Rewarding Routes
Rewarding Routes
What’s in My Wallet (2025 Edition): Cards I Use to Book My Trips to Japan
#12 I’m sharing exactly what’s in my wallet as we wrap up 2025 and head into 2026. I break down the cards I actually use every day, why they fit my spending habits, and how they support the future trips I’m planning especially Japan.
With the home-buying process finally behind us and the move complete, my wallet looks different this year. I also share why I slowed down on opening cards, how lenders react to new credit activity, and what I learned going through that experience while trying to secure a mortgage.
Why This Setup Works for Me Right Now
A quick look at how this new chapter new home, new office, baby on the way shaped the cards I’m prioritizing.
• How lifestyle changes affected my strategy
• Why your wallet should match your goals, not someone else’s
Capital One Venture X
My main catch-all card and the one I rely on the most.
• Solid 2x earning on everyday purchases
• Why I avoid booking flights through travel portals
• Real example of using its rental car protection
• How I plan to use Venture miles for ANA through Virgin Atlantic
Southwest Rapid Rewards Plus
The newest card in my wallet and the star of my late-year strategy.
• Signup bonus and my plan to meet the minimum spend
• Why I’m targeting the Companion Pass for 2026
• How this fits into future family travel with a baby on the way
• The story of how my original plan earlier this year fell apart
• How Southwest helps with cheap positioning flights for Japan trips
Bilt Mastercard (Revamp Coming February 2026)
A card that paused for now but will become important again.
• Mortgage payments becoming eligible for points
• Three new versions of the card rolling out
• Why transfer partners like Hyatt and Japan Airlines matter
• How Rent Day works
• New Rakuten partnership for easier point earning
Citi AAdvantage Business (Past Card, Future Use)
Not currently in my wallet, but a meaningful piece of my Japan strategy.
• 70K AA miles ready for a Japan Airlines booking
• Why AA miles work so well for JAL redemptions
• How this business card avoided affecting my 5/24 count
• Possibilities for future Citi cards to boost my AA balance
Looking Ahead to 2026
How I’m rebuilding and preparing for next year’s travel goals.
• Replenishing the Chase points I used on Hyatts in Japan and Korea
• Having my wife go for the Sapphire Preferred
• Keeping an eye on the rumored Hyatt card refresh
• Continuing a Player Two system for better long-term earning
Final Thoughts
This episode isn’t about copying my exact wallet it’s about showing the thought process behind building one that supports your own life and travel goals. Everyone’s path looks different, and that’s the beauty of this hobby. These are just the cards that make sense for me right now as we head into a new year.
If you want to share what’s in your wallet or get help building a setup that fits your goals, feel free to reach out anytime. I’d love to hear what you’re working toward for 2026.
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012 - 11:9:25, 19.43
John Diaz: [00:00:00] Ever dream of going to Japan, not just once, but every year. Me too. I'm John. And that dream became my mission, which is why I started rewarding routes. A podcast about making Japan travel possible. Year after year, I learned how to leverage credit cards to earn points and miles turning everyday spending into flights and hotel stays across Japan.
Each episode I'll share what I've learned from booking award travel to building meaningful itineraries and deep diving into regions, traditions, and experiences that make this country so special. Let's build your rewarding route one trip at a time. This is gonna be an exciting episode because this is the first time I'm sharing what's in my wallet.
I thought it'd be fun to walk through the exact cards I'm using as we end 2025 and we're beginning 2026 in the next couple of months. I want to be transparent about [00:01:00] what I'm actually using day to day, what I'm using my daily spend on cards that fit my normal spending habits.
Certain cards get limited time offers or maybe there's just a different, uh, strategy you wanna attempt with a different bank. There's just so many different cards, so don't feel the need to copy exactly what I have in my wallet, what I have works for me and what I'm currently working on and doing.
And of course, if you're listening to this, there's a strong chance you wanna visit Japan as well. But there are just so many different strategies to get there. This is just what currently works for me. But I will say recently I have slowed down a bit, and that's because we were in the home buying process.
