them for three cents a piece, you're getting two-thirds off. Um, so buying points for a penny a piece is probably okay. Just remember to have that discipline, never redeem them for less than two cents a piece.
Lesean asks, please explain the best use of cards and how to purchase gift cards. Can cards be used for Airbnb? Uh, yeah, they do have Airbnb gift cards. Um, this is venturing into something called manufactured spending. So, you do want to be careful, especially with AMX. This is not a recommended practice if you have a new card and you're pursuing a signup bonus. But if you had a card for a while and you mixed some gift cards in there to get 3x at the grocery store with your AMX Gold card, um, or at an office supply store with your Chase Ink card, um, that can be, as long as you're done, it's just a, you know, 10, 20, maybe maybe 30% of your credit card spend, sure, go for it. Do not abuse it. Um, there are lots and lots of horror stories out there of people getting banned for life for abusing the credit card system. That's called, uh, manufactured spending, and it's pretty frowned upon. So, definitely tread lightly when doing gift cards for, uh, point multipliers. Thanks, Steve. I still should have done better on the time zone. I apologize, but thanks for for being so gracious.
Bona, do you have any wrecks for health and wellness types of resorts? I have food restrictions and I'm open to new places where I can still enjoy the meals. Unfortunately, I don't. Um, we have several members in Jut Lounge who have dietary restrictions or have kids with dietary restrictions. Um, one of them is even thinking of starting a, uh, vegan and vegetarian, and Celiac travel blog. Um, but for right now, unfortunately, that's not in our wheelhouse. With Jut, in Jut Lounge, shameless plug for our coaching program, we do tend to talk about everything under the sun. Um, but for the most part, as, as demonstrated in the book, I really recommend sticking to that. You know, go where the deals are. There's almost always somewhere you can find in the areas that you're looking for. And, you know, flights first, find that cheap flight so that you save more of your budget for, for, you know, better restaurants, more accommodating restaurants. I'm married to someone with Celiac. We spend a lot more on dining than the average bear. So, I do understand that. But that just means we put more planning into the places we go. Um, but like I said, when you go where the deals are, you save the money on the airfare, you can spend it on other things like lodging, excursions, activities, better dining, etc.
Joel, why is AMX preferable to Chase? Is it the transfer partners? So, I wouldn't say one is better than the other. That, what our goal, the goal of this book is to keep things as simple as possible. I toyed around with the points game for decades. Um, I've had, I've traveled for free since early 2000s when I had a real estate business and was spending a lot of money. Um, but what I found is there are four families of flexible points, and flexible points are where the value is. And what I mean by flexible points is you can take those Chase points or AMX points or Capital One or City points and spend them with 10 or 20 or 30 or 40 airlines and hotels. Once you start learning transfer partners and having flexibility, gives you exponentially more power to find deals when you want to go, find better deals on points because you get to be a free agent. And, um, I've done webinars in the past, I even talk about it in the book, where, you know, Chase and AMX are just playing number one and two. City is still an okay card, but it's, it's third, it's not as good as the Chase AMX combo. More earning opportunities to earn more points. And that's counting City, or that's counting Capital One's 2x points. Um, they just have a bigger footprint. They have more transfer partners, so more opportunities to redeem those points for max dollars, more opportunities to earn max dollars with every dollar you, or max points with every dollar you spend. Um, and I wouldn't say it's preferable. I actually recommend that you get Chase first, you master it. Just like, you know, you learn to ride a bike with training wheels. Chase is, is a lot simpler to use, a lot easier to get to learn the value of points, how to calculate points, um, how to get more than just two or three cents, but five or six or seven cents out of those Chase points. Once you've mastered that, once you're putting 10 cents of every dollar that you spend with Chase back in your pocket towards free flights or free hotels, then it's time to graduate to AMX. So many people rush that process and forget some very important foundational principles. Um, so hopefully that answered your question, Joel. Nice name. And, uh, feel free to chime in again if not.
