Improved: Citi ThankYou Premier Card 50,000 Point Bonus = $500 in Gift Cards = $665 in Airfare

(Update: The Citi ThankYou Premier 50,000 point offer is back and improved, with a $2,500 spending requirement and also the annual fee is waived for the first year. In addition, you can now mix points and cash when redeeming ThankYou points at a 33% premium for travel.)

The Citi ThankYou Premier Card is now offering 50,000 bonus ThankYou Points after $2,500 in purchases within 3 months of account opening. That is enough to redeem for $500 in gift cards or $665 in airfare when you redeem through their ThankYou Travel Center. There is no annual fee for the first year, $125 after that. Let’s take a closer look at how this breaks down.

You can view your redemption options at ThankYou.com. In general, it takes 10,000 ThankYou (TY) points to redeem for a $100 gift card to retailers like Gap, Banana Republic, Barnes & Noble, Bath and Body Works, Bed Bath & Beyond, Cabelas, CVS Pharmacy, Kohl’s, Land’s End, LL Bean, Sears, Lowe’s, Home Depot, Staples, and Walmart. So with 50,000 TY points, you could get five $100 gift cards from different stores.

Want something closer to cash? For a check mailed to you, it costs 8,000 points for $50. For a statement credit, it’s 7,500 points for $75. A check mailed towards your mortgage payment or student loan (made out to your lender) costs 7,500 points for $75. You could also redeem your points for a Walmart gift card and then sell it for cash at a site like PlasticJungle.com that offers you 91 cents on the dollar. 50k points would net you $455 in cash.

Now let’s look at the advertised airplane ticket option. A good question is whether a flight booked through the ThankYou Travel Center costs the same as through any other travel site like Expedia, Orbitz, etc. I have some old ThankYou points laying around, so I went to the redemption site and found that the prices are very closely aligned to what is offered at sites like Expedia.com. I did a few quick searches for random flights, and the cost of the flight matched up with the cost in points in a 100:1 ratio. For example, the exact same flight below that cost $360 including taxes and fees on Expedia would cost 36,000 TY points.

ThankYou Travel Center screenshot:

Expedia.com screenshot:

So the pricing seems fair, no inflated prices or hidden fees. However, with this specific Premier card with the annual fee, you also get 33% more value when redeemed for airfare. Thus, 50,000 points can be redeemed for $665 in airfare, which would typically require 66,500 points. Since you can book any flight that can be found on Expedia, there are “no blackout dates”.

Update October 2011: Let’s say you found a ticket for $200 = 15,000 points, but only have 10,000 points in your account. Citi now lets you pay the difference, so in this case you can get your $200 ticket for 10,000 points and $67. This makes it much easier to use up all of your points at a 33% premium.

Some other highlights of the card:

No foreign transaction fee on purchases.Earn 1.2 ThankYou Points per $1 spent at gas stations, supermarkets, drugstores, commuter transportation and parking merchants. Earn 1 ThankYou Point for every $1 spent on all other purchases.No limits on earning points or expiration dates.Earn points for the miles you fly as well when you purchase a ticket with your Citi ThankYou Premier Card.Other smaller perks, like 200 bonus points for signing up for online account access, 200 points for paperless statements, and a 1-5% bonus on your existing point balance on your annual card anniversary.Annual complimentary domestic companion ticket. (Fees and taxes not included. Full details not available on application.)

Citi ThankYou Premier Rewards Card application link

Find more in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 10/21/11, 12:35am | Trackback

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Citi Checking Account Bonus $200/$400 in Gift Cards

Citibank is offering new checking account customers a bonus of either a 20,000 or 40,000 ThankYou points, worth $200 or $400 in gift cards. You must:

Open a new Citibank checking account in the Citigold or Citibank Account Package by 10/31/2011.Enroll the new checking account in Citi ThankYou Rewards.Within 45 days after account opening, initiate one direct deposit AND complete one electronic bill payment for two consecutive months.

