Transcription
So here's eight hacks I want to talk about. Some of these you may know, and some of these you may not know. I don't want to assume everybody knows; I want to be able to give some game to some people here.
The first one is the no inquiry hack. If you are a personal card member of American Express, you can apply for every single credit card that you see on the personal and on the business side with no inquiry whatsoever. I'll say that again: if you have an American Express personal card, you can apply for another personal card or another business card without ever having an inquiry. So you can apply as much as you want. Go at it! Try to get the cards that you want without having to worry about your credit being pulled. It's beautiful.
Now, the flip side of that is if you're a business card holder and you want to get a personal card, it's going to be a hard pull. Business going to personal is a hard pull; personal going to business is no hard pull. Okay, but once you're a personal card member, the no inquiry hack works.
The 14 card hack we kind of talked about already. You can have up to 14 cards with American Express. Most people don't know that; some people even have more because they were grandfathered in before this actual data point was released. So before, you could even have more, but 14 cards is your limit: 10 charge cards. What is a charge card? A Plum, a Gold, a Platinum, a Green—those are charge cards. Let's say it again: a Green, a Gold, a Platinum, a Plum. Those are charge cards; everything else is credit cards.
The employee card hack: you can get employee cards, and they usually have bonuses as well. That's another play with manufactured spending—run it all up! You can get 10 employee cards, guys. An employee card does not count as one of your 10. It's an employee card; it's a subcard. I think you can have up to 99 employee cards per card. I'd have to double-check, but you can actually have a lot of employee cards, and then you can set limits and things like that. So yeah, that's another hack. If you have a business and you're not utilizing this, you should.
The authorized user hack: being an authorized user on an American Express card allows you to be in their ecosystem. That's basically what it is. That way, maybe you get marketed to and are able to get in through the back door in that sense of a lower credit score sometimes, just because you've had history with American Express.
Now, if you get added on as an authorized user, you're not going to get the credit history of that account. I'll say that again: if you're an authorized user, you're not going to get the credit history of that account. But what you will get is that you will be in their ecosystem, so they can market to you. When you're in their ecosystem and they have data points on you and they use AI on you, now you have a good chance of getting in or not getting in, depending on how you look at it and how you treat the account. If the person that you're on the account with is not responsible, it's going to hurt you. If they're responsible, it's going to help you.
The AMEX get out of jail hack: I did that. Yeah, I'm good. You know, I was bucketed. I'm going to tell you my story in a minute, but I had my card bucketed to $44,000, and it finally went out of jail. Literally, I went to AMEX jail back in September or October of 2020, and I finally got out of jail last month. What I mean by that was I had my bucket even removed from my business gold card. I got a random email because I was using it; it got removed.
So the way that you get out of a bucketed card is by using that card day in and day out. Eventually, something triggers something within their algorithm that says, "No more bucketed; you're released; you're out of jail." So that's one of them. The other thing to get out of American Express jail, if you are in bad standing with them, is to do a lot of spending with them. If you're not in good standing with them, you need to be getting back in using the second chance hack with the Optima card.
Some people say the Optima is not around; it's still around. The Optima card is a second chance card. So if you've ever done American Express wrong and you need a second chance, a second start, you have a write-off account, you call them up and say, "I owe you money, and I am willing to pay the balance that I owe you in full, and I want a second chance with American Express." They have a department; you have to call around; you have to talk around, but they have a department where you can get a second chance with American Express. But you are going to have to pay the balance that you owe them in full, and yes, they know what that balance is. This is not a case where you settle or try to do a settlement. There's no settling with American Express; it's their way or the highway. You get onto their train, or you don't get on the train.
The Charles Schwab hack: we talked about that, where you're siphoning your MR points to your brokerage account, then you're buying stocks with that money in your brokerage account, and then you're moving that money from there. Well, you're not moving that money; you can sell if you want; that's a taxable event. But you can also just leverage that money, so you don't have to sell your position, right? You can just use that portfolio to acquire a line of credit, which that line of credit could acquire a home or anything. If you have a brokerage account that's big enough, guys, some of you may even have that right now. Some of you may have $300,000 in there; you can get a line of credit off that. You don't have to sell it. Some of you think you have to sell your account to get the money out. No, you can leverage that asset.
That's an asset. We leverage credit to acquire assets to build wealth. We're leveraging the American Express Charles Schwab card to siphon our points to acquire assets, and then we leverage that asset to get more credit to build more wealth. That's how credit works; it's a leverage game. But you don't get credit just to say, "I got this; I got that." You have to actually have a purpose for that credit.
Another thing is if you're in the military, you should not be paying military fees on the credit cards. Okay, so make sure that you call them up and say, "Hey, I'm part of the military; I want this annual fee waived." Now, the Platinum is really a good deal for you because you're not paying the annual fee on it, so make sure you guys check on that.
So what are the 177 things you should never do with AMEX? Now we're getting into the "no-nos." Do not credit card churn with American Express. What is credit card churning? It's getting the points, canceling the card, getting the card, canceling it again. American Express watches this like a hawk. Because this was the game back in the day—it's credit card turning. It's not so much big anymore, but here's the deal: if I open up a Platinum card and I close my Platinum card within a year, I lose my points that are attached to that Platinum card that came with it. So if I had 150,000 bonus points with American Express, and I cancel that card within a year, I lose that bonus. They take it; they claw it back; they take the points back.
So do not cancel the card in the first year. You look like a churner, and they will come after you. They may even tag you in their system where the rat team is watching you, or the almighty algorithm is watching you. The last thing you want is American Express Skynet watching you. Okay, so don't churn the credit cards; it's not worth it.
