Legitimate spend to maximize pts for home improvement

Hutch

Hutch

Level 2 Member
Need to do some updates on the house so I'm looking 5-10k legit spend at homedepot or Lowes. I want to maximize the hell out of this. Selfishly I'd like to beat up my Ink card/ office supply because I hate dealing with $200 gc and need ultimate rewards.
Anyone have any recent experience exploiting a real spend at home improvement?
Do they still sell home improvement cards at Staples/office depot? Can I double dip through portals?
 
ed1chandler

ed1chandler

Level 2 Member
I think Discover is still 5% for home improvement until the end of the month.
Likewise, Freedom is 5x at Lowe's.

That's a couple of options to cut down on the Ink/Staples load.

Also, go read up at FrequentMiler about home improvement coupons and such.
 
Matt

Matt

Administrator
Staff member
You can get a USPS movers guide that supplies you with a 10% discount code off Lowes upto $5K spend. Get the moving guide pack, then go here: LowesMoving.com/MySavings You might be able to get two if you use another name/email combo.

I think you can still buy the HIGC too, if you genuinely use them for home improvements - they can be 5x $500 cards for the Ink - perhaps someone could confirm that?
 
I

incendia

Level 2 Member
Citi dividend also has a 5% category this quarter


Since we are near the end of the quarter on all these cards you might want to go in and are buy giftcards
 
Anh

Anh

Level 2 Member
Speaking of HI. I was at Home Depot the other day trying to get 3x$100 GC for the Amex Sync (across 4 of my Amex). However, the HD I went had none instock (both Visa and MC). I politely asked the cashier if they had more stocked somewhere else and she told me some guy yesterday came in and scooped 30 of them. And before that, he came in every few days and grabbed all they had. Ok, am I missing something here, the fees on these cards are kinda outrageous, even at 5% they are barely worth it when you factor in the time for liquidating $100 at a time. Unless he had 40 Amex cards, which seems unlikely.

Sorry for hijacking the thread by the way
 
G

Gody

Level 2 Member
Why not go to giftcardgranny and find a bunch of Home Depot gift cards/evouchers that you can buy at 6-10% off true value. You can use your credit card to purchase those vouchers and if you happen to have a home depot/Lowes moving coupon that Matt mentioned you could stack that on top of your purchase.

I redid my fence last week at Home Depot and this is how I went about it:

1. Going through giftcardgranny.com I found that Raise had many gift cards that were discounted at ~10%
2. Used topcashback portal to get 1% for shopping at Raise
3. Bought $850 in gift cards for $765
4. Used my Barclay Arrival to get 2.2% on the $765 spend.
5. Walk into Home Depot, buy materials and use gift vouchers to pay for purchase(here is where you could use a home depot/lowes coupon if available)

So on my $850 spend at Home Depot, I saved:

Saved $85 using Raise.com
Get $7.65 from Top Cash back
Get $16.83 from Arrival
TOTAL: $109.48

Thats 12.8% on a $850 Home Depot purchase and there's room for improvement if you can get some Home Depot coupons to use(I believe they Home Depot's accepts competitor coupons, don't know if Lowe's does).

I don't see why you can't scale this to a 10K purchase. Its a lot more gift cards to buy but all you have to do is print them out (I actually let them scan the 3 gift vouchers I bought off of my phone which was nice).

By the way, am I missing something or shouldn't this always be a technique to be considered whenever you are doing regular spend at a place where discounted gift cards are available at a minimum 5% discount?
 
Matt

Matt

Administrator
Staff member
Gody said:
Why not go to giftcardgranny and find a bunch of Home Depot gift cards/evouchers that you can buy at 6-10% off true value. You can use your credit card to purchase those vouchers and if you happen to have a home depot/Lowes moving coupon that Matt mentioned you could stack that on top of your purchase.