Lesean, prior to joining Jut, I collected quite a bit of Capital One points. What's your recommendation for best use? So, here's the thing, the same principles apply. You want to focus on whatever earning multipliers you can. Capital One does not have Rakuten. They don't have, um, nearly as many, um, shopping portals or, or multi-earning multiplier opportunities. But it's still a great card. They do have, they do still have a lot of transfer partners. They're just all international travel partners that don't have nearly as large a footprint here in the US. So, they're a lot harder to work with. But the same principles apply. Whenever you redeem them, go to, there's a link in the book, or you can just write this down: jut.com/calculator. And go and calculate the value. Just make sure to never, ever, ever redeem your very valuable Capital One points for less than two cents a piece. It's going to be a little harder to find that value, but it is out there. So, don't say, oh, Joel says, you know, don't use Capital One points. Don't just cash them out for statement credits. They can still be very valuable. You're just going to have to be more patient because there aren't as many opportunities for huge value. But there is good value out there, don't get me wrong. There. Um, and, and as far as best use airlines, the reason I'm here in this VRBO, I do not recommend using points for VRBOs. But we have friends who don't mess with this points thing, and we kind of bartered with them. We flew them out because airline use of points for airlines is the highest and best use. Can almost always get better value out of flights than hotels. So, we flew them out, eliminating the most expensive part of a trip. They bought the, uh, the two villas. We, we stayed at a castle over, um, near Cinera, Chinatera, and we're staying here in Tuscany. All, you know, paid for. So, we paid for their flights with points. Points are a currency, they're not free. Um, you know, those are flights we could get for free that we cashed out for them, and they, uh, bought this, paid for this villa with cash. Great win-win. We both got a better deal out of it.
Um, okay, thanks for clarifying, Marcy. Hopefully, my answer clarified that. What do, what do you do when your AMX doesn't have my name exactly as in my airline accounts? I have a long name on my credit cards. It needs to be shortened. How to transfer then? I would call. I'd call your airline before you need to do that transfer and see about getting that corrected and do it in advance. Before you need to do that transfer, the last thing you want is to have those points get hung up because your name doesn't match the name on your credit card. So, I would go ahead and rectify that. Or, um, you know, if your spouse or travel partner has, has an account, have them do it. But if not, you have no other choice but to, you know, try to clean that up before you need to do it.
How easy would it get to be to get to Norway from Madrid? Man, it, it's a piece of cake. Uh, uh, I, you know, so there are two types of positioning flights. I like to call those Hail Mary plays. Positioning flights are Hail Mary plays you do when you can't get the optimal flights from your home airport. And the front-end Hail Mary play, I like to call a flea flicker. That's when you get yourself to a different airport in the US and then fly to your destination in Europe. A back-end Hail Mary play, and forgive me, I'm going to put myself on mute real quick and blow it out. Okay. Um, and a back-end positioning flight is when you get yourself from hopefully your home airport to Europe, and then you bounce around in Europe. Man, I tell you, that is, with both Europe and Asia, that is so preferable. Because, I mean, our flight, we got ourselves to London direct from Denver, which is a huge deal. $5.60, United Polaris lie-flat seat. It was great. And then we flew from London to Madrid for like $40. It was coach, but yeah, $40 to just fly from London to Madrid. So, and, and that's pretty much the case for all over Europe. Same rules apply. The more specific you are on dates, the more you'll likely have to pay. But the more flexible you are, the better deal you'll get. And they, they have discount carriers here just like we do in the US. Um, and for me personally, it, our, our family rule is, if it's over three or four hours, we don't have any problem flying coach. Some people are pickier, they're, you know, 6'2", 6'5", etc. They might have higher standards. But most of our clients in, in our coaching program, you know, we have no problem just bouncing around in a, in a cheap airline for a two or three-hour flight. We save our points. We save our, our fancy redemptions for those six, eight, 12, 18-hour flights. Um, and let me tell you, there's, once you do that, you just, you never go back.