As I talked about my last episode. it's currently what we're doing. We're currently moved and this is my second episode recorded in the new office, and it's very bare in here. There's the walls [00:02:00] are empty. It's just my desk and my computer in front of me with my mic. But slowly I'll be adding more character to it and I'll be posting videos and, and maybe some shorts and reels, um, to show myself a little bit more and, um, interact with you.
But let me just say, anytime you're applying for mortgage, uh, as you're in the home buying process, banks do take a look at your credit activity, opening multiple cards, taking new lines of credit. It can make lenders nervy. So just, it's just from my experience, what I just went through. If you are in the home buying process by any chance, uh, make sure you hold off on doing this, uh, hobby because you'll want to not open up so many credit cards and make the lenders nervous about all the lines you're opening up.
And this is regardless if you have a solid credit score. So with that. Let's dive into the episode because recently I just applied for [00:03:00] a new card and I was approved. This first card isn't the one I just got approved for, but it is my catchall card and it's the Capital One Venture X, and I've mentioned it before and it's such a solid card for me right now.
I use it for almost all of my transactions because you get two points per dollar spent. Not many cards do that. It's just a catchall. So what a catchall means is basically all the transactions that you're making with this card is earning you two points per dollar spend. Not many cards do this, so that's why it's almost a no brainer.
You don't have to think about it. It's just earning me points as I spend on my daily normal spend. I opened this card back in 2023. The signup bonus at the time was 75,000 miles for spending $4,000 in three months. The annual fee is 3 95. I know it could be a little bit on the higher side, but I'll get to that in a [00:04:00] moment.
The multipliers on this card are 10 times miles per dollar spent on hotels and rental cars booked through the Capital One Travel portal. You get five times miles per dollar spent on flights booked through the portal. The only thing with the portal. Is, I know it sounds like the rates sound great and amazing, but booking through the portal can mean higher prices, so just be aware of that.
And it's also harder to make adjustments or cancellations. I actually heard this story on another podcast where there was a group of people traveling and half of them bought tickets. Through the portal and half of them bought tickets directly with the airline. Well, they were going to some kind of positioning flight, so they were flying somewhere to position themselves to travel international.
The thing is, that flight that they're originally taking was getting delayed heavily, so they had to [00:05:00] pivot and. Make a choice to jump on another airline, but they're trying to cancel. The people who booked directly were able to cancel almost immediately. The people who booked through the portal were having a harder time and it was taking a lot longer.
So it's something to think about, especially in those situations where you need to make adjustments or cancellations. I'm sure the portal will eventually get there to helping you. But just knowing that the customer service directly with the airline will always, normally be quicker and better.
Normally I just like booking directly, but it's always up to you. And just make sure you do your research, see if the price is right, and take your shot. And the last multiplier is the two times multiplier. Like I talked about. You get two times points per dollar spent on all purchases, making it a true catchall card for this, strong Capital One Venture X Card.
The key perks to this card are the $300 [00:06:00] annual credit that you get through capital and travel. So that is when I use the portal because you get that $300 credit. Which you can just use on hotels or rental cars. So whatever you decide to use it on through the Capital One Travel Portal every year you'll get 10,000 anniversary miles.
You also get global entry and TSA precheck, and of course you get access to those nice lounges and you have priority pass. But remember in February of 2026. There's no more free guest passes, so it's only the person holding the card that's able to use the Capital One lounges and the priority pass you have to pay for that additional guest.
And I almost forgot, but this card has great travel protection, especially for rental cards. And I had a scenario when I traveled out to Seattle last year, and I guess a rock must have hit the windshield while I was driving on the highway out there. And. [00:07:00] Hertz was trying to come at me and say that I had damage to windshield, so I went ahead because I booked that rental with the Venture X card, I was able to use that auto rental collision coverage that the Venture X came with.
This card has some solid perks to it. You might wonder if the 3 95 annual fee is worth it, and honestly, to me it's definitely worth it because you get that $300 travel credit right off the bat. Plus you get 10,000 points yearly once you hit your anniversary, which 10,000 points is normally equivalent to about a hundred dollars.
