Wow, that was a great deal!
According to girl math, I am practically making money every time I shop… haha – NO! Speaking for myself (and probably you) the shopping will never end and I will NEVER stop needing things. So what’s the best thing to do? Get your money’s worth EVERY.SINGLE.TIME. I guarantee at least a 3% return on 99% of my purchases. How does this work? Well first of all you need to be comfortable with the concept of money. Take the time to think about what you spend most of your money on, where you spend money, and how you spend it. With this basic data, you can start to optimize your money spending habits and tailor it perfectly to you. My focus here is how to get the most out of money you are already planning to spend, not telling you to spend less money!
For our household, we have an extremely detailed budget listing out all of our ‘required’ monthly expenses, our take home pay, savings, and some budget for miscellaneous things. Based off this: 15%~ goes to food, 20%~ for housing, 5%~ for miscellaneous, and about 60% is left for savings but this would also fund all shopping whether for purpose or pleasure, and vacations, etc. So what does our basic data tell us? It tells me that I definitely need a credit card for food, travel, and shopping. It is just as important to properly plan your big ticket items in advance. I spend a LOT during Black Friday but that is because I do not spend much throughout the year and stock up on everything I need when things are on sale! I might be a tad extreme but I am buying a dress for a friend’s wedding in April 2025 when it is only November 2024 now… ( ͡°Ɛ ͡°) Saving money truly brings me joy and I ABSOLUTELY LOVEEE getting a great deal.
Online Shopping Tips:
Before I jump into sharing all the personal credit cards I own and how I use them… I want to talk about places you need to take a peek at BEFORE you get to the checkout page. When it comes to bonus cashback and savings to date, I have successfully saved $779.13 in Amex Offers, $638.57 using the Rakuten Google Chrome Extension, and $66.90 in PayPal offers alone. This equals $1484.60 in free easy money I got back for buying things I already planned to buy. IDK about you but to me, that sounds like a free flight ticket. (spoiler: I only started using Rakuten less than 1.5 years ago and already saved that much money!) You can use my Rakuten Referral Link to signup and start saving money yourself: www.rakuten.com/r/GRABIK?eeid=28187
Here are the details of one of my recent shopping experiences using a combination of strategic timing, coupons, Rakuten, and Amex offers:
I purchased an Alienware Aurora R16 with a list price of $2944.99. For Black Friday, it was $800 off putting the new price at $2144.99. I signed up for the Dell emails and they sent a 10% coupon which took off another $214.50. Then, I saw Rakuten had a 10% cashback for desktops which will send me another $193.05 in cashback. Lastly, I used my Marriott Bonvoy Business credit card that had a 10% back on purchases for another $193.05 off. Before tax, my new grand total went from $2144.99 to $1544.39! Dell is also having a 2x multiplier on their Dell Rewards program which is completely free to sign up for and this got me an additional $115.83 in rewards which I am 100% going to use to buy the Alienware keyboard and mouse bundle!
Truth be told, I ordered this exact same desktop the day before but did not use the Dell coupon because it took a while to come in my inbox and I figured like most stores, ‘it probably doesn’t stack right..?’ I WAS WRONG. It stacked. But the true catalyst of it all was that literally ONE day after I placed the [first] order, I went to see if my Dell rewards came in so I could buy the keyboard and my Rakuten extension popped up saying it is now 10% although when I bought it the day before it was only 2% for desktops!!! Needless to say, I was not willing to give up $200 so I cancelled my order right away and placed the exact same order again. I was previously only getting $42.89 from Rakuten at 2% but with the change to 10% and the 10% off dell coupon, I saved $407.55 by cancelling and reordering again. This was a difference of $364.66 for me in less than 24hours.
Find Out What I look at Before Checkout to Save Even More $
Here are my current credit cards:
Amex Gold, Chase Sapphire Reserve, PayPal credit card, Target Red Card, Amazon Prime Card, and Marriott Bonvoy Business. Now let me break down how I get the most out of each and every card.
| Credit Card | Annual Fee | Specific Credit Card Benefits I Use | Why I keep this card |
|---|---|---|---|
|
Amex Gold Card |
$325 but I think of it as $1 |
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Chase Sapphire Reserve |
$550 but I get all my money back |
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Marriott Bonvoy Business |
$125 |
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PayPal Credit Card |
$0 |
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Target Card & Amazon Prime Card |
$0 |
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Looking at the above chart, basically the only card I actually have to spend money on is the Chase Sapphire Reserve so let me give you an example… If I am trying to buy a flight to Asia, that is easily $1,500 aka 150,000 points. However given my 1.5x multiplier, I only need to spend 100,000 points for a $1,500 flight which saves me 50,000 points aka $500. Just by redeeming one flight with a multiplier, I covered two years of annual fee ($250/year) and this makes the card worth the money for me!
For my Amex Gold, we order UberEats and GrubHub often so if this is money I am going to spend every month anyway, I should at least be getting a $10 coupon for it every month! This not only makes me feel less guilty for ordering delivery but it saves me money that I would have spent otherwise. Might I add… we ONLY order UberEats if we get our 40% (up to $15) coupon. This typically works for 3 orders in a given Monday-Sunday week. Without the coupon you will never catch us ordering UberEats and maybe that is why we keep getting the coupons whereas I’ve read online that lots of people have completely stopped getting these weekly coupons altogether!
The key here is to do your research on which credit cards align best with your current shopping habits and getting the highest multiplier for points or cashback that is available in the credit card market.
Hopefully this goes without saying but… PLEASE pay off your credit card every single month! You should not have to put yourself in a situation that requires you to carry credit card debt. Think of a credit card like a debit card where the money comes out all at once at the end of every cycle. You should never be spending more than you can comfortably afford! As I said, the shopping NEVER ends so when you do have to spend money, make the most out of each and every checkout.