I redid my fence last week at Home Depot and this is how I went about it:

1. Going through giftcardgranny.com I found that Raise had many gift cards that were discounted at ~10%
2. Used topcashback portal to get 1% for shopping at Raise
3. Bought $850 in gift cards for $765
4. Used my Barclay Arrival to get 2.2% on the $765 spend.
5. Walk into Home Depot, buy materials and use gift vouchers to pay for purchase(here is where you could use a home depot/lowes coupon if available)

So on my $850 spend at Home Depot, I saved:

Saved $85 using Raise.com
Get $7.65 from Top Cash back
Get $16.83 from Arrival
TOTAL: $109.48

Thats 12.8% on a $850 Home Depot purchase and there's room for improvement if you can get some Home Depot coupons to use(I believe they Home Depot's accepts competitor coupons, don't know if Lowe's does).

I don't see why you can't scale this to a 10K purchase. Its a lot more gift cards to buy but all you have to do is print them out (I actually let them scan the 3 gift vouchers I bought off of my phone which was nice).

By the way, am I missing something or shouldn't this always be a technique to be considered whenever you are doing regular spend at a place where discounted gift cards are available at a minimum 5% discount?
Click to expand...
Nice work Gody! I believe that HD matches that lowes coupon, not sure if anyone can confirm?
 
S

Stuck in KC

Level 2 Member
Used the coupons for my son's Eagle Scout project. HD definitely matched the lowes coupons. Took the kids to a local grade school with multiple paper recyclers and turned them loose. Got about thirty coupons to cut down the price quite a bit. Moms weren't particularly happy with me but kids had a great time. I called it "thinking inside the box"
 
Hutch

Hutch

Level 2 Member
These are great ideas, just keep stacking and rerouting. I'm thinking I can lessen cost even more. start w/ (10%) moving card, but vgc at CVS for cashback (5%). go through cash back portal (1%) to Raise and buy HD gc with VGC at a ~8-10% discount. Pay HD w/ GC. Raise.com or granny should take vgc as payment.
ie on 5k HD spend
$500 = 10% moving coupon
$250 = 5% on 5k vgc
$50 = !% cash back portal
$400-500 = ~8-10% discount HD cards
= 1,200 - 1300 off 5k spend = 24-26%
 
O

Onlybeef42

Level 2 Member
Though not directly on point....

Be sure to mind your receipts of any potentially returnable items as multiple gift cards can make returns a nightmare. Also, if you are buying appliances or warrantied items it may be better to use a card with a free extra year warranty.
 
Malvina

Malvina

Level 2 Member
You wont find 10% moving coupon at post office.

You can find 10% Lowes codes on Slickdeals, then go through portal and pay with gift card.

If you want to buy more than $2500 go to contractor's desk and place a bid. Usually they will give you 12 - 15% (depends on what you are buying) but you wont be able to use 10% coupon. Do not tell them that you will pay with gift cards (they always ask)

Better go shopping on Wednesday or Thursday after 7:30 pm. The cashiers are more agreeable to coupons.

Shop in NH

With all these strategies + pricematching HD versus Lowes I saved about 35% on Andersen windows for the whole house
 
Matt

Matt

Administrator
Staff member
So... I just sold my apartment! What a pain in the arse getting it ready for closing... anyway, the second thing I did after seeing my wife and newborn son was to come here and confirm that the coupon does seem a bit harder to come by perhaps. Though potentially game-able (as is everything) In order to get my 10% HD coupon I went online to USPS mail forwarding, it costs $1.05 to process the mail forwarding service, for which you gain access to the coupon.

You should note that there are two options, temp and perm, the temp is for up to 12 months for people returning to the same home, so it might be an option (or might be too much hassle) to set up forwarding to a trusted family member, access the coupon, then cancel the forwarding service a day later... just a thought.

https://moversguide.usps.com/icoa/home/icoa-main-flow.do?execution=e1s1&_flowId=icoa-main-flow&referral=MG90

I just thought it might be better to just pick up a coupon on eBay, and they are pretty cheap it seems:
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR10.TRC2.A0.H0.Xhome+depot+coupon&_nkw=home+depot+coupon&_sacat=0&_from=R40

So maybe that is a better option?

Sorry for the ramblings... running on fumes.
 