So that's $400 you're getting back in credits that you can use. So it's a no brainer for me. The card pays for itself and it's going to be in my wallet. We'll see what next year holds. 'cause the Chase Reserve. I'm buying it, but I'm not sure I'm gonna pull the trigger next year.
It might be in the future for me. If you listen to a [00:08:00] previous episode I did about my trip to Japan and South Korea, you would've already heard that I used my venture miles to transfer over to Virgin Atlantic to get our flights from San Francisco over to Seoul, South Korea, and from Busan over to Tokyo.
Right now at the moment, I have a little over 200,000 venture miles saved up. I plan to use this on my next Japan trip. What I'm going to do is use the Virgin Atlantic way, but I'm gonna call Virgin Atlantic to book an a NA flight directly. Um, I think we're just gonna go economy. I might play around with this, see if there's any business class, but I think this is gonna be just calling Virgin Atlantic to book a Economy a and a Flight over.
I do talk about this in a previous episode as well, on using your points to fly over to Japan, so if you wanted to hear more details on that, I believe that was episode seven [00:09:00] of Flights to Japan Using points. Yeah, if you wanted to hear more details about that and other flights and other opportunities that you can do, go ahead and check out that episode.
So at the moment, right now, this is my go-to card, especially for international travel because it has solid travel protection. It has no foreign transaction fees. It earns you two points per dollar spent. So it's just a solid catchall card. But the next card is actually the card I just applied for. Was approved, and now I'm moving all my spend to this card because I'm trying to hit the signup bonus pretty soon.
That way I can move on to another card that I have my eye on. But this card is the Southwest Rapid Rewards Plus. So there are two reasons that I'm trying to get this card, and I've been actually trying to get an A Southwest card for a while now, and I'll explain it more in detail here, but. [00:10:00] Let me just go over the signup bonus.
That's, uh, currently going on right now. There's 85,000 rapid rewards. If you spend 3000 in three months, Daniel Feess $99. The way you can earn points on this card are you earn two points per dollar spent on Southwest purchases, two points per dollars spent on gas stations and groceries up to $5,000 per year.
One x on everything else. Some key perks to discard. Every anniversary you get 3000 rapid reward points. You get 25% back on in-flight purchases. You get 10,000 companion pass qualifying point boost yearly,. Some of you may know Southwest is now charging for bags. So with Discard, you get a first check bag free up to eight passengers on the same booking. You also get two free early bird check-ins. Now, this is only through December of this year, 2025. [00:11:00] Southwest is going to be moving into assigned seating.
So once that starts, this perk will be phased out and this card has no foreign transaction phase. Which is cool. So other than the signup bonus being 85,000 rapid reward points, and Orlando being a major hub for Southwest and we fly Southwest quite a lot. The biggest bonus for this card, and the biggest reason I'm trying to get it is for the companion pass because the companion pass on this card is pretty unbelievable and probably the best out of all the airlines there are.
So if you're wondering what a companion pass is, basically once you hit a certain goal, you'll earn a buy one get one free pass. So let me break it down here. Right now I'm currently sitting at 99,024 points out of 135,000 points towards the companion pass. [00:12:00] So the way to qualify for the companion pass first, you can either fly Southwest a hundred times.
I'm not getting near that number. Second, you can earn 135,000 qualifying points in one calendar year. Once you hit that, you pick a person, you wanna fly free with you, and all they have to do is pay the taxes. So say if a flight that I want to get on is 15,000 points. I use my 15,000 rapid reward points.
I pay the $5 and 60 cents in tax and my wife will be completely free, which all she has to pay is the $5 and 60 cents in tax. And what's even better is the past will last you whenever you hit that goal. Say you hit it at the beginning of 2025, you would get that pass for all of 2025 and a rest of [00:13:00] 2026.
So if you time it right, which I didn't, and I'll get, I'll get into that story. You could technically have this pass for almost two years at max, which is pretty wild and really handy. I mean, it can save you a lot of money. You can accumulate the points. And you can just, if you have a partner, you two are just flying for, for one person, and that's a really good deal, and there's no deals like that anywhere.
