Every month, the Frequent Miler team takes your questions live on YouTube.
We normally hold Ask Us Anything at 9pm on the first Wednesday of the month. However, due to a couple of team members not being available on April 1, we rescheduled it for the following week. That means that our next Ask Us Anything session will therefore be live at 9pm Eastern Time on Wednesday, April 8.
And of course, the best way to make sure you don’t miss these live episodes is to subscribe to our YouTube channel here and click the bell icon next to the “subscribe” button to enable notifications from our channel.
You can watch the most recent Ask Us Anything video below!
Want to catch up on past Ask Us Anything recordings? Click here.
More info
Join us once a month on our Frequent Miler YouTube channel. We’ll be there to chat, answer questions, and joke around. See you there!
- When: the first Wednesday of every month at 9pm Eastern Time, but as a one off it’s the second Wednesday in April, so April 8.
- Where: Our Frequent Miler YouTube channel. Subscribe now, here.
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you all have an older ask us anything above, not the latest….the youtube link works to the most current
Question for the 4/8 Ask Us Anything: Any update on when in May that the Hyatt award chart is changing?
May 7th
I feel like it’s been a little bit since we’ve seen a “What’s in your wallet” question/article so “What’s in your wallet”?
What’s everyone’s favorite airline or hotel program for availability and value? Final value of an award booking, in my opinion, should take into account time spent researching and booking.
With all the recent and pending devaluations, what hotel reward program, if any, would you recommend for someone who generally only stays in hotels for a week or two each year?
Question to all. Any prediction that BOA can transfer points to Alaska?
Question for Nick – in the recent podcast episode where your friend needed to spend 115k what cards/spend/welcome bonuses etc did he/she end up going with and why?
Umm, did you guys see that some guy named Eddy created a competitor site to your MaxFHR.com… called betterFHR.com? DoC had linked to it recently. It’s a little wonky, and no paywall. Interesting…
https://www.doctorofcredit.com/recap-betterfhr-tool-aer-lingus-offer-citigroup-dismisses-us-regional-bank-acquisition-rumor-more/
Yep, they commented a couple of times on here about it. I took a quick look and saw that it was listing ~$150 rates for the Park Hyatt New York, so I immediately jumped on to Amex Travel to check that out, only to discover rates were ~$1,800 per night or something like that.
It might be that that’s a one-off glitch, but I haven’t had time to do a deeper dive. Seeing that glaring error straight off the bat though meant I haven’t prioritized it.
If it does display results correctly and without a paywall for date searches, it would be a great tool to use.
I respect what you (FM) and Eddy are trying to do, regardless. It seems he’s still basically beta-testing, making course corrections. Either way, feels like a little healthy competition. Wish Amex simply made tracking FHR properties easier. Bah!
Hi Stephen, I have a question for you. Now that you and Shae have moved back to the UK, is there anything you miss about the United States or wish you had done/seen before you moved? Thank you.
Oh man, how much time do you have?! There’s so much of the US we didn’t get to see during our 50 state road trip, plus loads of places we’d love to return to. In CA, we never made it to Yosemite. We missed out on Death Valley, never got to Taos, NM despite spending two months or so in New Mexico across a few different visits.
As for stuff I miss, TBH there’s not a ton, but that’s not to say I didn’t like living there. Thanks to VPNs, we can still watch US shows and use streaming services too. We’ve stocked up on various products whenever we’ve been back in the US.
It’s also hard to assess things based on how different our life is now compared to how it was on the road trip. Life here feels very easy now, but I’m not convinced that’s due to living in the UK as such, but more simply because we’re not moving home every single week anymore. I think if we’d settled down in the US after our road trip that I’d probably feel similarly.
We do miss having so much daylight though during the winter, as well as nice weather. During the summer we get really long days as we’re in the north of England, but it’s therefore not as great in the winter.
Actually, something else I miss is how much easier it is to manufacture spend in the US versus trying to do that kind of thing from over here.
Thanks for the quick response, I thought I would also make a good conversation for your ask us anything live. I know exactly how you feel. I have lived in California and the United States for my entire 36 years, and there’s still a ton of stuff I have not yet seen. I don’t think it’s possible to see everything but it’s fun to try 🙂
Could you do a 50 State road trip but European country version or maybe just UK version?
