New roof equals 5 new credit cards!

For the last 12 months I have been diligently putting money away for a new roof. We knew it would be around 10000 dollars for metal kind, a good chunk of change. But since our mortgage is currently paid off, we had a surplus that we could channel towards that goal. I recommend, everyone saves money ahead for major repairs instead of going into debt. Of course, some things  break unexpectedly and there isn’t much you can do. But a new roof is usually a foreseeable expense.

So, the bid was 9500, just as we expected. Another thing that was expected:the guy didn’t take credit cards.  I asked him if I could pay for materials directly. He said he would check but didn’t think it was possible. We scheduled the job and I forgot all about it. Then a week later I got a call from the roofing supply company representative, who wanted to take my credit card info over the phone. I asked if there were any fees and he said no. Yay!

But I didn’t stop there. I asked if he could split the payment between 2 credit cards. You see, I was 1700 dollars short on each Amex SPG and Southwest card in order to fulfill my minimum spending requirements. The guy said, they accepted Amex and I could indeed split the payment. Now that is what I call a silver lining!

So just like that, we got our bonuses taken care of. The question was, which cards to sign up for next. I mentioned before that I don’t follow a set schedule but hop from one card to the next. I decided to apply for Citi Thank You Premier  Visa in my husband’s name. I got one for me a few months earlier.  The result: pending.

And the worst thing was, it said my husband had to call to verify some things. I described earlier how much he “loves” this hobby. So you can imagine my excitement over asking him to call Citibank, which I consider the dim-witted cousin of Chase.

Fortunately, he did agree to it. After about half an hour on the phone the agent approved him. Phew! Not sure what the problem was , but I suspect it was due to several cards we got lately from other banks. The lack of instant approval usually is a sign for me to slow down. Especially if the app is in my husband’s name. I tread lightly as not to irritate him too much with these sort of calls. And I never use the word “reconsideration”. 🙂

I also decided to get CITI Thank You Preferred card(in my name) and Chase Airtran visa (in my husband’s name), since I just got a Chase card not too long ago. Thankfully, both were instantly approved. If Chase card got declined, I was just going to let it be.  Since I have a CITI Premier  visa, I should be able to combine the rewards and redeem points for flights, netting more in value.

Chase AirTran card was a bit of an odd choice. I have actually passed on that offer previously, as described in this post, but decided to pull the trigger this time around. The reason? The annual fee is waived and the card will be discontinued soon. Plus, I have had most of the bonuses on my list by now.  I also picked up US Airways Mastercard, since it’s going away  and the spend is 1 dollar to get the bonus. All 4 cards approved!

Oh, and remember how I said, that occasionally I would break my rule of not taking on more, than our regular expenses, in order to get an unusually good bonus. Well, I got the Venture card with 50K offer (see my previous post), that popped up a few days after my app-orama. That bonus is increased only once in a blue moon, so I decided to pull the trigger. Result: approved! I will either buy Walmart or Amazon gift cards and possibly Vanilla Reloads, in order to meet the minimum spending requirements.

In my blog I try to cover long-term card choices, because at some point a family like mine, will run out of sign-up bonuses to apply for. If you are just starting out, it’s not an issue. If you have been at it for years like me, it’s on  the horizon. What I foresee happening is me lowering the bonus threshold to 200 dollars at some point in the future. But I’m not complaining. Free is free!

Picture credit goes to benchmark roofing.ca