So currently my goal is to hit this signup bonus before the end of the year. That way I can get companion pass for at least all of 2026. So now let's get into the story. In December of 2024, I went ahead and applied for a Southwest Business performance card. This card had a signup bonus of 85,000 points, and it also had that 10,000 point boost that just gets added to your signup bonus.
You don't get these [00:14:00] points. These just go towards that goal of 135,000 qualifying points. So I hit that sign of bonus, I believe in early February of this year, 2025. And my goal, or my plan was to get another Southwest card to then hit that signup bonus and then get past that 135,000 qualifying points to get the companion passed.
Well, when I went to apply for my next Southwest Business card, which was the premier card, and you're allowed to have both of the business cards, you're not allowed to have. Multiple of the personal cards. Just a little tip right there. But I was going for both of the business cards, which is completely valid, and I went ahead and applied for it, I believe in March, to give myself a nice little gap between opening up cards, which never really fails for [00:15:00] me.
It's normally pretty safe to do that, and I was denied. Chase said that I had too many. Accounts opened and what I found out was Chase was tightening up on their approvals this year. So I waited again for a few months and I tried to apply for that same card and was denied. So the companion pass just wasn't happening for me at that time.
Then, as you know, if you heard the last podcast, we were in the market for a home and I had to kind of pause on opening up any cards because I didn't want to show any of the lenders that I was trying to open up a bunch of lines of credit and make them nervous and not approve us. So I, I just went ahead and just slowed down and I was gonna just try again at the end of the year to at least get the companion pass for 2026.
And that's what happened. I finally was approved, [00:16:00] but this time I went with a personal card instead of the other business card, the premier. And the reason I was going for two of the business cards with Southwest is the business cards actually don't go towards your Chase five and 24 rule. And just to freshen up your minds, if you forgot what five and 24 means.
Having five accounts open in 24 months, so in two years, and at the time I believe I was at four in 24 or five in 24, but I had rolled off. At the beginning of this year for two accounts. So I was back down to three and 24. So I went ahead and opened up this personal card and I actually just took a quick look on, uh, travel Freely app, and I was at two and 24.
So now with that Chase Southwest, plus I'm at three and 24. So I'm in pretty good shape. I like that. So a quick recap of how the [00:17:00] Southwest Cards work. You can only have one personal Southwest card at a time. You can have multiple business Southwest guards. The signup bonuses from both the personal and the business can stack towards that 130 5K that's needed for the companion pass.
Now that we have a baby on the way, I was looking at what family travel will look like with Southwest. So this is what it says online. If your child is under two, they fly free as a lap infant on both paid and points bookings. Just add them to your reservation and bring a birth certificate to the airport.
After they turn two, they'll need their own seat , but you can still use your rapid reward points to book it. . Combine that with the flexibility of the companion pass that we have, and it becomes a really good setup for us, especially with us wanting to experience travel with the baby sometime next year, which I'll have [00:18:00] the companion pass all of 2026, so maybe we'll take some short flights out of Orlando to some closer cities just to give it a go and give it a test to run.
And maybe visit some new cities that we haven't been to around here. So it's really good to know that you can use the companion pass and have a lap infant. You'll just need to call or check in at the counter to add them manually. You can't do it online. You have to do it in person. Also, if you plan on going international, that's when you have to pay taxes for the infant.
Just giving you a heads up. So how this works for Future Japan trips is Southwest is our go-to whenever we want to position ourselves from the East Coast to the west coast. Orlando's a major hub for Southwest flights, so it's no problem making our way over on Southwest to these other cities. And the companion pass just makes it so affordable and is truly one of the best perks out there for any airline.
So I'm really [00:19:00] glad to have gotten this, uh, new Southwest card and hopefully hit it by the end of November, possibly December. Because how I line this up is that we just moved into our new place, which requires us to buy some things for our place and. It's money that we're gonna spend anyway, so might as well get a new card, hit the sign a bonus, get the companion pass for 2026.
And I think that's awesome. It is just a really good perk and it's a really good card for myself to end the year on because unfortunately I couldn't get it into beginning of the year at least. I'm getting it now. Alright, moving on to the next card. And this is a card that's getting a revamp. But it's the built MasterCard.