Ah, let's see. What's the minimum bonus points I should be looking for when signing up for AMX or CSP cards? So, a lot of people try to time this just right. I'm a big believer that this is a marathon, not a sprint. And just like timing the stock market, it's impossible. One of our friends here is a stock broker, and he's like, if you try to talk to me about timing the stock market, I'm not your guy. This is a slow and steady thing. And, and the points game is very much the same. So, so, um, the best time is as soon as possible. If you don't have a Chase card in your wallet, you should get one as soon as possible. I don't say that so I can get a referral link. I don't care if you go to jut.com/cards, which would be nice because we get a referral, or just go straight to Chase. What I do care about is that you start earning those points as soon as possible. Because just like a snowball rolling down a hill, the sooner you get that momentum going, the bigger and more effective that is when it gets to the bottom of the hill. So many people wait and wait and wait for maybe more points down the road, and in the meantime, they're earning worthless points with their BFA card or their Amazon card or their Costco card or their Discover card, or any of dozens of other cards that aren't nearly as powerful. So, my philosophy is, start earning the points, start learning to earn more of them, start learning to redeem them more effectively. I had a friend who came out to the conference just last month, and a couple years ago, I told him exactly that. I said, look, I don't just stop putting money on your Costco gas card. Go and get your, you know, you have a business, you spend a lot of money, go and get yourself a Chase card and just start earning the points. He got a Chase card for their personal use, he got a Chase business card for their business. And by the time he got to the conference, he's got 1.2 million points, which is enough for plenty of roundtrip business class flights to Europe, which is what they want to do for their family before their kids go off to college. So, just start earning the points. Um, and then figure out how to use them later. Use that calculator, make sure not to waste them for less than two cents a piece, and you'll be fine.
Carol says, how do you feel about joining the Dollar Flight Club for more flight deals? Although services are great, they're just doing what rule one teaches you to do. They all have their different ways of going at it. I've subscribed to them all, Dollar Flight Club, Jack's Flight Club, Scott's, which used to be Scott's Cheap Flights, now Going.com, Pomelo Travel. There are half a dozen more. We used to have a service, we still do, it's just for our coaching clients. And I believe firmly in it. Why? Because someone else is doing that looking for you, and they just send you the cream of the crop every day, every other day, couple times a week, whatever. My philosophy on that though is, by the time, I mean, if you subscribe to all of those services, by the time you open all of those emails, you could have gone to Google Flights and used their explore feature or Kayak Explore and found those deals yourself. The key is the consistency. You have to look every day because we're looking for the best 1% of deals out there. There are tens of thousands of flights a day. All you need is one or two a year to change how you travel forever. And best way to do that, look every day for cash deals, for points deals, schedule vacations around those. 10 times easier than traveling the traditional way. So, like I said, Dollar Flight Club, Going, all of those guys, they're great services. The key is making sure to use what you pay for and open those emails every day, or read the point hedging 101 section of our book. Do the challenge on page 19 of the book, Point Hedging 101 Challenge, and you can win a $100 savings card just for booking a flight that passes that test. Um, and it doesn't matter if you do it through Google Flights, Scott's Cheap Flights, Going, whatever.
Let's see. Uh, Laura says, what site did you use to get the Italian Italian Villa? I don't know. Our friends were, our friends have very, very picky tastes and they, um, you know, they, a couple of them, uh, chose it. Um, and when I looked it up to, to just gather some pictures, I think it was on booking.com, but I was pretty sure it was VRBO. But you can look it up. They have their own, um, Instagram page. You can just Google Erini and it's, uh, in Pienza, outside of Pienza, in the Tuscan Village in Italy. Um, Midway down the boot of Italy. Let's see.
