So this may be redundant (and boring) to those who frequently travel, but I don't, and I'm looking for help from those that do
.
I'm looking to take advantage of the fact that I have a lot of time in advance (aprox vaca time - end of august begining of september) to plan a 5 day vacation with my wife and son (will be just under 2 imy"H). I only travel to places with a minyan and I have not yet decided if I want the trip to include shabbos.
So my conclusion thus far is MIA (We have never been, and i'm not neccesarily glued to this, but it just seemed sensible.) I'll preface also that I am not really a manufacture spend guy, I just open new cards from time to time and find ways to make threasholds - therefore I would like to be relatively conservative in my point usage, so I can conserve miles for future trips.
I currently have ~ 60K UR (2 CSP, 1 Freedom) and 35K SPG, and I'm not against using cash or selling points for revenue rates assuming that I can get decent rates booking so far in advance.
My questions given the above considerations are:
1)When would it be most sensible to use points vs cash ( a)30K BA for round trip airfare or wait on cheap revenue tickets b) open up another SPG to get to 48K to book the 4 points, or book a small chain with cheap rates (we like nice hotels though
)
2)I do have the ability to open a few cards between now and the vaca, any suggestions what I should open with this vaca in mind? (Amex Gold, Hyatt, BA, Citi...)
3) Should I shoot for something a little more ambitious for us like LA given the amount of time I have to accrue the neccesary miles?
Thanks in advance!