Transparency is my thing, right? Are we not known for that yet? Well we should be. Carrie displays every tiny spend, and does more readable monthly summaries at her Freakin Flyers blog. But in this post I wanted to try to dig back before July, when we started posting all our stats.

The finds for how many miles and points we spend, might be shocking to you.

I’ll show every flight we’ve taken and go over the prices, then show every single hotel we’ve stayed at in a while, then go over the exact costs in points and dollars.

 

The Price of 3 Years of Flights

Here are all of our flights in pictures:

Here are some flight related prices for both of us:

• Total number of miles spent on flights: 904,000 miles
• Total number of US dollars spent on flights: $4,276
• Total number of flights: 110
• Total amount of US dollars spent of fuel surcharges: $0.00
• All of our flights were booked using United miles, AA miles, Southwest points, or BA Avios.

This shocked me.

I mean, I’m doing a bit of guess work on the flights. I have not been keeping track of this stuff like I have been with hotels, until very recently. But still, it’s pretty close.

So where did all my miles go? I know for a fact we earned over 1.5 million in our first year.

The more I thought about it, the more I realized how much went to our friends. For example, I flew one friend out to China, roundtrip, in business class. It cost me 200,000 miles. Then I flew a friend, and sister-in-law to easter island, in business class.

The more I think about it, I realize how quickly it goes… and how my friends have flown premium cabin as much as we have.

-_-

Still, all that flying for so little miles. Look at our flights. Then think about how easy it is to earn miles. There is no excuse not to travel the world. :-p

What saves us on flights?

The reason we’ve seen so much with so little is stopovers and crazy routings. Like look at our Pacific Hopper post. We did Guam, New Zealand, the Cooke Islands and Japan for 40,000 miles each in Business Class. Sooo much flying, for so cheap.

Another example would be how we flew (under the old British Airways scheme) to Easter Island with stopovers in Santiago, and Lima for only 20,000 British Airways miles (avios)! Incredible. And other tricks like the Caribbean Hopper and so forth.

What kills us on flights?

Short direct flights that miles don’t cover. I mean, this kills us, especially lately… since I got scared away from the Indian train. In one month in India we spent $350 each on tiny flights. $700 total. Plus, like $300 to get there. $600 total. Our India experience alone ran us $1,300.

Discount airliners like Air Asia and RyanAir are amazing. And British Airways Avios, to get from places like Budapest to Berlin (for 4,500 Avios)… this is huge. But when there are no OneWorld routes for Avios and no discount airliners, we either kill ourselves on busses or kill our wallets and fly. And to be honest, lately my tolerance for the bus thing has gone down (and yet we still had long busses in India too).

 

(Nearly) Every Single Hotel Stay of Ours

I started keeping a spreadsheet (I have tons of those) of every hotel stay, here is our specific breakdown for hotels, then I’ll sum it up.