It's a really good card. It's a up and coming card, and it was a card that I was using to pay at our previous apartment, which we no longer live at, and it was only good for rent. So we kind of had a drop off for us until we [00:20:00] heard the recent news of this card getting a full revamp in February of 2026.
And it'll be coming with mortgage payments. So now we'll be able to pay our mortgage with this card to earn built rewards, which then we can travel to some travel partners that will definitely benefit us for Japan trips. So to go over this card, there is no bonus for this card. You can't even apply for this card anymore until February, because in February they're moving over from Wells Fargo and transitioning to the built card 2.0.
There's no annual fee on this card that I have, but there will be three different annual fees for the cards coming out in February. One's gonna be $0, the second's gonna be $95 and the third's gonna be $495. These cards won't be revealed until January. They have a whole reveal thing that's happening sometime in January.
I'm not sure, but I'll make sure [00:21:00] to post it on my Instagram at. I'll be covering in a podcast because this is a really exciting card and it has really good transfer partners for Japan. So yeah, I'm gonna have a dedicated episode once I find out more information about that card. 'cause it's definitely a card I'm going to be
interested in. And it's definitely a card that's going to be in my wallet. So for those who are wondering how this card works, because it still works for me. Until February 6th, I believe, and then we're able to change cards that it should be here on February 7th. But how this card works is you get one point per dollar spent on rent up to a hundred thousand points per year.
You get two times points on travel when booked directly with airlines, hotels, and car rental agencies. You get three points for dollar spent on dining and restaurants. You get $1 spent on everything else. There's no annual fee on this card and there's no foreign transaction fees. So I was doing some research and this is what the Built card [00:22:00] 2.0 updates are going to be
Like I talked about, there's gonna be three new versions instead of the one. There's gonna be the three different annual fees of the $0 $95 and $495. That's gonna be explained in January, but those are going to ex expand on benefits and they're gonna include mortgage payments. I'm not sure if all three of 'em are, but we'll find out in January. Now, if you have the bill card, you can transition with no hard inquiries. They're gonna, I guess, send us a form or an option to pick what card we'll want and we'll receive that card in February. Now, if you decide that you don't wanna transition, your old built card will be converted into a Wells Fargo autograph visa.
I'm not very familiar with this card, so I am not gonna go into it, but um, yeah, you'll be getting the Wells Fargo. Autograph Visa, which earns Wells Fargo Rewards. Not sure about that program. So I'm gonna pass on that. [00:23:00] All existing built points stay safe in your account, so no worries there. And there's gonna be expanded features, so we'll see what they add in January.
So this card was excellent for being able to pay your rent, and there's something called Rent Day that I'll get into. But other than those two things, it was really hard to accumulate more points for. Built and Built has just announced a new partnership. Rakuten Rakuten is an online shopping portal with thousands of online retailers.
I haven't personally used it, but I've heard so much about it and it's something I want to learn more about, especially with the holiday season, just around the corner. This is a really exciting partnership because you can really start to build points by just doing shopping on this online portal.
Say if there's something you were to buy anyways at another shop, you can just [00:24:00] buy it online with Rakuten and earn built points. So how this works is you're gonna want to link your Rakuten account with the built app. Make sure you're using the same email for both. You're gonna select built points as your Rakuten payment method and just shop as usual, and you'll earn these points automatically each quarter.
So there are four quarters that you get paid out with built. Those dates are February 15th, May 15th, August 15th, and November 15th, which is one day after this podcast gets released. So just plan for February 15th with the news. Right now there's a limited time intro offer, which is one-to-one conversion rate for the first six months.
So that's $10 of Rakuten cash back, which equals 1000 bill points. Afterward, blue status members earn 50 bill points per $1. Rakuten cashback silver and above earn a hundred bill points per dollar. [00:25:00] So basically blue tier is the lowest tier that you are. The more spend you put on the card, you get higher status, and then you get a better conversion rate.
Right now there's a welcome bonus of 2,500 bonus bill points. After signing up for Rakuten through the Bill app, you just need to make a qualifying purchase of $25, and that leads us to rent day perks. So what is Rent Day? Each Rent day, which is the first of every month. All the built card holders earn double points all on non rent purchases, so rent doesn't get doubled, but all of the categories do.