Shae and I had talked about doing a European road trip, or a UK road trip to visit all 48 counties, perhaps doing one per week over the course of a year.
That’s not likely going to happen anytime soon though. We’re both enjoying not moving around constantly now, plus our pup is getting older (she’s 13 this year) and she’s lost nearly all her sight, so full-time travel would be much harder on her now. She’s small (only 10 lbs), so we’re hoping she’ll live to 18-20, so I can’t imagine we’ll do any full-time travel again before she’s no longer with us. To be honest, I’m not convinced I’d be ready for full-time travel myself before then!
Gotcha, sorry to hear that Truffle’s eyesight is not as good as it used to be, hopefully she is enjoying the slower pace of life nowadays 🙂
A question for this month’s Ask Us Anything: What’s the most obscure/lesser-known credit card you use? For example, I use the Venmo credit card for utilities and bills to get 3x on my top-spend category. What are some fun, unusual cards you all use that don’t get talked about much?
It is often suggested to book a flight closest to what I want for points and destination, watch for better deals and rebook. Could you describe how to do the rebooking without losing points or paying fees? Some airlines charge fees if you cancel. I don’t think trip insurance applies in this situation
Any speculation/news on additional travel partners for Wells Fargo? I’m trying to justify holding onto the card for another year, but having trouble doing so.
Do you report profits earned from buying groups in your schedule-C? What CPP value do you choose for profits earned in points/miles?
Question for this months ask us anything. I watched all the frequent milers family videos but im curious about Nick’s strategy/how he handles this when he travels with his kids 1) Do you always try to find business class since you have 4 people or do you mix n match? 2) How do you book hotel rooms since most rooms state only 2 occupancy
I have a question for Stephen and Carrie. Now that I am retired my wife and I are interested in finding rentals for several weeks at a time. I am pretty good at finding good properties on Airbnb and VRBO for several days but have less experience with navigating longer term rentals. Do you have any tips on how to find good locations and get good deals?
Are your stays in the US or overseas? If they’re in the US, on Airbnb check pricing for stays of 31+ days. Many states don’t charge tax for stays of a month or more (see this post for more details). With hotels, you usually have to proactively ask for a refund of the tax. With Airbnb though, they seem to automatically remove the tax when booking.
Many Airbnb hosts also offer a substantial discount for month-long bookings. It could also be worth reaching out to the host before booking if you find a property that you’re particularly interested in. Explain that you’re interested in a long term stay and ask if they’d be willing to offer a larger discount for that kind of booking.
When doing a search on Airbnb, make sure you use the filter options to pick anything that’s a must-have for a longer stay: Wi-Fi, a kitchen, free parking, x number of bedrooms/bathrooms, washer/dryer, etc. That’ll help narrow down the properties, then use the price slider to whittle the list down even further.
I’ve never made a booking through Vrbo, so I can’t really offer many recommendations on that front.
With regards to good locations, do you mean in general because you’re happy to visit anywhere in the world, or finding a good location in any given city? If the former, I think Airbnb lets you search by country or even continent. If the latter, try searching online for the best neighborhoods to stay in a particular city. You could also take a look at Google Maps and check the hotel options in certain neighborhoods. If you have a Hyatt Regency, Crowne Plaza, Renaissance, etc., you’re probably looking at a business district. If you see an area with brands that are predominantly ones like Days Inn, Red Roof, Quality Inn, Super 8, etc., it might mean it’s a part of town you might not want to walk around in late at night.
Oh thanks. Those are good tips.
Most of our longer trips are international. I usually spend quite a bit of time using Google Street View and the like to find good areas. I hadn’t thought of looking at where hotels are, like you suggest. It makes sense and also explains one reason I prefer Airbnb over hotels for longer stays, which is that hotels (and especially chain hotels) are rarely in neighborhoods where I want to stay for any length of time.
I also only tend to book properties that have had numerous reviews and are rated at least 4.4/5. Read the reviews too as that can help give a sense as to whether it’s a dodgy neighborhood.
Thanks! Actually I have a secret weapon there. I send the link to my wife and she is great at sniffing out the little complaints and inconsistencies in the reviews that I miss.
Perfect!