What's In My Wallet - Summer 2026 (Maximizing Points)

[00:01] do another update on exactly what's in my wallet and the credit cards I'm using most value. So, let's jump right into things starting with credit card number month for new applications, and that is the Citi Custom Cash. So, the Custom

[00:15] Cash earns 5% back or really 5x Citi ThankYou points per dollar on your top cycle for up to $500 spent. And if you've watched my channel before, then card for one thing and one thing only to basically lock that in as my high spend

[00:28] category by default. the summer of 2026, one category I'm using this card for is that's because my wife and I find ourselves going to places like Home care of yard work around the house right now. So, locking in 5x back on that is

[00:41] pretty great. However, apparently the problem with that strategy of only using doing for years, is that I guess it was almost too easy for anyone to do that. realized that this card was overpowered because back in May, they decided to

[00:54] Now, the good news for me and many of you watching this who already got this still continue using it as normal with the same benefits. But, unfortunately, just planning on getting the Custom Cash and now they're kind of disappointed

[01:07] thing I want to mention is that as of the day this video is being uploaded, Citi is allowing product changes from a few other cards where you can still switch from a Double Cash or Sapphire Preferred, for example, into a Custom

[01:19] to still get this card if you want it, but you might want to take advantage of chat with Citi customer service to start the process of product changing, but as on when you're watching this. And by the way, while you're watching the rest of

[01:32] down below as well because it's completely free and it really helps to 300,000 subscribers by the end of the year, so thanks in advance for that. over to another card in my wallet right now that I love using for its changing

[01:45] course is the Chase Freedom Flex. So, 5x Chase Ultimate Rewards points per purchases in rotating categories each quarter after activating. And for Q3 of

[01:58] gas stations and EV charging, public United Way. Those are great categories for summertime, especially if you're with that live entertainment category. That covers stuff like concerts,

[02:11] parks. Or if you're going to be doing some road trips or a lot of driving, categories are going to be good as well. For me and my wife, we're mostly just bunch of other travel earlier this year, and we're also doing a big trip out to

[02:23] doing a lot of driving to and from the Jersey Shore to beach towns like Ocean City, Sea Isle, Avalon, and all those. If you're from the Philly area, then you if you see me on the boardwalk. But yeah, it's about an hour and a half to a

[02:35] several times this summer. So, that's going to really add up to a lot of gas Freedom Flex. Tolls can add up on roads like the Atlantic City Expressway as public transit category on the Freedom Flex this quarter is going to include

[02:48] as well as parking and garages on top of all the other public transit stuff. So, decided to include with this card for Q3. Now, one thing I did want to mention the credit card world that the Chase Sapphire Preferred got a major update,

[03:02] addition of gas and EV charging as 3x multipliers on that card. So, just a reminder for anyone who's excited to earn 3x back on gas and EV charging with want to actually hold off on using that card for those things until October if

[03:14] you also have the Freedom Flex as well. Also, depending on when you're watching launched on the Sapphire Preferred for a limited time. So, if you want to see as well as some of the other cards mentioned in this video, then as always,

[03:26] below in the description where you can learn more. Using those links is the addition to subscribing to get us up to 300k subs. So, thank you as well to next up here, let's talk about one more Chase card that's in my wallet for this

[03:39] wallet, and that is the Chase Sapphire Reserve card. And the main reason this my wife Jackie just got it the other month to take advantage of a different available. And currently, we've got a few thousand dollars left until we've

[03:52] earn that bonus. Now, what I typically recommend and what Jackie and I do bonuses is we put almost all of our spending on each new card we get until we hit that requirement. And in this case, it's 150,000 points after $6,000

[04:05] again is no longer available. The reason we're doing that is because 150k points divided by 6k of spend is equal to effectively 25x points per dollar when the minimum spend. And 25x back obviously beats any multiplier on any

[04:19] that's the most efficient way to do things. But we had a few large expenses when Jackie got this card. So, like I said, we'll hit that minimum spend that's when all these other credit cards in my wallet right now are going to take

[04:31] you've seen any of my previous what's in my wallet videos, you might remember well. So, I just want to make it clear that even though we both have this card that next year to see if that still makes sense for us just like we

[04:44] re-evaluate any credit card we have year after year. Realistically, we do credits on the Sapphire Reserve to make the $795 annual fee worth it for at least one of us. So, for example, we use the credits for travel, the edit, Apple

[04:56] I'm talking about credits, I want to go on a quick tangent here with a warning this card for me because of an experience I just had with it. So, National Park, which was amazing by the way and I highly recommend it to anyone

[05:10] there, we needed to go out to dinner one night and so we were looking around at to myself, let me go ahead and just search online to see if there's any Sapphire exclusive tables program on OpenTable because I knew I can get up to

[05:23] Sapphire Reserve. I eventually got brought to this page here where it tables. And so, I scrolled down to where it says explore restaurants by city areas where Banff is actually located. And over there, I was happy to find one