Should I cancel my CSP if I now have the CSR? Uh, so it's, if you have both, you're grandfathered in. Um, this is a little bit more of an advanced question, which I can't really dive into. But the, the short and dirty answer would be, don't cancel them. That's two different cards that can collect referral points. Um, your job is to make sure to rationalize that annual fee. Both cards have credits that offset that annual fee. Just go to their, to chase.com, look up those cards, look up the benefits that come with those cards. And, um, I say keep them. Um, if you really don't like one of those annual fees, you could downgrade one of them to a Chase Freedom card. That's part of something we call the Chase Trifecta, a little bit more of an intermediate advanced strategy. But, um, there is a Chase Freedom. I'm, I'm not going to say which one because I don't know off the top of my head. Um, but there is a Chase Freedom card that earns 1.5x on every dollar you spend. So, you make that your everyday card. It earns 50% more points. Um, and so I would, either way, I would not cancel that card. I would either keep it if you have lots of friends that say, hey, how do you travel so much? You could refer them to one of those cards. Um, or, uh, downgrade it to a Freedom card that earns more points. Um, and we cover it a little bit in our book. It's a, it's, it's kind of not part of that 80% that I prefer people focus on, so we don't go into too much detail. But you could Google it. Google the Chase Trifecta, the AMX Trifecta, and see if one of those would be worth adding to your arsenal. The important thing, like I said, along with my Euros, one Chase card, one AMX card, got to have one of each. Don't, don't rush it. Master the Chase first, then move on to AMX.
Hey, look, Julie, you, you would have your first followers if you start that blog. Um, Saison, hello. I, this looks like a follow-up question, but I didn't see your initial one. Um, you're replacing your roof. I'm going to guess that the earlier question had to do with, you know, should we get, uh, a new card because of this big expense coming up? Um, two things. One, when you have the Jut philosophy, you're always kind of focusing on long-term goals. Just earn points every day. Like our coach Kira, our earning multiplier expert, says, it's about slow and steady turtle points, just a little bit every day. Think about that card when you swipe at the grocery store, at the gas station, whether you can, you know, get more points through Rakuten or through Rocket Miles. There are all sorts of ways to do that. But sometimes when you got a big expense coming up, and if you're comfortable getting another card, sure, go ahead and get one for a signup bonus. But I always recommend getting one that is in the book that will earn Ultimate or Membership Rewards. That way, they go into a nice tidy pile of points that you can use wherever you want. Don't go stretching yourself thin and get a Capital One card or BFA card because it's got a lot of points or whatever. Keep them in the Chase and AMX's family. There is nothing more powerful than just having two piles of points that you're constantly building, than spreading yourself too thin and having three or four different programs to have to keep track of. The only other thing I will say is sometimes when you have contractors, one thing you want to do first is negotiate with them up front. Just like you tell all contractors, painters, contractors, builders, whatever, mechanics, you tell them all, hey, we're, we're seeking bids for this job, and part of that bidding process is whether or not you take credit card. So, please factor that into your bid. And that just plants a little subconscious seed that makes sure they know that they have to be really competitive. And sometimes, you know, if you say that after the fact, they'll tack on 3% to your bill. If you say it before, they might just knock it off because they want that job.
Let's see. Angela, just signed up today. Welcome. Um, if you got the digital download, you should have had instructions on how to do that right away. The book, the softcover shows up in four to six days, the hardcover takes eight to 10, but you can read the digital download while you're waiting. Uh, so thanks for your purchase.
I'm new here, just signed up today. I've been reading heaps of information. Should I set up my complimentary call prior to finishing part one? Thanks in advance. Yeah, we do recommend at least, like in the book, I actually recommend just kind of taking a quick pass through the book, like literally skimming it for headlines and pictures. The goal of this is to, so that you actually get the motivation. Every single picture in this book is from a client or myself or one of our coaches. Um, there are heaps of testimonials, case studies from people who have applied these strategies. And step number one is to just breeze through the book and kind of see that, yes, it is worth the trouble. Um, you know, most of the people buying this book would never pay five or $10,000 a seat for business or first class, and we don't either. We pay $50 or $100 or $5 for business and first class. And we use points that we earn passively. So, my recommendation is, at the very least, get at least skim through the book. Um, and then, if you feel like you have a good grasp of it, great. Set up a call. We can help you, you know, help you hone in on what you should focus on for your personal goals. If, um, if not, if it feels really complicated, maybe slow down, read through it a little more thoroughly, and set up a call later. Our job, the job of this book, this is my resume, this is my company's resume, and all we're doing is saying, look, this book alone will save you $5 to $20,000 in travel per year. Now, some people think, how's that possible? That's possible by flying bigger and better and more lavishly than you normally do. And, you know, when you're flying first class in seats that cost five or six grand per person, when you're staying in luxury hotels that cost a thousand bucks a night, that adds up. And the book shows you how to do that. Once you have, like, done that a couple times and saved a hundred or, or, you know, $500 or a thousand or a couple grand, hiring us for our coaching program is just like hiring a personal trainer. You can totally keep applying this book on your own, just like you can go to the gym and lift weights on your own, or you can hire a personal trainer who's in better shape, who's been around the block a few times, and will get you faster progress. That's all it is. And if you want help figuring out if, if our personal trainers or our coaches can help, set up a call. There are, there are links in the book. If not, keep applying the stuff in the book.