HOTEL	WHERE	Total Points Price	Total $ Price	# of nights
Radisson Niagra	Niagara Falls, CA
Radisson Blu	Shanghai	18000		3
Park Hyatt	Shanghai	cert		1
Bali Hyatt	Bali	15000		3
JW Marriott	Bangkok	giftcard		2
Renaissance	Bangkok	giftcard		1
Courtyard	Bangkok	giftcard		1
Mayfair	Bangkok	giftcard		1
Holiday Inn	Chiang Mai		$45	1
Renaissance	Saigon	cert		2
InterContinental	Hong Kong	40000		1
Courtyard	Hong Kong	cert		1
Park Hyatt Tokyo	Tokyo	cert		1
InterContinental	Yokohama	giftcard		1
Marriott	Guam	cert		1
Hilton	Guam		$100	1
Hyatt Regency	Saipan		$80	1
Crowne Plaza	Auckland		idk	idk
InterContinental	Fiji	40000		8
Crowne Plaza	Queenstown		idk	idk
Hilton Kawarau	Queenstown		idk	idk
Holiday Inn Airport	Auckland		idk	idk
Radisson Blu	Sydney	10000	$100	1
Radisson Narita	Tokyo	?	$50	1
Ritz Carlton Central Park	New York	70000		1
Grand Hyatt	Santiago	20000		2
DoubleTree	Philadelphia		$50	1
Radisson Blu	Philadelphia	50000		1
Waldorf Astoria	New York	50000		1
Conrad	New York	50000		1
InterContinental	New York	50000		1
Crowne Plaza	New York	35000		1
Renaissance	Aruba	cert		1
Radisson	Panama City	28000		1
InterContinental	San Juan	BRG		1
Gran Melia	Puerto Rico		$100	1
Radisson	San Juan		$100	1
Fairfield Inn IAD	IAD		$60	1
InterContinental	Dusseldorf	BRG		1
InterContinental	Athens	20000		4
DoubleTree	Bucharest	BRG	0	1
InterContinental	Bucharest	40000		8
Courtyard	Budapest		$70	1
Radisson Blu	Budapest	9000		2
InterContinental	Budapest	BRG		1
Leonardo Hotel	Berlin	mistake fare	$27	8
Park Inn	Berlin	9000		2
Park Hyatt	Hamburg	cert		1
Leonardo Hotel	Hamburg	mistake fare	$8	1
Radisson Blu	Salzburg	84000		6
Crowne Plaza	Salzburg		$184	1
InterContinental	Berchtesgaten	35000		1
Hilton	Innsburg		$161	1
Holiday Inn	Salburg		$149	1
InterContinental	Vienna	BRG		1
Radisson Blu	Vienna	50000		2
Park Inn	Bratislava	9000		2
Radisson Blu	Budapest	9000		2
InterContinental	Kiev	85000		17
Crowne Plaza	Vilnius	10000		2
Crowne Plaza	Vilnius		$82
InterContinental	Warsaw		$300	3
Plaza On The River	London	100000		4
Holiday Inn	Swindon		$200	2
Hampton Inn	Corby	5000		1
Holiday Inn	Glasgow	10000		1
Holiday Inn	Edinburgh	17500		2
Renaissance	London Heathrow	cert		1
Holiday Inn	Paris	40000		8
InterContinental	Paris	50000		1
InterContinental	Paris	cert		1
InterContinental	Vienna		$300	2
Crowne Plaza	Salzburg		$142
InterContinental	Berchtesgaten	70000		2
EurHotel	Vienna		$40
Candlewood Suites	Hot Springs, AR		92	1
StayBridge Suites	Hot Springs, AR		$228	2
IC Sandton Towers	Johannesburg	10000		2
Crowne Plaza	Johannesburg	40000		2
Candlewood Suites	Dallas	20000		2
InterContinental	Guadallara		$100	1
Sheraton	Puerto Vallarta		$108	6
InterContinental	San Fran		$372	2
Candlewood Suites	Times Square		$228	2
Andaz Wall Street	New York	giftcard		2
? some place	Como		$50	1
InterContinental	Davos	50000		1
Best Western	?		idk
?hotwire	Venice		idk
Westin	Venice	20000		1
Hilton	Florence		$94	1
Garden Inn	Florence
Crowne Plaza	Rome	90000		6
Crowne Plaza	Milan	35000		1
Grand Hyatt	New York	giftcard		2
Grand Hyatt	Hong Kong	25000		1
Holiday Inn Express	Jakarta		$140	2
InterContinental	Jakarta		$180	1
Holiday Inn Express	Kuta, Bali		$168	4
InterContinental	Bali		$200	2
Hoky Homestay			$149	17
Hyatt Regency	Yogyakarta	10000		2
Holiday Inn	Singapore	20000		1
InterContinental	Mumbai, India	25000		5
Holiday Inn	Mumbai, India	15000		1
? some place	Udaipur, India		$26	1
Park Plaza	Jodhpur, India		$84	2
Holiday Inn	Jaipur, India	20000		1
Marriott	Jaipur, India	cert		1
ITC	Jaipur, India	3000
Park Inn	Jaipur, India	9000		2
ITC	Agra, India	8000		2
Country Inn & Suites	Katra, India	9000		2
Country Inn & Suites	Amritsar, India	27000		5
Radisson	Varanassi, India	15000		2
Park Inn	Kolkata, India	5000	$55	1
Hyatt Regency	Kolkata, India	8000		1
Grand Hyatt	Kuala Lumpur	cert		1
DoubleTree	Kuala Lumpur	2000	$41	1
Holiday Inn	Phuket Mai Khao	45000		3

Here are some facts:

• Total number of nights = 237
• Total number of points spent = 1,639,500
• Total number of US dollars spent = $4,663
• Average hotel star rating = 4.19
• Number of hotels visited = 120
• Number of hotels free = 81
• Number of hotels with breakfast included = 32
• Number of hotels with lounge access = 31

And guess how many points we earned this year via credit cards? A total of 173,000 hotel points were earned via credit cards. That’s it. If I were to break it down, it would be: 80,000 IHG; 33,000 Hyatt (from Chase), and 60,000 Club Carlson points. Before that 2 nights with the Marriott card and 4 nights from the Hyatt card.

What do these numbers mean?

If you take the total dollars spent ($4663) and divide it by the total number of nights spent in these luxury hotels (237), you would get $19.67.

$19.67 is our average price for a 4.2 star hotel.

