June was a great month because the 100,000 bonus from the Chase Sapphire Preferred (referral link) posted along with another 3,465 Ultimate Rewards from what I spent. I used a few American Express cards for things like the streaming credit on the Platinum (referral link) so that added 1,466 Membership Rewards.
Since I wasn’t working on a bonus for much of the month, I picked up 888 Mariott points because my Chase Boundless (referral link) card had a 5% grocery bonus. I also worked on some Citi Thank You points. Disappointingly the Rewards+ card will not be sticking around. On July 20, 2026 Citi will convert the card to a new Strata which won’t have the points round up or the 10% back when redeeming. My plan is to earn what I can when not getting a sign up bonus and cash out to get that last bonus right before the conversion. I currently have 2,291 points.
Now that I’ve completed the CSP bonus, I’m looking for my next card. American Express sent an offer for another Business Platinum, (referral link) but the spend requirement is too high for the timeframe. Chase revamped their Sapphire Reserve card in June and increased the bonus, but when I applied I got a notification that I wouldn’t be eligible for the bonus; I opted not to continue as I just don’t think I’ll be able to get good value from the card. Chase added a business version as well, but that’s another one with too high of a spend requirement. With this Reserve change, they’ve also devalued points for travel redemptions; to make up for that, Chase is giving Sapphire Preferred and Ink Preferred cardholders a $50 credit for a purchase through the travel portal. I’m assuming I won’t be able to combine the two credits I have, but I’m sure I’ll find some use.
I did end up getting a new Barclays Aviator Red with a 50,000 American Airlines miles bonus and the annual fee waived for the first year. I downgraded that card less than a year ago, so I thought I’d need to wait a bit longer but decided to chance the application when I was on an American flight back from Salt Lake City in June.
For my trip to Utah, I used 25,000 American miles from a bonus earned last year. For my hotel I found that the Crystal Inn offered a free airport shuttle as well as breakfast. The hotel is a walk across the parking lot from the Maverik Center which made it ideal. The rewards program they have is The Guestbook; I haven’t used it before, but it gives two redemption options–$8.12 to PayPal (referral link) now or $24.57 to use on a future stay at a participating hotel. I’m leaning toward the $8.12 immediate cashback.
I had a few PayPal redemptions in June: $100 from MyPoints, $15 from InboxDollars (referral link), and $10.65 from BrandClub (this one has become harder to earn with, so I decided to cash out once I hit the minimum). The majority of that $100 from MyPoints (referral link) came from a very easy Discover checking deal. For a single deposit of $50, MyPoints awarded 12,800 which works out to about $80 (16,048 points equal a $100 PayPal redemption).
I redeemed for a few gift cards this month too. $10 Starbucks and $5 Chewy gift cards came from Microsoft Rewards (referral link). I also grabbed the discounted $25 MasterCard from Swagbucks (referral link) which I then turned into Uber (referral link) since I needed to get to and from the Phoenix airport in June. Another $2 in prepaid MasterCards came from the no beer purchase required Anheuser-Busch rebates. Finally I had a $10 Amazon gift card from Checkpoints and $3.20 from Amazon Shopper Panel.