ThankYou Point Value Recap
There are a decent number of options for these poitns. 10,000 ThankYou points = $100 Wal-mart Gift card, which you can sell for a $95.55 Amazon.com gift certificate or $91 cash at PlasticJungle.com. Alternatively, can be worth $100 towards Expedia travel, a student loan, or paying down your mortgage. More details in the Citi $500 ThankYou card post.

Citibank Account: 20,000 ThankYou Point Bonus (Easier)

$100 minimum opening deposit$6,000 minimum balance in linked accounts (checking, savings, personal, credit card balances) to avoid $20 monthly fee.

Citigold Account: 40,000 ThankYou Point Bonus (Harder)

$500 minimum opening depositThere’s no monthly service fee for the first 2 statement cycles. After that, in order to waive the $30 monthly service fee you need the combined average balance of your eligible linked accounts to be: $50,000 or more for all linked deposit and retirement accounts OR$100,000 or more across all your eligible linked Citi accounts, excluding a first mortgage with Citibank OR$250,000 or more if your Citibank first mortgage is included in the total relationship.

For most people, I think the 20,000 ThankYou point offer will be the easier one to qualify for if you have $6,000 to move over there instead of an online savings account earning only 1% APY. $6,000 would only earn $60 over an entire year, at that rate. Even it takes 6 months to get your $200 bonus, that’s a 6.67% annualized return.

I thought that the Citigold might be doable since the monthly fees are waived for the first two months, but I saw in the fine print that the points might take another 90 days to post and your account must be open until then. This option would only work well if you have a mortgage with Citi.

The bonus ThankYou Points will be credited to your ThankYou Member Account within 90 days from the end of the statement period in which you satisfy all offer requirements. New checking account must be open and in good standing at the time the bonus ThankYou Points are posted to your ThankYou Member Account.

Afterwards, if you wish, you can downgrade to the Basic Account which offers a way to avoid monthly fees with no minimum balance, if you make 5 “qualified transaction” activities per month (direct deposits, debit card purchase, bill payment, ACH payments, checks paid, ATM withdrawals).

Update: Citibank has updated their checking account to have different restrictions starting with statements ending on 12/9/2011.

Find more in Banking, Deals & Offers | 10/4/11, 5:09am | Trackback

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Citi Forward Card Review & Improved Offer – $100 Gift Card Bonus

As I was reminded in my best cash back credit cards post, the Citi Forward card is a great rewards card for those who spend a lot on restaurants and at Amazon.com. That’s not everyone, but sure sounds like me in my 20s. Okay, okay… it sounds a lot like me now. What can I say, I still love food, friends, and Amazon Prime 2-day shipping. I have this card saved as the default card on my Amazon.com account for the 5x points, choosing this card over the Amazon-branded credit card. Why?

The Citi Forward Card earns 5 points for every $1 you spend on restaurants, book stores including Amazon.com, video rental stores, and movie theaters. On everything else, you get the plain vanilla 1 reward point for every $1 spent. The important part is that I have confirmed that all Amazon.com purchases count as a bookstore under their categorization system (books, textbooks, music, electronics, cool pumpkin-carving tools, etc).

The news here is that they just added a new 10,000 ThankYou point sign-up bonus, redeemable for $100 in gift cards for new cardholders to stores like Home Depot, Macy’s, Gap, etc. You must make $650 in purchases and sign up for paperless statements within the first 3 months. That is the best sign-up offer they have ever had for this card, as I got this card when it first came out.

Alternative for 10k points include a $100 Amazon.com gift card, or you can also get a check for $100 towards your student loan and/or mortgage. You also get another 100 points each month just for paying your bill on time and not going over your credit limit. No annual fee.

Find more in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 10/20/11, 5:15am | Trackback

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Chase Bank $125 New Checking Bonus In-Branch or Online

Chase Bank is offering a $125 bonus for new customers if you open a new Total Checking account with $100 and set up direct deposit within 60 days of account opening. They state that the direct deposit must be “an electronic deposit from your employer or the government of your paycheck, pension or government benefits (such as Social Security)”, but I’m not sure if they manually check. You must keep the account open for 6 months. To avoid a monthly fee, you must do one of the following each statement period:

have at least one direct deposit of $500 or more post to your account (two or more direct deposits that add up to $500 or more do not qualify), orkeep a minimum daily balance of $1,500 or more in your checking account, orkeep an average balance of $5,000 or more in qualifying accounts with Chase.