So the three points for dollar spent in dining and restaurants gets bumped up to six points for dollar spent. The normal two points for dollar spent booked directly with airlines, hotels, and rental carts. Gets bumped up to four points for dollar spent and all normal purchases gets bumped up to two points for dollar spent.
So good ways [00:26:00] to maximize rent Day is to schedule your bills. Uh, if you have travel bookings, book it on the first of the month. If you're going out for a dinner or a date night, save it for the first of the month. Make it like a grand event and you can lock in all of these bonuses. The only downside is previously there was a higher cap on how many bill points you can earn on rent day.
Well, that cap has been brought down, so you can only earn a maximum of 1000 bill points on rent day. Now, beyond the multipliers, there's also a limited time run. During rent day, you'll see promos such as transfer bonuses to travel partners and status challenges. So you'll see other, , promos pop up on rent day, and you could take advantage of 'em if you wanted to.
If you have the bill card. If you don't, you don't have to wait until February to apply. Now, how this card works in favor of future Japan travels is [00:27:00] being able to pay mortgages is a massive way to build points for myself. So that's definitely something I'm looking forward to. Now, the partnership with Rakuten.
I can do some online shopping if I need to for maybe birthdays or. Uh, anniversaries or any other events that I can buy things to the shopping portal and earn built points that way. And the transfer partners with Built are fantastic. And right now only Chase has this partner, but Built has them as well.
And it's my favorite hotel brand and it's Hyatt because Hyatt has such a good value when it comes to points. So being able to transfer not only points from Chase, but now from Built gives me so much joy because now I can double up on points if I can, um, as well as transfer partners of Japan Airlines and Atmos, which is Alaska and Hawaiian's merger.
Those two [00:28:00] are options to get over to Japan. Well, Japan Airlines will get you directly there at most, could get you over to places like Taiwan, which we can visit Taiwan, Taipei, and then take a short flight over to Japan. Bill is only gonna get better and better, and with their announcement in February, I feel like they're really going to take over this points in Miles hobby and be a major contributor.
Along with the banks of American Express and Chase and Citi and Capital One Bill is gonna be right up there because their transfer partners are fantastic, and now there's more ways to earn those bill points. So moving on to my last card now, which is a bonus because it's not actually a card I have in my wallet anymore, but I did have it in my wallet for the beginning of the year and I thought I would include it because I have plans for this card to use on our next strip to Japan.
This card is the City Advantage Business World Elite [00:29:00] MasterCard, the American Airlines card. Now, I got this card back in March. The signup bonus was 65,000 advantage miles for 4,000 spend in four months. So with the daily span that I put on it to hit the signup bonus, I roughly have a little over 70,000 AA miles.
Now with this card, it does have an annual fee of $99, but it's waived the first year that you get it. The spending multipliers are two points for dollars spent on American airline purchases. Two points for dollars spent on cable, phone and satellite providers. Two points for dollars spent on rental cars, two points for dollars spent on gas stations and one point per dollar spent on all other purchases.
Now the key perks to discard are like priority boarding. 25% in flight purchases. No four transaction fees. It's nothing really crazy. Nothing really stands out. The only thing I really wanted was the signup bonus from this card. [00:30:00] When I got this card in March, no banks transferred over to American Airlines, so the only way to get American airline points we're getting American airline cards.
Well, that changed. Now Citi transfers over to American Airlines. So that's a big plus and it's something that I'm going to keep an eye on. Moving forward into 2026 with American, they're one world partner and part of one world is Japan Airlines. So you can book Japan Airlines flights on American's website, and you can normally fly an economy flights for about 35,000 points in economy one way.
So two of those economy one ways will come out to 70,000 points, which is how much I have. And that's the main reason I went for this card. I also went for the business card because it doesn't count towards my Chase five and 24 rule. I'm gonna have a separate episode about my business card strategy and why they play such a major role in what we do.