Uh, so San, San, yes, so hopefully my earlier question did answer that. Just the key is negotiate up front. Tell, tell them you're seeking bids and hopefully that would, that will get them, at least one of them, and all you need is one to wave that fee.
Let's see. Just a few more questions, but I don't think I want to, uh, rush it. I'm going to put you on mute and blow my nose one more time. Glad I did that one off camera.
Let's see. Uh, Joel says, I have the Chase Sapphire Reserve, 200k points. I like this card for 150 redemption. No, no, no. But Jay, go made this obsolete. Good thinking about switching to Preferred to get signup bonus. Should I? Again, signup bonuses are not the foundation of the Jut Way of Travel. So, um, you know, what I always like to say is, you know, are you, do you have a specific need in mind? If not, just focus on slow and steady. You'll be a lot better off. Now that you have 200k points, go and do the exercise in page 50 of the book. Point Hedging 201 Challenge. So, instead of getting three grand for your points, this will show you how to, you know, so three grand, you're adding 50% to 200,000 points. 200,000 points by themselves at a penny a piece, or with two grand, getting three grand is 50%. This exercise alone will show you how to double that value, if not quintuple it. And it's so easy, it's not even funny. So many people skip this part of the book. They think, oh yeah, I got that. But there is a lot to this book, to this exercise. So much that I added a page to the printed book that isn't, that wasn't in the digital copy for our first 10,000 readers, and it stresses the importance of doing that exercise. So, while you're sitting on 200k points, don't settle for three grand. You should be aiming for getting four, six, 10 grand out of those 200,000 points. And the exercise on page 50 of the book, assuming you read up to that section, will show you how to do that. Um, so yeah, I would say your primary focus, 200,000 points, that's a, that's a lot of points. Don't rush the, the Preferred. You would have to downgrade, you'd have to wait, it's an advanced move. Don't do that. Um, learn to use that CSR and get all the benefits you can out of it. And that's covered in the Point Hedging 2011 section of the book.
Let's see. Robin, hi Robin. Uh, Robin has a Chase Freedom that earns 1.5x on everyday and AMX Blue earning 2x. Is it better to get the AMX for 2x? I have a few big expenses coming up and not sure which to use. So, this is a personal choice. I make the same choice every time. I also, I don't, it's not required, but I also have an AMX Gold card. I'm an advanced user. I'm allowed to do a, you know, bend a few rules that are in the book. Um, and I have a Gold card and I could earn 4x on dining for that. And I have my Sapphire Reserve that earns 3x for dining. In my opinion, Chase points are harder to earn than AMX points, mostly because of AMX offers and Rakuten. Those are covered in the 301 section of the book. Um, but, you know, Chase points are harder to earn. So, sometimes I choose to use my Chase card even though it gets 3x versus my AMX card that gets 4x because I can earn a lot more AMX points. So, it's a personal choice. The other reason I do that is I like my Hyatt hotels. I like luxury. My wife likes luxury when we travel. And Hyatt hotels gives us the best paying for our buck with points. Um, and so I, you know, I, I tend to try to keep a good balance. I probably have, at any given time, I probably have three times as many AMX points as I do Chase points. But really, it depends on you. If, if you like Hyatt hotels, you know, focus more on Chase. If you like luxury flights, focus more on AMX. But having that diversity gives you the, the, the idea to kind of balance it based on what points you need.
