Getting down to business (cards)

Good morning from the lovely Tokyo suburb of Yokohama.

If Tokyo were New York City, Yokohama would be Newark… except they’re allowed to pump their own gas here, like real grownups.

Here’s what’s on the menu today:

• 💳 How anyone can get a business credit card

• 🏨 How I’m hacking Hyatt’s new promotion

• 🖼️ Travel meme

💳 How anyone can get a business credit card

Many of you have reached out to us asking about business credit cards. How do they work? What is a “business” anyway? Why should I care?

Well, I’m going to answer all of those questions today, along with an exciting announcement…

First of all, let’s clear the air.

You do not need to own a registered business with employees earning millions of dollars a year to open a business credit card.

In fact, many of you probably have what banks would consider to be a business and don’t even realize it.

If you make ANY side or freelance income, you have a business.

If you have plans to make any side or freelance income, you have a business.

If you have ever sold an item on eBay, you have a business.

If you want to one day sell an item on eBay, you have a business.

If you sing opera occasionally, you have a business (no? just me?).

If you walk your neighbors’ dogs for $10, you have a business.

If you sell homemade woven baskets on Etsy, you have a business.

If you have a single homemade woven basket for sale on Etsy and have never sold one, you still have a business.

…

Are you starting to get the picture…?

Here’s the deal:

If you do anything resembling what I just described, you don’t even need to register a business.

Instead, you can simply become a sole proprietor (not to be confused with a soul proprietor, which is VERY different).

By the way - Soul Proprietor? EXCELLENT name for a metal band.

A Sole Proprietorship is basically just a person making a side income. It doesn’t need to be registered, you don’t need to have revenue coming in, and you don’t need an EIN (Employer Identification Number).

Instead, the business is simply attached to your personal Social Security Number.

This means that when tax time comes, you don’t need to do any complicated business taxes either. You simply file taxes for yourself and any business income is marked as self-employment income.

When filling out an application for a business credit card, you simply use your own name as the name of the business.

Honestly, that’s all there really is to it. It’s way more simple than you may have initially thought!

But now for the million-dollar question…

I’m glad you asked.

Business cards often have great offers and perks that you don’t get with personal cards. 

Additionally, they often pair well with personal cards from the same bank or points program, allowing you to further maximize your spending, earning, and redeeming.

To help you navigate this whole new world of travel hacking, we’ve created a page on our website that showcases our top picks for business credit cards based on current offers, perks, and more.

There are some pretty stellar offers right now, so I highly encourage you to check them out 👇

One final note about business cards (and another reason they’re so great) is that they don’t get reported to credit bureaus, at least in the U.S.

So if you’re worried about loading up on too many cards because of the effect on your credit score, this is one way to alleviate that stress a bit.

There is a LOT more we could talk about on this subject, but I’m already running out of newsletter space. So for now, we’ll leave it here.

🏨 Hacking Hyatt’s new promotion like a pro

Last month, I told you about Hyatt’s new “Bonus Journeys” promotion, which offers really good value in exchange for completing some stays this Spring.

I wanted to give you a quick update and tell you about a way that I just “hacked” the promo to get some amazing value so you can hopefully do the same.

In a couple of months, I’ll be in Sweden before my trip to Greenland. Specifically, I’ll be in Malmö, where there is only one major hotel chain with a property. Yep, you guessed it - Hyatt.

After looking at the rates for the hotel, I was deeply disturbed to see that four nights would cost me a staggering $1,056… which is, let’s just say, way too freakin’ much money.

When looking at the property, I noticed that the hotel is a Category 1 property, the lowest category of Hyatt hotels.

This means that regardless of the cash price, the points price should be low.

Upon further inspection, the property only cost 5,000 points per night for the same exact stay.

But here’s where things get interesting…

Hyatt is currently having a sale where when you buy Hyatt points, you get a 25% bonus.

My four-night stay would cost a total of 20,000 points, which, with this points-purchasing promo, only costs a grand total of $384, compared to the cash cost of over a thousand dollars…

That’s insane… But it gets better.

The promotion I told you about recently (read it here if you need a refresher) awards 3,000 bonus points for every two nights stayed at Hyatt hotels, including award nights.

That means these four nights I booked are going to give me 6,000 points back from the promotion, or a 30% return on the points spent.

Since Hyatt points are worth about 1.7 cents each, those 6,000 points are worth about $102.

So I’m spending $384 and getting $102 in value back, for a final net cost of $282 for my four-night stay.

This was me after I figured this whole thing out:

Of course, you’d also get those points if you paid cash. But even without those points, this method is saving almost $700.

Plus, the overall value of four nights for $282 (or $70 per night) for a $1,000 stay is some of the best points arbitrage I’ve ever seen.

So if you have any trips coming up in the near future, I highly recommend crunching the numbers to see if you can come out ahead on this promotion.

🖼️ Travel Meme

I recently discovered a whole new sub-genre of memes… Airline safety memes. And I gotta say, there are some gems out there.

That’s gonna finish off the day, my friends. I’m going to go visit the only place that most people know Yokohama for; the Ramen Museum. 🍜

While I’m doing that, how about you answer a quick question:

Take care and I’ll see you tomorrow morning ❤️

35.6762° N, 139.6503° E