🎉 INCREDIBLE Credit Card Bonus – 80k Bonus – Chase Sapphire Preferred

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Our “must read” on credit cards: The Pros and Cons of Credit Cards

***Note: As of 10/8/21, the Chase Sapphire Preferred Credit Card changed to 60,000 Ultimate Rewards points. You can disregard any reference to 80,000 points.***

We’re big fans of the free stuff around here. Free air? Free hotel? Free money? All of the above? Absolutely. But because of a new promotion, we’re going back to one of our old favorites, the Chase Sapphire Preferred credit card (For business owners, the Chase Ink Business Preferred is still a top choice.).

We’ve talked about the card in the past and tend to recommend it when they offer more than 50,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points to sign up. Now’s one of those times.

Oh, and be sure to read the rental card details, because they’ll also save you a fortune at McCarran, or anywhere else you rent a car.

What You Need To Know

° $800 Credit Card Bonus to Sign up
° Huge Rental Car Insurance Benefit
° Any Negatives?
° The Chase Ink Business Preferred Card
° Eligible? Business Card

Chase Sapphire Preferred: $800-$1,000 Credit Card Bonus to Sign up, Big Rewards after That

One of the things that I love about Chase is the huge rewards that they give you when you sign up for a credit card. Such is the case with the Chase Sapphire Preferred card. They’re currently running a higher-than-normal credit card bonus, offering 80,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards (UR)* points after you spend $4,000 on purchases in the first three months from account opening.

Bonus Statement Credit

This time around, Chase is upping the ante, by offering an additional $50 statement credit when you spend $50 at a grocery store.

What can all of those points get you? How about:

• $800 in cash. One UR points is worth a penny. Treat yourself and your favorite traveling companion to the Sterling Champagne Brunch at Bally’s (when it reopens, of course) and have plenty left over for the tables.
• $1,000 in travel. Hopefully, you’ll be doing some traveling soon, so if you use those points to pay for travel through the Chase travel portal, they’ll give you a 25% bonus in value.
• Exchange to an airline or hotel. You have ten airline partners and three hotel partners to choose from. In the US, the airlines include Southwest, JetBlue and United. Outside the country? British Airways, Singapore and Air France/KLM are on the list. Most points exchange 1:1.
• Use the “Southwest loophole” to your benefit. Southwest points have a cash value of about 1.6 cents each (It rarely varies more than 0.1 cents either way.). In other words, 10,000 points will buy you a ticket on a flight that costs $160. That means that 80,000 UR points will translate to over $1,200 in Southwest travel. It works the same way with JetBlue, where points are generally worth about 1.5 cents.

Huge Rental Car Insurance Benefit

If you ever rent cars, this alone is worth having the card: Primary rental car CDW/LDW (collision damage waiver) insurance. With primary coverage, if there’s an accident, Chase will handle it. You do NOT need to go through your own insurance company first or, for that matter, buy the expensive stuff through the rental car company. You can see all the details here.

Just about every type of car is covered, although there a few exceptions, such as for luxury cars. Also, the CDW only covers the vehicle itself. You’ll want to make sure to have liability coverage for injury to others.

Bonus Points on Purchases

Most purchases on the Chase Sapphire Preferred card will earn you a point per dollar spent. Some are even better, though.

• Travel and dining, though, two big-spend categories, will get you two points per dollar. That’s key for the multipliers that I mentioned above.
• Riding Lyft? That’s worth five points per dollar spent

Any Negatives?

A couple, but neither of them is a big one.

• There’s a $95 annual fee. Some companies waive the fee the first year, but the benefits are simply too strong on this card for Chase to do so.
• Double points on dining are good, not great. If you want to maximize dining points, check out another favorite card, which pays 4% cash back on all dining and entertainment.
• You must not have either a Sapphire Preferred or Sapphire Reserve at the time of application, and you must not have received a bonus on either card within the last 48 months.

LEARN MORE

Chase Sapphire Preferred
Chase Ink Business Preferred

The Chase Ink Business Preferred Card

Got a business? Or anything that might qualify as a business? The best card right now is the Chase Ink Business Preferred Card. They up the sign-up credit card bonus for you, with a promotion to earn 100,000 UR points after you spend $15,000 in the first three months. That’s $1,000 in cash or $1,250 toward travel expenses. The card also has a $95 annual fee.

Eligible? Business Card and Credit Card Bonus

Not sure if you are eligible for a business card? Take a look at this snip from our friends at Your Best Credit Cards:

Chances are, you do something that can qualify (although you should check with your accountant if you have related questions).

THREE POINTS PER DOLLAR! – Spend Bonus

Spend a lot of money? Good, because this card offers you three points per dollar for the first $150,000 in spending each year in the following categories:

• Travel
• Shipping Purchases
• Internet, Cable and Phone purchases
• Advertising purchases on social media and search engines

This card also comes with the same primary rental coverage for business trips as the Sapphire Preferred, so it’s an excellent card to use for business travel, not to mention any of the triple point categories. I have my cable and phone charged directly to my card every month.

So what are your thoughts? What have I missed about the best time to use these cards?

*“Ultimate Rewards” are the name for Chase’s proprietary points. You can exchange them for cash, gift cards, miles, travel, etc. They’re better than an airline mile, because they have more uses.