The One Citi Credit Card Paid Me $600, 50000 AAdvantage Miles, And More

The First Card

In 2013, I opened my second credit card with Citi when they offered a Visa AAdvantage card with a 50,000 AAdvantage offer and 2 Admirals Club passes. Nowadays, you can find a MasterCard version.

The Second Card

Some time in 2014, I redeemed American Airline miles for the 10% rebate and held on to the card. After exhausting the miles rebate, late in that year into early 2015 I product changed the card into the Citi Dividend card. I should have converted it earlier in 2014 and would have earned $900, but did it too late. Instead I was able to get back $600 for the year 2015 and am satisfied. I plan to earn another $300 for 2016 in the explanation below. Either way, the plans are falling into place.

For those that do not know, the Citi Dividend is unique because you can use up the 5% all in one shot for the calendar year up to $300. This is why it’s very important to target 1 quarter and max it out. Luckily, I targeted the fourth quarter with the Dividend card and I was able to extract a second $300 in 2015 because of the Devil’s Advocate where I outlined it previously. Doubling down on the fourth quarter I was able to earn $600 from the card.

The Third Card

Once the Dividend statement closed, I cashed in the rewards and product changed the card to the AT&T Access More card for the 3x retail purchases.

As I am switching from the “normal” methods of manufactured spending to reselling, specifically retail arbitrage, I hope the 3x purchases at “retail” will code as 3x. I am expecting the returns to be higher using this card than a 2% cash back or even 1 SPG point. It does add to the paperwork with the corporation using a personal card, but I plan to use this card strictly for reselling purposes to avoid any doubts.

For me, there was no allure to open this credit card directly for the $650 phone rebate and then figuring out what to do with the phone. With enough planning, you too can earn back $600 with about as many hoops to jump through.

In Sum:

I have used one hard pull and was able to maximize all the benefits of Citi’s generous product change policy for a multitude of cards and is helping with my average age of accounts. Not only was I able to receive American Airline miles that I wanted, but I was also able to manufacture spend $12000 for $600 easily in one calendar year. Now I can pivot the credit card strategy and use it to earn plenty of Thank You Points. I still haven’t decided what to do with all the points, but maybe a visit to an African safari via Virgin Atlantic or may be a Singapore Airlines Suite Class redemption.

Bonus: The Fourth Card

For a second hard pull, I have another Citi AAdvantage card that has an annual fee due around February/March time frame and I plan to do the same thing as the first AAdvantage card, product change it into the Dividend to quickly hit the Drug Store category for the $300.After I exhaust the second quarter, I have not decided if I want to switch to the double cash card or hang on to it and use up the fourth quarter for another $300. Obviously this strategy that I’ve employed only works for someone who is holding on to a card for more than a year. Many churners out there will open the card and subsequently close them for the sign on bonus.

I will hang onto my second Dividend card and do a wait and see for the 2017 Dividend categories. Afterwards, I am not sure what other cards are worthwhile with Citi to product change into, likely the double cash card. I also have a Citi AAdvantage Gold card that I have plans to converting into the double cash. Unfortunately, the earliest I can convert the Gold card would be in May and may be too late for the second quarter. My interest for a 2% credit card is not too high on the list.