And I have quite [00:31:00] a few of 'em, and you actually don't need a full on business. So I'll talk about it in a separate episode 'cause it's a strategy I've taken advantage of. Ever since last year and it's been a major contributor of how I earn points now for future travel to Japan. Like we talked about, I plan on using these, uh, American Airlines points for Japan Airlines.
But Cafe Pacific is also a in one world, so you're able to find those Cafe Pacific flights, maybe even in business class. But I don't think I have enough points for that, but it's an option. If I wanted to try to get more AA miles, maybe I can get another city card. Um, expand on how much, how many points I have and maybe look for a, uh, cafe Pacific Business class flight to Asia.
So those are the cards that are currently in my wallet. I have my Venture X, which is my international and basically catchall card. Now I have my Southwest card, which I put all of my [00:32:00] purchases on to hit that signup bonus and get that companion pass, which I. So very want, especially with the World Cup happening in 2026.
I forgot to mention that, but I would really like to travel to see a game and you're able to change your companion. I'm not sure how many times I'd have to research that, but I know you can change your companion a few times, but yeah. I'm really excited. I, I've been wanting to companion pass at least for a year, and to travel with my baby.
That's on the way. I'm just so excited for it. Then I have the bill card, which is getting a revamp. I can't really use it right now, but in February when mortgages come and play, I'll be using the bill card quite a lot. With aa, I have those AA miles. I can lock in a Japan Airlines flight, which I might start planning soon.
For later next year or early 2027. But I would like to aim for November of [00:33:00] 2026. So, as you can see, I'm, I'm building a, a setup and a lifestyle with the goals that I have planned for me, when it comes to building your own setup, just focus on the cards that align with your goals. , Don't worry about anyone else's.
Don't worry about hearing all of the different cards that somebody else has. Or that I have go, what aligns with your goals? Because there are so many different paths and there are so many different strategies. I had gone through so many other cards before these cards in my wallet, and maybe I'll do an episode of all of the cards I've opened up and I have a whole spreadsheet of that that I can go over all the signup bonuses and such.
But yeah, I did want to end this with what do I plan? For 2026, well, one plan is to replenish the chase points that I used for all those Hyatts that we stayed at in our last trip to South Korea and [00:34:00] Japan. And I used quite a lot of Chase ultimate reward points for those Hyatts. So I would like to try to get that back.
And one card we're definitely eyeing is the Sapphire Preferred because my wife hasn't hit that signup bonus and hasn't had that card. For over four years, which now allows her to reapply and get that signup bonus for the Sapphire Preferred. I'm also going to be eyeing one of the Chase world of Hyatt cards.
There's the personal and the business card. I did hear rumors that a new revamped versions coming out, so I'm definitely going to take a look on that and hold up. I'm just gonna hit this sign up bonus before I do anything else, and I'll probably reapply for another card. Say in January or February, I'll let my wife sign up for a Chase card as well and we will go back and forth doing a Player two system and hopefully get those points [00:35:00] back so that we can start booking up Hyatts for our next Japan trip.
I can't wait to start planning these trips and going over my whole process of. What goes behind the scenes of how I plan a trip, the itineraries I make, uh, how I go about redeeming these points for flights and hotels activities. I book, uh, how I budget for these trips. And the more I do this podcast, the more we're gonna dive deeper into all of these different categories, and it's gonna be really fun.
It's gonna be really exciting. And I just can't, I can't wait to, uh, keep going and to keep sharing everything that I'm learning. And I'm learning so much more than I had ever learned before at and at a faster rate because I did hear from someone that one of the best ways to learn something is to teach it.
And it's very true because now that I'm [00:36:00] talking about these things and researching them even more, I find myself. Maintaining this information and retaining it easier, and it's almost more exciting learning this way. So I'm glad, I'm glad we're here and I'm glad we're, we're talking about these subjects and, and talking about ways to travel more.
And if that's Japan, that's awesome. And if it's not, that's still great because. The goal is just to travel more consistently and to create memories and make it affordable for anyone. So thank you for listening to this episode. I'd love to hear what's in your wallet, what's your, what are your plans moving forward?
Definitely message me, tag me, send me an email, anything you want. I'm here for you and now I'll catch you on the next one. See [00:37:00] ya.
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