The Sears 20X points deal through the Ultimate Rewards Mall in August (via Ink Bold) and September (via Freedom) was incredibly lucrative. Many folks went in for much more than I did (I don't have time to buy goods for resale on eBay or Amazon), but I thought I'd share my results off a relatively modest spend.
A nice bonus on top of the 20X points was that Sears has sent me a total of $52 in eGift Cards just for making purchases. I'm not sure what the threshold or calculus is (one of them came in snail mail and was for a weird $12 denomination, the other $40 consisted of one $20 eGift card and two $10 eGift cards) but this brought the return up even more. I haven't used these Sears gift cards yet, but hope to next time there's a Sears 10X bonus, or at least one higher than the current 4X points. Here's what the emailed gift cards look like:
Total August-September Spend: 3 x $500 Gift Cards = $1500
Points from buying gift cards: 10 x $1500 = 15,000
Points from spending gift cards: 10 x $1500 = 15,000
Total Points: 30,000
Value of Points at 2 cents per UR Point: $600
Value of Points at 2.3 cents per United mile/UR Point: $690
(2.3 cents per UR Point is my valuation for a United Mile, which is what I almost exclusively use Ultimate Rewards points for; see How Much Is a Mile Worth? Value of United Airlines Miles)
Total in Bonus Sears e Gift Cards: $52
So, if we take the 2 cent value of a UR Point, that's $652 in value for $1500 in spend, or 43% back from spend! Using my personal higher valuation of 2.3 cents per United mile/UR Point, it would be 49% back.
Naturally, we'll be using our Ultimate Rewards points by transferring them over to United miles, their highest value use. Those 30,000 miles are nearly half of a one-way first class flight on Lufthansa to Europe, a flight that easily is over $6000 even as part of a roundtrip, so nearly $3000 in nominal value.
That's why for everyone who loves travel, it's very hard to do better than travel credit cards such as the Ink Bold, Sapphire Preferred and Freedom leveraged with great spend bonuses, in this case via the Ultimate Rewards Shopping Mall.
And for everyone with zero interest in travel, there's always 2%-6% cash back cards 🙂
Check out and apply for the Best Travel Credit Cards.
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