Otherwise, a $12 monthly Service Fee will apply ($10 monthly Service Fee in CA, OR and WA). Per the fine print, if are not a current customer and you’ve closed an account more than 90 days ago, you count as a “new” customer again. However, you can only receive one checking account-related bonus per calendar year. Thanks to reader Andy for the tip. Offer expires 10/7/11.

Find more in Banking, Deals & Offers | 10/4/11, 4:57am | Trackback

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TripAlertz $10 Bonus For Referring Others – Like Groupon For Travel

TripAlertz.com is a new site that is basically like Groupon for travel, even though Groupon already does travel.

Anyway, they have a refer-a-friend program where everyone referred gets $10 towards a TripAlertz deal, and so does the referrer. No purchase required. Signing up is quick, I just did it to grab the $10 now before it expires (and my friend got $10 too). Here is my TripAlertz $10 referral link, after which you can bug your friends to join as well.

(Oops, I read this wrong last night! Only the referring person gets $10. To make this right, I am not going to use any of this credit for myself at all. At the end of this week, I will be giving all new users using my sign-up link a chance to win the entire “pot” of TripAlertz credit. I already have a list of all referred e-mails.)

The refer-a-friend program works in that the referring person gets $10 for referring a new user. The new user only has to sign up with an e-mail address, nothing else. However, the new user does not get a bonus.

Find more in Deals & Offers | 10/11/11, 2:20am | Trackback

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New: Citi ThankYou Preferred Card 50,000 Point Bonus = $500 in Gift Cards

Citi couldn’t stay way, given all the other $500 value offers still hanging around. I love that this is the new standard for a simple credit inquiry, and that basically my wife and I can score at least $2,000 in free money a year, exempt from taxes, with as little as two credit applications per year. (We actually do much better than this…) We just refinanced a mortgage and got a new homeowner’s insurance policy, so I know it’s not hurting us in other areas either.

The Citi ThankYou Preferred Card has upped their game with a 50,000 ThankYou Point bonus broken down into two parts: You get 25,000 bonus ThankYou Points after $5,000 in purchases within 6 months of account opening, and you get an additional 25,000 bonus points after another $5,000 in purchases are made within the next 6 months after that. You do not need to qualify for the first 25,000 points to be eligible to earn the second 25,000 points. See below for details on how this is worth $500 in gift cards, airfare, or a check towards your student loan or mortgage. No annual fee.

This offer is both better and worse from their last 50,000 point promo back in June. The required spending is higher, although spread out over a much longer period. You basically have to spend $5k within 6 months twice, for an average of $833 a month. However, the last offer was for the Premier card with a $125 annual fee. This Preferred version has no annual fee.

Here’s a summary of your best values for ThankYou points, in case you don’t want to slog through all the many redemption options at ThankYou.com. In general, it takes 10,000 ThankYou (TY) points to redeem for a $100 gift card to retailers like Gap, Banana Republic, Barnes & Noble, Bath and Body Works, Bed Bath & Beyond, Cabelas, CVS Pharmacy, Kohl’s, Land’s End, LL Bean, Sears, Lowe’s, Home Depot, Staples, and Walmart. Bolded are my favorites. So with 50,000 TY points, you could get five $100 gift cards from different stores.

Want something closer to cash? For a check mailed to you, it costs 8,000 points for $50. For a statement credit, it’s 7,500 points for $50. A check mailed towards your mortgage payment or student loan (made out to your lender) costs 2,500 points for $25. This works out to 1 cents per point. Otherwise, it may be better to redeem your points for a Walmart gift card and then sell it for cash at a site like PlasticJungle.com that offers you 90 cents+ on the dollar. I just checked, and a $500 Walmart gift card would net you $455 in cash or $477.75 in Amazon gift certificates.