Haley

Haley

I am not a robot
They still have the Movers Guide at the Post Office, you must request it now, is the coupon no longer in there?
 
R

RamboAroundTheWorld

Guest
Haley said:
They still have the Movers Guide at the Post Office, you must request it now, is the coupon no longer in there?
Click to expand...
That's not actually the coupon. Its just a slip with a code telling you to go to the Movers Coupon site and register. Which you could just do anyway at the Movers Coupon site.
 
R

RamboAroundTheWorld

Guest
I don't know if the OP's still around, but I've been dealing with this for a few months now with a nightmare remodel, and I've been trying my hardest to manu this to death. The easiest way to go about this is HIGC's. Period. Now, if you're getting fixed price items like appliances, you can use the sites like Raise and GCG to your advantage for a fixed amount. But even that is a hassle as you have to wait for the cards, then verify, then try to use them all in one sitting, etc.. If you're shopping for hundreds of little items, and especially if you want to break each purchase up to use coupons, then the HIGC's are a godsend. Not to mention that they get categorized as Discover purchases, so the Discover cash back portal won't bounce your purchases.
 
K

kristian

Level 2 Member
Frequent Miler had a pretty good blog post on the subject:
http://frequentmiler.boardingarea.com/2012/06/12/extreme-savings-at-lowes/

I'm currently in the midst of a major, unplanned remodel. Here are a couple things I'm doing:

Keep in mind you can't absolutely maximize everything and have the project get done and keep your sanity so try to score where you can and don't make things too difficult on you builder/gc. His time might be more costly than your savings.

After your builder/contractor/yourself has been to HD a dozen or so times and established that much money is and will continue to be spent, ask for a 10% discount on all your purchases for the project. That may be simpler than showing or matching a 10% movers discount every time.

HIGC is good but you can also (unless it recently got shut down) stack by going through Rewards Boost or UR->Staples->HD GC with Ink and Visa savings edge. They are just as happy to use/accept any form of payment so long as it goes through w/o a hitch.

Good luck! For me personally it's not a barrel of laughs.
 
Haley

Haley

I am not a robot
RamboAroundTheWorld said:
That's not actually the coupon. Its just a slip with a code telling you to go to the Movers Coupon site and register. Which you could just do anyway at the Movers Coupon site.
Click to expand...
I just got a coupon in the mail in the mailing confirming a change of address for my son. Hard copy coupon, not a code.
 
A

amk522

Level 2 Member
I know this thread has been quiet for the past month, but have some questions/suggestions.

Let's say I want to buy this washing machine for $799
http://www.lowes.com/ProductDisplay?langId=-1&storeId=10151&catalogId=10051&productId=50197659&cId=list

If I don't have the Old Amex Blue card - Could I do the following:
-Buying AGC w/2.2% cash back CC using TCB and getting 3% - fees
- Receive GC from Amex, go to Raise via TCB and get ~12.9%, use AGC to buy other GC - Is that possible? Otherwise skip AGC and start with 2.2% cashback card in this step
- Go to Lowes.com via UPromise for 5%, also an assumption that I can use a GC and get credit at UPromise
- Order appliance and use 10% movers coupon
- Use lowes price match to snag an additional 10% off since this exact washer is selling at best buy for 719.99 -- Not sure how to do this for an online order, but I have no experience trying
http://www.bestbuy.com/site/samsung-4-8-cu-ft-11-cycle-high-efficiency-top-loading-washer-white/3656051.p?id=1219092665431&skuId=3656051&st=Samsung 4.8-cu ft High-Efficiency Top-Load Washer&cp=1&lp=1

I know this is a lot of work but the discount seems amazing if this is able to be pulled off! Any feedback is greatly appreciated.
 
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A

amk522

Level 2 Member
I made a bunch of assumptions, and I doubt that portals will pay out for other GC's... Might have debunked my own post.
 
P

pillow25

Level 2 Member
You could also potentially buy Lowe's / HI GC at OD, Staples, whatever office supply store and earn 5x that way if you have an Ink card. Not sure if that would come out to be cheaper than Raise / GC Granny though...
 
