Get $100+ Bonuses From Credit Card Promotions

Here are some easy promotional offers from credit cards that have helped me save for an early retirement!

I regularly supplement my income and boost my savings rate by taking care of my credit and only applying for the most lucrative offers, like the ones below.

50,000 Points, Redeemable for $500 in Cash

The Chase Sapphire Preferred Card is a rewards credit card that is now offering new cardholders 50,000 bonus points after you spend $3,000 in purchases within the first 3 months. This is quite a good deal, as 50,000 points can be redeemed for $500 cash or two airplane tickets worth up to $312.50 each (you can buy a more expensive ticket and simply pay the difference). No annual fee for the first year, $95 in future years. They also now offer 2 points per dollar spent on dining & 1 point per dollar spent on all other purchases.
(This card is the “big brother” of the regular Chase Sapphire Card, where you can get 25,000 points after you spend $3,000 in purchases within the first 3 months, and there is no annual fee in the first year or subsequent years.)

Two Free Nights at Any Hyatt Hotel in the World

The new Hyatt Card comes with a unique perk – two free nights at any Hyatt with no blackout dates. This is best used at their top tier hotels like Park Hyatt and Hyatt Regency, which are some of the best hotels in the world – up there with brands like Westin and Four Seasons.
Try looking some of them up. I found the Park Hyatt Paris runs $900 a night and the Park Hyatt Tokyo runs $600 a night. The annual fee is $75, so basically you’ll be getting two nights at any Hyatt for 75 bucks (award nights include all taxes and fees). Additional details here.

$300 in Gift Cards or $399 towards Airfare or Hotel

The Citi ThankYou Premier Card currently offers 30,000 bonus ThankYou Points after $1,500 in purchases within 3 months of account opening. That is enough to redeem for $300 in gift cards at stores including Walmart, Home Depot, Lowes, and CVS Pharmacy. Alternatively, you can get $399 in airfare or hotels when you redeem through their ThankYou Travel Center (prices match Expedia.com). If you redeemed for Walmart gift cards and exchanged them online at a site like PlasticJungle.com, you would net $270 in cash.
This is their new travel-oriented card, with no foreign transaction fee on purchases and you can also earn points based on the amount of miles you actually fly. The annual fee is free the first year, $125 in later years if you keep it. Alternatively, if you want a card with no annual fee period, the Citi ThankYou Preferred Card is offering 20,000 bonus points after $700 in purchases within 3 months.

Free $150 in Gift Cards

The American Express Premier Rewards Gold Card offers 15,000 Membership Rewards bonus points when you spend $1,000 in your first 3 months of Card membership. MR points are very versatile, and can be converted to 15,000 frequent flier miles in a number of programs, or you can simply get $150 in gift cards at several stores like Home Depot, Crate & Barrel, or Macy’s. You can view the reward options at MembershipRewards.com. I think you can also get cash equivalents at a reduced ratio.
You can also earn another 15,000 Membership Rewards bonus points when you spend $30,000 per calendar year. No annual fee for your first year. After that it is $175, so remember to cancel within the first year if you don’t want to continue.

Free $100 Amazon.com Gift Certificate or 3 Hotel Nights

The Starwood Preferred Guest® Credit Card from American Express is currently giving out 10,000 Starwood points for signing up and making any purchase. That’s enough for a $100 Gift Card to Amazon.com, Gap, Nordstrom, Banana Republic, and more. Not only do you get the bonus, but this card is one of my favorite rewards cards.
10,000 points are also good for up to 3 free nights at Starwood hotels like Four Points Sheraton. If you like airline miles, you can get 1.25 frequent flier miles per point, 25% more than other airline-specific cards. This card is great for people who like to travel and make the most of their existing frequent flier miles, and can be very useful for getting miles for many different airlines like Delta, American, and more. Click here for details.
Finally, if you spend $15,000 within the first six months, you get another 15,000 bonus Starpoints on top of the 15,000 earned normally. So all in all you’d get 40,000 Starpoints = 50,000 frequent flyer miles = 2 free roundtrip tickets!

Small Business Card: 50,000 American Express Points Worth $500 in Gift Cards

Ready for another one? American Express just announced a limited-time 50,000 Membership Rewards point bonus for their New Business Gold Rewards Card from OPEN, which is one of their upscale-oriented charge cards for small businesses where you must pay off the balance each month but you get the famous AmEx perks like purchase price protection, extended product return protection, and AmEx extended warranty. Here are the highlights:

Earn 50,000 Membership Rewards (MR) bonus points after application and spending $10,000 in your first five months of Card membership. That is enough points to convert to enough frequent flier miles (50,000) for two airline tickets or $500 in gift cards. Actually, after spending $10,000 and earning a point per dollar, you’ll earn a total of 60,000 MR points for another possible $100 in gift cards to retailers like Gap, Home Depot, Zappos, Olive Garden, etc. As a backup, you can use 50k points to buy $350 of anything from Amazon.com. Existing American Express OPEN Gold Card members are not eligible for this offer.
The annual fee is $0 for the first year of card membership, and $175 thereafter. This way you can try out the card for a year for free, get the 50k points, and then decide later if you wish to keep it.
Triple points on airfare. What makes this card “new” is that you can now earn triple points on airfare as well as double points on advertising, shipping, and gas purchases on the first $100,000 of eligible purchases in each category each calendar year. Everything else earns 1 point per dollar spent.
Limited time offer, they even explicitly reserve the right to end it early in their fine print. Otherwise, ends 11/28/2011.