[05:38] called Lupo, which was an Italian place. So, I thought that's great. I love Then after dinner, I paid with my Sapphire Reserve. I made sure there was account to receive this dining credit. And then several weeks passed by, but I

[05:51] never actually got that credit. So, I called up Chase and they told me, that's a part of this program for this credit." And what I found out by doing had to go through this website right here to search for restaurants, which

[06:03] side by side with that other page I went to, as you can see, both of them say top, which is what this dining credit's supposed to cover. So, I'm kind of mad something on OpenTable's end that Chase maybe just wasn't aware of because

[06:16] Sapphire Reserve on that page. But also, even if I did not run into this issue, I enough restaurants available to use this credit on, especially when compared to much easier to use on a couple of Amex cards. See, I wasn't going to make a

[06:31] dining credit of the Sapphire Reserve, so I figured I could just kind of vent year, let's go ahead and move on to credit card number four in my wallet the Bilt Pladium card, which still is somehow the most polarizing credit card

[06:44] months after Bilt 2.0 launched. So, on one hand, you'll see people like me and comment section here defending just how valuable this card is for earning 2x extra points you can unlock on rent and mortgage to make this up to an effective

[06:58] 3.33x catch-all card, which obviously is powerful. Not to mention, Bilt cash has points are still objectively the most valuable points currency out there have and the transfer bonuses they run. But on the other hand, there's people

[07:12] either paid by them to say whatever Bilt wants them to say, or they think they're matter what I talk about with the good things for this card or the bad things I'm never going to make everyone happy with this. So, I'm just going to keep

[07:24] have here on this channel and give you guys my thoughts from the middle with any card. That way, I can just leave it up to you to decide for yourself whether because I will always say that credit cards are a very subjective thing. So,

[07:37] what works for me might not work for you and vice versa. But for right now, here I'm continuing to use the Bilt Rewards as my catch-all card, earning that effective 3.33 x points per dollar on everything for up to 75% of my mortgage

[07:50] the math in more detail, then I'm going to link a video somewhere on the screen description, where I just go over how all that works. Now, one other card next wallet as well, because I've been testing it is the Robinhood Gold Card.

[08:03] bigger and bigger fan of recently for what it offers as a cash back alternative to something like the Bilt Rewards or any other points and miles earns 3% cash back on everything, which is super simple and honestly amazing

[08:16] You don't have to think about what categories to use this card for, and you fee, either, because it's only 50 bucks per year to pay for Robinhood Gold, ways that this $50 effective annual fee on this card can be offset, which I'll

[08:30] soon. But, that's really the main reason it's here in my wallet because I just finally able to get off the waitlist for this card after like 2 years, which of negatives I'll talk about in my review. But, yeah, it's a great card so far,

[08:43] do prefer to earn points and miles with the elevated rates and all the other And next up here in my wallet is going to be another card that I think still right now, and that would be the American Express Gold Card that always

[08:56] Gold earns 4x points on restaurants worldwide and groceries at US other multipliers as well, but the 4x multipliers are really the only reason to make sure that I'm getting enough value from the credits in this card in

[09:09] order to justify the $325 annual fee, but lately I've actually been pretty Uber, Resy, and Dunkin' credits, which all add up to $424 in annual value. So, those credits, I'm still able to come out ahead or very close to ahead of that

[09:23] this card, I also like to mention Amex offers that you'll find here because another 50 to 100 additional dollars every year with my Amex Gold. There's a out of this card as well, so I'll go ahead and link another video on the

[09:37] description that goes over the 10 things you must do if you want to get max value business credit cards I'm using right now, there's really two cards that I which would be the Amazon Business Prime Card, as well as the Chase Ink Business

[09:50] annual fee, and basically what I've been doing is just using that Amazon Business other stuff that I buy for my business through Amazon to lock in a guaranteed 5% cash back. But then for everything else, like subscriptions, newsletter

[10:04] newsletter and a bunch of other random stuff, that's usually just set up to get charged to my Ink Unlimited card to earn 1.5x Chase points per dollar. Now, I'll and it might make more sense to earn 2x points on my Amex Blue Business Plus

[10:17] over. But I just have a lot of Amex points right now and almost no Chase a lot of my Chase points before the recent Hyatt award chart updates. So, for right now, I'm okay with earning that 1.5x on my business spend because

[10:30] points at a 1:1 rate over to Hyatt because I do have the Sapphire Reserve. with me in my wallet, I always like to mention the Schwab Bank Visa Platinum Bank Investor checking account, and I've only got this card for one reason. That

[10:44] fee rebates for cash withdrawals worldwide, and that's a benefit I past as I've traveled around both the US and other countries as well. Now, I only checking account, but it is good to know that if I ever need cash, I can just

[10:58] I'm going to get reimbursed by Schwab for any fees that I get charged. So, well because I'm always curious and I love hearing from you guys. And also, I credit cards for myself, but if you want to hear why they might actually be a bad

[11:13] and check out this video over here on the screen next. But as always, thanks so much for watching, and I'll see you in the next one.