How I earn up to 30% return on my Hotel Expenses

I am currently working at a financial software house as a consultant which requires me to do a lot of traveling at different client sites which means flying every week and staying at hotels. For some this can be perceived as a negative part of the job but I always try to look at things in a positive light and try to maximize the hand I am dealt with. With that being said I decided to do some analysis on my situation to see how to get the most out of my traveling. After some research I finally implemented a strategy that has allowed me to earn up to a 30.75% financial return on my hotel expenses. Based on current savings rates and the fact that this strategy is basically zero risk I would say this is a great way to make money. The ironic part of this is I am making money on expenses and not on an actual investment vehicle. For me my hotel costs are reimbursed by the client so its zero cost and zero risk for me.

I created a spreadsheet combining all the hotel expense “rewards” to show you how I come up with a 30+ return. This spreadsheet example is based on a $1000 weekly hotel expense. As with all financial analysis, there are some assumptions and details not stated in the spreadsheet so I will go into more detail to make sure everyone understands this breakdown.

Marriot Rewards:

Every dollar spent for the cost of the hotel (not including taxes) earns you Marriott Reward points. The standard is 10 points for every dollar. For example, if the hotel bill is $1000 (not including taxes), this will give you 10,000 points. Since I stay at Marriott all the time I achieved Platinum status which gives you an additional 30% in points. The final part is Platinum members receive a amenity gift for every stay which can be in points if they choose (500 points at Marriott and 250 points at Courtyard). Now the assumption component of this reward is what is the equivalent in dollars. Its not an exact science. One way is to compare the cost of a hotel room in dollars versus how much it would cost in points. After doing some research I concluded that a good rule of thumb is 1%. So 10,000 Marriott points would be the equivalent of $100. I would say the Marriott Points/USD conversion is not an efficient market because you can get a better or worse rate depending on season, location, status, etc. . I am sure you can write a blog just on this subject but that’s not the goal of this article.

Marriott Gift Card Promotion:

Marriott offers gift cards that can be redeemed at any Marriott hotel for hotel stays, food, etc.

They usually have different promotions and I jumped in on this one. Link to promotion: https://deltapromo.netlinkrg.com/

The promotion with this one was 2 fold. The first was 10% off meaning pay $900 for a $1000 gift card. The second component was get 1 Delta Skymile for every dollar on the gift card. So if you by a $1000 gift card you get 1000 Delta Skymiles. Unfortunately the fine print for this promotion is it ended in Dec 2007 and there was a max limit of 10,000 Delta Skymiles. So I maxed out on this one.

Citibank Credit Card with 5% cash back

Citibank has a promotion going with the Citibank Cashreturns credit card which offers users 5% cashback on all purchases for 3 months. So I used this card to buy my Marriott Gift Cards. The fine print for this promotion is its only for 3 months.

Rewards Portal

Rewards Portals such as fatwallet.com and mrrebates.com allow users to get a % cashback on their internet purchases. I book all my Courtyard Marriott reservations on the internet and use these Rewards Portals as the first point. All the portals that offer Marriott cashback basically have the same % cashback of 1%.So if I make a hotel reservation on Marriott for $1000 and the click through began on a site like fatwallet.com then I get $10. The fine print for these types of sites is to be aware of using corporate codes or coupons as these can cancel the cashback reward. Make sure you read the fine print on these sites. Rewards portals can definitely be talked about in great depth but this would be outside the scope of this post. So I will eventually post an article specifically on this type of rewards vehicle in the future.

So when you combine all these techniques I end up making up to 30% return on my hotel expense. I get reimbursed for my hotel expenses so my costs are essentially zero so it’s a win-win for me, but even if you are paying out of your own pocket for a hotel you should still apply these techniques to lower your overall costs…a penny saved is still a penny earned…

Any actual refinancing stories?

So with the fed cuts we are seeing lots of news about refinancing opportunities and that there is a surge in refinancing applications. So I am interested what kind of rates people are able to procure through refinancing recently. I am curious because before the third week of January it seems like mortage rates were on a downward trend but the last week of January, mortgage rates went up even with the rate cut. I know my colleague refinanced his NJ house and went from 6.25 to 5.25. Anyone else have any refinancing stories?

Opportunities created by Fed Rate Cuts

With the Fed cutting the Fed Fund Rate to 3.5 and potential further rate cuts down the road this means debt is becoming cheap again. So now is the time to start looking at using debt to buy assets such as real estate. Add this with the housing market in a downturn I say the next 6 months to a year could mean good buying opportunities.
If you currently have a real estate asset that you leveraged the other opportunity is to refinance. I was speaking with a colleague of mine during the week who recently refinanced his house in New Jersey. His original mortgage rate was 6.25 which he got almost a year ago but he just recently refinanced with a rate of 5.25. This is a full point difference which is pretty big if you ask me. Again these opportunities are really only available for people in good financial shape since the credit crisis has made lending restrictions stronger. Make sure you shop around for the best deal on acquiring debt.