3

3rddayfan

New Member
I am pretty sure I saw mention of a deal I recently had at Simon Mall on a thread here. The info is/was offered here, too, right?

Weeks back I bought the Lowes GCs as a stock up item since a homeowner's work seems never done. ;)

One could buy 10 x $50 Lowes GCs and obtain a separate Simon Mall Amex card for $100. Not to upstage those online GC websites or portals, but it does seem to be a "cleaner" transaction with just a quick stop at the mall service desk.
 
K

Kendon

Level 2 Member
Don't forget the Lowes store credit card gives 5% off. It might not be the sexist thing around, but it's a nice discount for that large of a spend.
 
Z

zeitgeist

Level 2 Member
i would get 5x/5% cards either lowes, hd or higc at pharmacy/od/whoever and use that...i wonder if they work on stuff at home depot gas stations?
 
beth p

beth p

Level 2 Member
FYI in case anyone has big home improvement projects
We were buying $3,500 of carpet from Lowe's . I googled how to get a Lowe's coupon and I found this link. It worked, it just takes 3 days or so to come through.
They took the 10% off coupon off the carpet (but not installation, they did take it off the padding because we upgraded).
Then today I also got 2 coupons in the mail for $10 off 50 and $50 off 250
There is a video too. I think this is the link I used: http://www.lowes.com/cd_Coupon+Registration_253641591_
The coupon had an expiration 6 wks out from when we filled out the form.
I just put my moving date as the next day.
 
A

Andres

Level 2 Member
Guys,

I'm on the market for a new electric water heater. I was thinking of buying on Home Depot (no Lowes in PR). Raise.com sells eGift Cards for 9.5% discount. I would pay with my 2% cashback CC, and get 1% extra using TCP for a total of 12.5% off.

Question are:

1- How long does it take for Raise to send me the eGift card if I order today? Any one with experience here?

2- Can I stack it with one of these 10% off or 20% off Harbor Freight coupons from eBay?
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR10.TRC2.A0.H0.Xhome+depot+coupon&_nkw=home+depot+coupon&_sacat=0&_from=R40&rmvSB=true

It would be nice if I could get an extra 10%-20% with those eBay coupons. I wonder if Home Depot won't allow the use of my Home Depot eGift card if I use a coupon.

3- Can I sell back the eGift card in the possible case that Home Depot don't allow stacking eGift card + coupon?

Thanks for any feedback.
 
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Matt

Matt

Administrator
Staff member
Andres said:
Guys,

I'm on the market for a new electric water heater. I was thinking of buying on Home Depot (no Lowes in PR). Raise.com sells eGift Cards for 9.5% discount. I would pay with my 2% cashback CC, and get 1% extra using TCP for a total of 12.5% off.

Question are:

1- How long does it take for Raise to send me the eGift card if I order today? Any one with experience here?

2- Can I stack it with one of these 10% off or 20% off Harbor Freight coupons from eBay?
http://www.ebay.com/sch/i.html?_trksid=p2050601.m570.l1313.TR10.TRC2.A0.H0.Xhome depot coupon&_nkw=home depot coupon&_sacat=0&_from=R40&rmvSB=true

It would be nice if I could get an extra 10%-20% with those eBay coupons. I wonder if Home Depot won't allow the use of my Home Depot eGift card if I use a coupon.

3- Can I sell back the eGift card in the possible case that Home Depot don't allow stacking eGift card + coupon?

Thanks for any feedback.
Click to expand...

Raise eGift cards come through between 2 mins and 1hr more towards the 2 min phase. I've bought them in store in the past. BUT....

Your first purchase may require validation (ID check, call in etc) so you need that account live before you start heading to the store.

You can stack coupons and certs - I did this many times using the Lowes coupon - HD will match it somewhat.. Lowes offers $5000 max at 10% for a $500 discount, HD takes that coupon but offers only $500 max for $50 or something...

There is no issue using a HD (or Lowes) coupon with an egift card.
You can sell back the egift cards but you'll lose out on the exchange as they buy them for less than they sell them (their profit)
 
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