That is hard to beat. And remember we’ve earned most of our points via paid stays, not via credit cards. Just by maximizing promotions from paid stays, we’ve earned over a million points.

Yes, we’ve blown 1,639,500 hotel points. But that statistic is irrelevant, what matters is how the total costs breakdown.

What matters is this…

Out of 120 hotels, 81 were free. That means 2/3 are free nights. So the question is when to use points vs paid nights. And it’s a tough thing to calculate the more you travel.

How many nights do you need – how many nights could you get with the points you have = how many nights you still need to cover.

–> So, of those nights you still need to cover, where in your travels should you pay for them?

And my over-simplified answer to that is this priority list:

1. If there is a great redemption where you are traveling, do that.
2. If there is a great promotion and cheap hotels do that.
3. If there is a decent promotion and decently priced hotels, do that.
4. If there are no cheap hotels, make the best use of your points as you can.

Now these priorities aren’t necessary for every stay, just for the number of stays you still need to cover. Maybe #2 should be; if you have enough points to last your travel, keep using points. Or maybe #3.

What’s left out?

Anything I can’t remember, which is mostly before I started keeping track. So a lot of little tiny hotels may be left out. We’ve stayed in hotels cheaper than cheap. We shared a twin bed in Thailand once for a hotel under $5 a night. I can’t remember the exact price and for sure can’t remember the name. So my average price per night would probably go down if we could remember further back, and the average “star” rating would go down.

Still these are the more recent and actual numbers. This could be done by anyone for this price!

 

Part 3, Card History

A lot of this is based on memory, but I bet I can come close to every card we have ever had.

Drew: Chase Freedom, British Airways, Chase Sapphire Preferred, United, Amex Plat, Amex Gold, AA Visa, US Airways card, IHG, Marriott (idk why), AA Business, AA Executive.

Carrie: British Airways, Chase Sapphire Preferred, United, Amex Gold, AA Visa, AA MC, Ink Bold, US Airways, Hyatt, IHG, Hilton Signature, SPG, Lufthansa.

Now this was more off the top of my head, since I lost that spreadsheet. But it’s probably pretty darn close to most all cards we’ve had.

In 2011 there were a number of cards that were 100,000 miles, like the British Airways (as usual), and Amex Plat. A number that gave 75,000, like the Amex Gold, and AA cards. Even United and Chase Sapphire Preferred had some big matched bonuses in the past.

And honestly, we slowed down a lot in the last two years. Just made sure we had enough and a little more. But lately, I’ve been tired of being close to miles broke (or any kind of broke) and will probably get back on the horse and get some new cards.

Annual fee’s we’ve paid: $95 Chase Sapphire Preferred, $69 Southwest, $99 Southwest premier, $89 Hyatt x2 years (done with that), $89 US Airways x 2 (dumb), $79 Lufthansa (first year), $85 Marriott, $50 Amex Plat ($450 – $400 in reimbursements (first year)), $250 AA Executive (first year)

$1,083 in fees.

I’m done with that crap. Cards actually worth keeping = none. You learn as you go though and I get pretty lucky with downgrades and what not.

 

Conclusion

Yes, we’ve spent about $8,939 on flights and hotels + $1,083. But we live in hotels and on the road. I don’t want anyone to think that they must muster up $10,000 to do a vacation. You could honestly recreate the free things we do for a 2 week vacation or even 2 month vacation and not spend a dime. A single dime, I believe that.

But for us $10,000 is cheaper than rent and a car and what not. Plus it’s way more fun.

So you could say that $10,000 gets you 271 days in 4+ star hotels and 110 flights to over 40 countries, in a short period of time. But if you plan to spread that travel out, it could be way cheaper.

Now we spend way more money on random things… I guess like everyone. And we spend waaay too much money on food. That being said, there is always a cheap option. Always.

Like at the InterContinental Fiji, down the road a couple of miles was a super cheap and good Indian place. Like a few bucks for both of us to eat. And the restaurant at the hotel was super expensive. We got a taxi every now and then and also got some food for the room in Europe since there are bakeries that have cheap sandwiches, and there’s always a home option… but we just don’t find it worth it, I guess.

Also, I didn’t talk it about it for a while, but our first year of marriage, we were super super broke. And yet, still traveled. We did things most people would not. Like go to the airport to spend the night when we were out of points in Tokyo. I kid you not. We’re now more likely to just spend the money. Those weren’t productive or fun days in Tokyo.

 

All that to say… You can do this at whatever price you want. We’ve hitchhiked and slept on benches and beaches. Or for shorter trips you could blow all your points and stay at the nicest hotels. Or for a little more money, you can live in 4 star hotels. Whatever price you want, I guarantee it’s possible.