Credit Card Arbitrage

This has become a popular strategy for those who have good credit and are very organized in maintaining payments in a timely manner.
How it works:
1. apply for a credit card that has a promotional 0% apr for a period of time for balance transfers.
2. do a balance transfer for the maximum amount. You can either to the transfer into another credit card or request a check.
3. If you transfered to another credit card then contact the other credit card company and request a credit refund.
4. take this money and invest it depending on your risk tolerance level. If you are risk averse then go with a savings account or CD(4-5%). If you love risk then go for a canadian royalty trust to get around 14%. Since you are using debt its probably best to go the low risk strategy and just put it in a savings account.
5. make sure you pay on time each month and pay back the remaining full amount when the promotional period ends. Best way to do this is to have an online bill pay account with your bank. This way you create a schedule of automatic bill payments so you do not have to worry about missing payments. Then you just sit and make money.

Key things to remember -
1.Make sure you pay on time
2.Make sure you pay the full remaining amount prior to the promotional period expiration.
3.Make sure you verify the amount of the balance transfer fee (if any). CC companies are starting to have the fee be a percentage of the balance transfer amount with no max. If there is no max transfer fee amount then this fee could negate any potential earnings from the investment. This happened to me with a Citibank transfer fee. I transfered 10k and the fee was $300. So make sure you check.
4.When requesting credit you will be hurting your credit score initially so be aware of that.

You will not get rich from this but you will make some nice extra cash with little effort.

Get $10 for every 10 reviews you write on Epinions.com

Epinions.com is running a promotion where you can make some extra cash.

Submit 10 reviews to Epinions.com beginning January 1, 2008 (12:01 AM Pacific time) and receive $10. The Promotion is valid until the first 30,000 reviews are received or until January 31, 2008 (11:59 PM Pacific time), which ever comes first.

Participants are not limited to only writing 10 reviews for $10. You can also participate and earn more by writing reviews in the following denominations:

10-19 reviews for $10
20-29 reviews for $20
30-39 reviews for $30
40-49 reviews for $40
50-59 reviews for $50
60-69 reviews for $60
70-79 reviews for $70
80-89 reviews for $80
90-99 reviews for $90
100+ reviews for $100

Lendingclub.com 5% promotion

I signed up as a lender on lendingclub.com to take adavantage of the 25 dollar bonus and 5% bonus if you lend 5,000 dollars or more. I decided to take the plunge and put up 5000 dollars which to some is a good chunk of change but this is just a continuation of one of my business's goals which is to help others. This is the first time I am using one of these P2P lending sites (besides kiva) so I am curious to see how this project ends. I will keep my blog updated on my future experiences and hopeful positive outcome for all parties.

Loan Portfolios

Name	Submitted On	In Funding Loans	Active Loans	Expected Monthly Payment		Payments to Date
jewelrycharity	Jan 19 2008	$300	$0.00	$9.72	10.68%	$0.00
jewelrycharity_com 2	Jan 19 2008	$975	$0.00	$31.62	10.79%	$0.00
jewelrycharity 3	Jan 19 2008	$2,350	$0.00	$74.85	9.52%	$0.00
Jewelrycharity 4	Jan 19 2008	$1,400	$0.00	$44.07	8.76%	$0.00
$5,025			$0.00	$160.26	9.62%	$0.00

Earn 5% return on a Kiva.org loan

Kiva.org is an innovative website that uses the capability of the internet to create a community of microfinanciers helping entrepeneurs in emerging markets and third world countries. Lenders can loan out a minimum of 25 dollars to entrepeneurs to help them with their businesses. By doing this Kiva.org is a great example of free markets at work by matching lenders and borrowers. The only drawback I find is lenders do not earn interest on these loans. So the major driving force is the fact that lenders are helping empower entrepeneurs out of poverty while risking very little money.
Even though lenders do not directly earn interest they can still earn compensation in another way. Kiva.org uses paypal for transactions so you can use a credit card for funding a loan. The key is to use a credit card that offers cashback, miles, or points. If you have a rewards card such as the Citibank Cashrewards card then you can be earning up to 5% on your micro loans. I recently got this credit card which has a promotion of 5% cashback on all purchases for first three months. So all the recent micro loans I made will give me a 5% return and I am helping others out at the same time. So its a win-win situation.