At TPG, I spend a lot of time writing about airline and hotel loyalty programs. Yet I never expected to earn top-tier status through my lip gloss and travel toiletries purchases. Last year, I meticulously tracked every Premier Qualifying Point as I worked toward United Premier Silver status. I even booked a last-minute mileage run…

July was a good month for me. Instead of chasing dream redemptions and the ultimate lie-flat seat, I chased my friends near and far and remembered why all of this matters. A great hotel room is a dream, but so is sleeping on your friend’s couch. For me, July was a few nice hotels —…

The recent 100,000-point bonus offer on the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card just ended, and as we expected, many of our readers waited until the absolute last second to apply. In fact, we saw hundreds of link clicks after the offer ended at 3 p.m. ET on Thursday, July 30. And while the public offer has…