Sapphire Preferred + Reserve possible via upgrade

Miles to Memories has reported some data points indicating that it is possible for one person to hold both the Chase Sapphire Preferred and Chase Sapphire Reserve card at the same time. I don’t think most people would be interested in having both at the same time, but perhaps some will find it interesting to know that it is indeed possible.

Of course, you will not be approved for a new Sapphire product (either the Preferred or Reserve) if you currently have one of those two cards or if you have received a welcome bonus on either card in the past 48 months.

The way to get both cards would be by having one of them (either the CSP or CSR) and upgrading another card (such as a Chase Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, or Slate card) to a second Sapphire product.

Until reading Mark’s post at Miles to Memories, I honestly hadn’t considered whether or not this would be possible since it wouldn’t make sense for most people to be interested in normal times since the cards share the same bonus categories — there would be no reason to pay the $95 annual fee on the Sapphire Preferred since bonus categories all overlap with the CSR. The only reason I can think of to have both cards in a normal environment would be to pick up referral bonuses. I actually wasn’t as surprised as others to hear that a second Sapphire product is possible given Chase’s liberal downgrade rules.

However, given the current situation, there are a few reasons why Mark’s find here could be interesting and valuable: the first (very small reason here) is that it would be possible to earn a few thousand extra points in grocery store bonuses (for May and June 2020 only) if you were maxing out the cap on both cards. A second (and likely more widely applicable) reason as to why you might want to do this is if you have a Chase Sapphire Preferred that you opened within the past 12 months but you would like to cash out Ultimate Rewards points at 1.5c per point. Chase won’t let you product change to a card with a higher annual fee within the first year, so you wouldn’t be able to upgrade the Sapphire Preferred to a Reserve. If you had a Freedom, Freedom Unlimited, or Slate card with the minimum credit limit of $10K (or if you could reallocate credit to put that together), you could upgrade to a Sapphire Reserve to use points at full value against grocery, home improvement, or dining purchases for the next few months. Don’t sleep on that option — I wrote this morning about why that’s something that many of us should be considering.

I still suspect that this situation of upgrading to a second Sapphire product is likely pretty niche, but it could certainly be useful for some and may be worth some thought if it makes sense for you.

H/T: Miles to Memories

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