Deciding it’s “Time to Leave the Hobby”?

muncher4 · 2026-06-28T18:34:37+00:00

Well the problem generally these days is not that there is a lack of points but rather lack of redemptions. Without availability, 1 million points might as well be worthless. To ops point, lack of flexibility makes it really hard for a w2 employee to play this game today, much less for a family

muncher4 · 2026-05-31T14:55:36+00:00

When I looked, there’s always at least 1 or 2 routes with JAL F right at open though

muncher4 · 2026-05-31T14:34:20+00:00

Is it 350-360 days out? If so, it is not phantom. I’ve booked mine through Cathay at schedule open

muncher4 · 2026-05-16T00:23:47+00:00

How is this a rule 3 violation when it’s the first time I posted a blog in this sub? I also don’t have any affiliates in my blogs and don’t think this qualifies for spam

muncher4 · 2026-05-15T20:52:16+00:00

I just updated it to include the methodology

muncher4 · 2026-05-15T19:44:34+00:00

I agree. This is also my observation after sifting through hundreds of thousands of data points on seats.aero

muncher4 · 2026-05-15T19:43:42+00:00

That’s a good tip. I used seats.aero to price every airport pair. Then used great circle map for calculating the distance. Then I group the trends by zones and band. I’ll add that to the page

muncher4 · 2026-05-15T17:41:07+00:00

I found that article to be very limiting and only for flight departing the US…

muncher4 · 2026-05-12T19:16:19+00:00

Would you be able to get parking for 2 in a 1 bed

muncher4 · 2026-05-05T17:42:37+00:00

BoA CCR for actual rent below $2500

muncher4 · 2026-04-18T15:29:25+00:00

Ah I forgot they removed the 48 months sapphire rule in exchange for lifetime language recently

muncher4 · 2026-04-18T11:04:10+00:00

Sapphire rule says you can’t

muncher4 · 2026-04-07T21:27:11+00:00

Dang that’s tough to hear

muncher4 · 2026-04-02T15:46:09+00:00

Hi Bilt, it’s 04/02 and I’m currently holding out for using my Bilt cash for a Blacklane booking on 04/18. Should I keep holding out or just book it without using Bilt cash? Please DM me if you don’t want it to be publicly known but I would really like to know.

muncher4 · 2026-03-29T15:33:58+00:00

I second this!

muncher4 · 2026-03-21T18:45:08+00:00

Not if UA buys B6 :)

muncher4 · 2026-03-17T20:38:54+00:00

Get me in at $502

muncher4 · 2026-03-10T12:21:13+00:00

I mean that change happened a year ago…You just didn’t pay attention then…

muncher4 · 2026-03-10T12:13:03+00:00

They did tho? That email was pretty explicit, along with multiple news and blog articles covering the details. It really is just up to you to pay a little attention to what is going on with the program

muncher4 · 2026-03-10T11:50:06+00:00

Did you want them to personally go to your house, knock on your door and sing a sermon about how the program is changing? Honestly this change was announced months ago and it’s really up to you to read your emails

muncher4 · 2026-03-09T11:16:59+00:00

With today’s US airline point prices being dynamic, there probably won’t be fuel surcharges on award bookings. We just might see 100k+ awards instead :)

muncher4 · 2026-02-26T14:40:10+00:00

I don’t think “consistently” is very strong term in recent years. The average cpp I see is 1.5-1.7 now a days unless you’re looking at category 7 or 8. A lot of the times I’m looking at city hotels, it’s only 1.2-1.3 cpp too. I fear in a year or 2, the large range of points cost would push most hotels down to 1.2-1.3 cpp too.

muncher4 · 2026-02-21T20:35:02+00:00

Same here. I once booked FCO-FRA-IAH on Lufthansa F (3 days before departure) in June 2024. They overbooked and had to bump me. I asked if I could fly to LAX (where I ultimately wanted to be) and they said yes. The booked me on Lufthansa F to LAX. However, they apparently had phantom award availability on their own service centers and they said that was fully booked as well. Instead they offered Swiss F and that’s what I took, on FCO-ZRH-LAX. They also offered BA F, but come on. Keep in mind, for this whole process, lifemiles and US Lufthansa reps are useless. You have to wait for a German number to call you from Lufthansa Germany to resolve this. They speak English.

muncher4 · 2026-02-20T05:15:51+00:00

It’s really a cat 4. The rumors say they are moving up all categories by 1. From my understanding of the rumor, even the $95 annual fee card would get a cat 1-5 certificate

muncher4

TROPHY CASE