Also, do not get a credit card with American Express and then try to wipe the inquiry because there is no inquiry. Okay, so don't try to do that because if you're an American Express holder, you're not going to get an inquiry for this. Do not cancel your AMEX card until you first move your MR points as well. I don't feel comfortable ever canceling an AMEX card without moving my MR points. Okay? I just don't. I've seen horror stories happen, and I'm just not going to be that guy that does that. So make sure that before you cancel your AMEX card, you move the points.
Do not put high spend on American Express right away. Okay? Take it slow, just like dating. Take it slow; don't rush in. You know, don't say, "I'm going to go buy a Rolex; I'm going to go buy a diamond ring; I'm going to go put this down on a car." Don't do that. That's the quickest way to trigger that algorithm to have them look because you will be a credit risk, which will trigger a manual review, which will trigger the rat team to watch you. This rat team is real; I'm going to be making a video about it for the YouTube channel.
Okay, but warm up the card one to six months. Warm it up; put $1,000 on it the first month, put $2,000 or $3,000 on it the second month, $5,000 to $7,000 on it. Warm it up; use the card. Actually use the card. If you're not using the card and you're just randomly spending, you're a red flag. So don't do this up-and-down stuff. You know, use the card; make it steady. Okay? Work it.
Do not buy high-risk items in high amounts: jewelry, car down payments, things like that. You know why? Learn from me. That's how I got into AMEX jail. Okay? I got excited, guys. I had a $30,000 Blue Business Plus card. This was my second business card; the first one was a Business Gold. Then I was like, "Huh, I can get a Business Blue Plus card too; I'll get that." They gave me a $30,000 limit, so I had a $30,000 limit on that card, and then I had an unlimited limit on the Business Gold card. Guess what I did? I bought a brand new Honda Civic; I put $5,000 on the card, and then I also bought an expensive piece of jewelry for somebody. Next thing you know, I wake up to an email: "Your Blue Business Plus is under further review." The next day, same thing with the Business Gold card. I call them; I send them all my documents about how much money I'm making. The next day, the Blue Business Plus card goes from $30,000 to like $2,000 or $4,000. Horrible! I was planning on using that money. Okay? I was planning on using that money—$30,000 to $2,000 to $4,000.
This is a 0% $30,000 card. I'll say it again: $30,000 at 0%. And it gets moved down to $2,000 to $4,000. That's a big drop. Okay? And then they bucket my Business Gold card all the way down to $4,000. Okay? I just got out of jail not too long ago for this right here. So when I tell you to warm it up, I know firsthand. I had the hardest experience with American Express for the longest. Take it slow; it's not a rush.
Let's see here. Do not manufacture on these cards unless it's organic spend. If you don't know how to do this, don't do it because American Express, Navy Federal, and Chase are another one—they can see third-party spend. And you think that you can go buy gift cards with it? You're wrong. Okay? You will have a manual review. When you have a manual review, they can bucket you, they can reduce your lines, or they can blacklist you. If you're ever blacklisted from American Express, you can never get back in. Is it worth it? Is it short-term worth it? No, don't do this unless there's organic spend on there. Okay? That's all I'm going to say. They have the ability, like I said, to see what you're spending at any time. Don't do this at all.
Do not invoice yourself with your merchant account and pay with your own AMEX card. Oh my God, this is the quickest way to get your card shut down, card blacklisted, card bucketed, and your merchant account shut down. You do not want to play around with your merchant account. We're going to do trainings on that. The moment your digital footprint gets messed up with a merchant account, you are not in good shape at all. Okay? So you do not want to play around with that. Do not invoice yourself and pay with AMEX.
Do not also do it to some person all the time because they catch on to that. Okay? If somebody invoices you, also make sure that they have a seasoned merchant account. Some merchant accounts aren't verified, so it looks at risk, and that can also trigger a manual review. So make sure that who you're spending your money with on American Express is seasoned. Okay? Because if American Express doesn't like the merchant account, they may call the purchase into question and look into things, and then they have their rat team that's sophisticated with their AI and their algorithms, and they'll go to work. So be very careful. If you don't know somebody, don't pay with this type of card.
Now, you might be like, "Well, I want buyer protection." Okay, cool, but just know that it could trigger it. Okay? Just know that. Do not screw up your relationship with AMEX. They barely give second chances. You said they do; they barely do. Okay? And if you do, you're one of the few. Okay? They hold grudges; they are the worst grudge holders. Okay? So they don't believe in second chances that much. So if you do want a second chance, you need to call them up and say, "I want to pay in full, but before I pay in, I want to promise in writing that I can literally get into this second chance system that you guys have, this Optima card, whatever it is, because I want to have a relationship with you guys again." Okay? And you're going to be paying what you owe them plus interest, whatever that is. So just be aware of that.
Okay? So don't screw that relationship up. Do not pay late. My goodness, the biggest way to screw up your credit is to pay late. You'll suffer for seven years for that. The other thing is to screw up your utilization. Now, utilization you can fix in a month, right? So you max out a credit card, and your score drops all the way down. Okay? Pay it all the way off, pay it all the way down—boom, right back up. So that's not a problem. But if you're late one time, you're dealing with that late for seven years. So just be smart, guys. Put your stuff on autopay. It takes one bad move, one careless mistake when life is busy, to make you suffer for seven years for something where you don't get approved for the cards you want, for the homes you want, for whatever it is. You'll be suffering for that for seven years.
Now, some of y'all don't have seven years; some of you guys are going to be dead in seven years. You guys are getting old. Okay? But some of y'all young people, you know, that's still going to be an eternity for you. You know, because if you're 23, you're not going to be able to do it until you're in your 30s. So get out of that late fee. So guys, just don't pay late, period. And on top of that, it's massive fees with American Express, and it's horrible data points for you internally.