Now let’s look at the advertised airplane ticket option. A good question is whether a flight booked through the ThankYou Travel Center costs the same as through any other travel site like Expedia, Orbitz, etc. I have some old ThankYou points lying around, so I went to the redemption site and found that the prices are very closely aligned to what is offered at sites like Expedia.com. I did a few quick searches for random flights, and the cost of the flight matched up with the cost in points in a 100:1 ratio. For example, the exact same flight below that cost $360 including taxes and fees on Expedia would cost 36,000 TY points. ThankYou Travel Center screenshot:

Expedia.com screenshot:

Quick recap. 50,000 ThankYou Points = $500 in gift cards, ($500 Walmart Gift can be easily sold for $450+ online), $500 to pay down your student loan, $500 to pay down your mortgage balance, or $500 in airfare at the same rates as available at Expedia.com.

Find more in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 9/23/11, 5:00am | Trackback

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CollegeInvest Smart Choice 529 College Savings Plan: $50 Opening Bonus

Here’s another 529 bonus that’s pretty easy to grab. (See Ohio 529 $50 bonus.) The FDIC-insured version of the CollegeInvest College Savings plan is currently offering a $50 bonus if you deposit $50 of your own money and set up automatic transfers. There is no minimum balance, and the terms only require a $1 monthly transfer for 6 consecutive months. Effectively, double your $50 to $100 in 6 months.

This is one of the several 529 plan options for Colorado, and you do get a state tax deduction for your 529 contributions if you’re a Colorado resident (subject to recapture if you don’t use it for a qualified expense). One that caught my eye was the stable value version that is paying a 2.84% rate for 2011.

Plan Review. This bank version itself is pretty bare, and is intended for people who want to invest very conservatively in FDIC-insured accounts. There are only two options: (1) a 1-year CD paying 0.30% APY, and (2) a savings account paying 0.05% APY on balances up to $20,000. Even if it’s tax-deferred… yuck. If you are currently in college or have a really short timeframe, then you could just grab this bonus and take a qualified withdrawal soon afterward. Otherwise…

Take advantage of plan rollovers. I’ve opened a lot of 529 plans for the bonuses over the years, and I enjoy trying out each new service. Some have surprisingly good online interfaces (Ohio), while others are shockingly bad (Oregon circa 2007). But the good thing is, it’s pretty easy to roll over funds from one 529 to another existing plan. You usually just have to fill out a rollover form.

Find more in College & Education, Deals & Offers | 10/11/11, 2:18am | Trackback

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Citi Dividend World MasterCard – 5% Cash Back on Rotating Categories + $300 Cash Bonus

The battle to be the credit card inside your wallet or purse heats up again! Citibank has a new offer for the Citi Dividend World Mastercard with an improved sign-up bonus of $300 cash after making $5,000 in purchases within the first 3 months of the account opening. (There is still same card with the original $100 cash bonus for $500 in purchases, if you prefer.) In addition, there is a good rewards program to keep you interested, offering 5% back on different rotating categories every 3 months.

From 7/1/11 to 9/30/11, you’ll get 5% cash back on airlines, hotels and car rentals. On all other purchases, you get 1% cash back with no tiers. After you get your card, you must enroll by logging into your account online or calling 1-800-231-0891. There is no cap on the 5% back, except for the $300 overall cap on all dividend rewards earned annually (sign-up bonus doesn’t count). This card has no annual fee, so I can still keep it around specifically as a 5% cash back card.

Chase has their similar Chase Freedom Visa card, which is recently increased their promo offer to a $200 cash bonus (coincidence?) and offers 5% cashback on up to $1,500 spent on dining, department stores, movie theaters and charitable organizations from 10/1/11 – 12/31/11. Must spend $500 in 3 months. No annual fee. While there is often overlap, having cards from different issuers allows higher spending limits and different categories at times.

Compare with other $500+ credit card bonuses available, but remember that this card has an ongoing benefit as well as no annual fee.

Find more in Credit Cards, Deals & Offers | 8/30/11, 5:30am | Trackback

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