Okay, so Marcy asks, how do I get the updated book? You can get the updated book at any time. Um, the updated digital copy, you do have to buy the updated print copy. Both are on jut.com. You can just go to the book link. Um, and you can, uh, the way to do that, I'll put a link in the comments. You go to jut.com and this is, this is basically the same link that you saw on the thank you page when you booked it, when you bought the book. And you go to, and I just put it in the chat, jut.com/accountaccess. That will give you instructions on how to go and activate your account. And once you activate your account, um, you can go and download, download the most recent copy of the book. You do have to have that activation email, which you can find in the link I just gave. Once you do that, once you have activated your account, and I'm sorry, there's no way around it. If you lost that email, we can't help you. It's a $7 book. Buy again and redownload it. And then, once you activate it, you can find all of our products at jut.com/school. So, if you want the audiobook, you can add that. If you want, um, the, uh, yeah, we're adding something soon called Jut Vault, which is a whole library of old trainings, video trainings. You can add that. So, anytime, once you've activated your account, log into jut.com/school and you can see any offerings that we have.
Let's see. Uh, Lesean, thanks for thanking and thank you for the well wishes. Um, I think I'm rounding the corner. I have one last question. So, I will, I will cap this at an hour and say, throw out, you know, one or two more questions and I can answer those. If not, I will wrap up with David Taylor's question. I have 85,000 United miles. Can they be used for anything other than flights? Not really. Um, you know, there are a couple loopholes. Marriott can be used for flights, but most airlines, you're stuck with using them towards that airline's flights or their partners' flights. So, you can use your United miles to fly Air Canada, to fly Singapore Airlines, to fly any of their partners in the Star Alliance network. We cover that in Point Hedging 301 section of the book. Um, but, you know, except for some excursions, which I do not recommend using United miles for, the best use is, is flights. Um, I will go ahead and wrap up this comment with one plug for everyone, and that is that all airlines occasionally have good values for their points, but the problem is, you're stuck with that one airline. So, if they don't have a good redemption, you're either going to blow points for a low value, or you're not going to find something you're looking for. So, you know, our whole argument is that it just because you have 100,000 United miles or 300,000 Delta miles or whatever, that does not mean go and blow them. They can still be very valuable. And my philosophy is, by putting those points on the back burner, and waiting until you find that good redemption, and focusing on flexible points in the meantime, you will increase the value of, uh, those points. Um, so, you know, by diversifying, by allowing yourself to play, be a free agent with Chase Ultimate Rewards points, with AMX Membership Rewards points, you can put those United points on the back burner. And every time you book a flight, go and check if you can get a good value. But odds are, you're going to find a better deal with, uh, with your flexible points as you build those up. So, I know I gave you more than you asked for. Um, but hopefully that, that looks like that answers all the questions that came up. Thanks everyone for your patience with my mess-up on time zones. Um, I'll send a recording of this, since it does look like this successfully recorded, to make up for my tardiness. But, uh, and that's perfect timing because I hear some of our guests just got home from Florence, and I don't want them to have to be quiet in our house. So, uh, thanks everyone. Um, thanks for your purchase of the Jut Way. Um, if you ever have questions, there are links in the book. You know, the whole goal of this is to show you how to save five, 10, $20,000 on your travels. And if you want more personal help, you know, as a book buyer, we, we typically only help people who are familiar with the Jut Way of Travel. I'll pop a link in, uh, in the chat. You can book a call with us and see if our coaching program is a fit for you. It's not cheap, it's several thousand dollars. Um, but we do guarantee a minimum of $10,000 in free travel before you graduate our program. Um, so with that said, here's a link: jut.com/bookacall. Um, and this was only shared with book buyers. So, as a book buyer, you do have the right to book a call with one of our coaches. We're glad to tell you if we think it's a fit, or we, we're glad to tell you, you know, what chapter of the book might be best for you to dig into until it is a fit. Um, and, uh, thanks everyone. Have a great night.