Launch HN: Roame (YC S23) – Flight search engine for your credit card points

> Airlines, especially US airlines are making billions of dollars a year by selling points to credit card companies. So in theory, they actually want as many people in the world of points as possible because they a consistent high margin revenue from credit card companies.

They want to sell as many points as possible, for as much as they can, and redeem them for as little as they can. (And in the middle, they want you to keep them as long as possible while they collect interest on the float while depreciating their value.)

> If the flight is only 50% full, then that points redemption is going to help amortize the large fixed costs of operating that half empty flight. So having a bargain points redemption rate, would look attractive. Now, if that flight is 90% full, then the airline may not offer seats to redeem with points or raise the price to something extremely high like 200,000 points.

I suspect the market for flight redemptions reflects this. The airlines would prefer that you can't redeem your points until the flight is absolutely unbookable by any more valuable means -- and for the airlines, essentially every form of cash booking is more valuable than points, since a "point" in your wallet means cash on their balance sheet. It's not in their interest to make cheap redemptions easy to find.

If I had to guess, the airlines that do early releases of award seats treat it as marketing expense. All things equal, they'd prefer that you have to hunt for them like truffles.

Edit: not sure if your comment was meant for me or timqin. Leaving it up just for general awareness

General tips:

  - Never carry a balance, ever.  If you do, forget about playing this game because it'll cost you more than you gain.  Pay off your CC debt first.
  - There are many blogs/sites that push "their" link over ones that pay more to the user because they get paid a hefty affiliate fee.  Be wary.
  - Have a goal in mind before you accrue points so you can be more strategic about accruing.  I recommend starting with a list of all the trips you'd like to take in the next two years and using that to frame what points you will need to accrue.  Don't forget hotels as the cost of hotels can easily outweigh the cost of flights.
  - Figure out how much work you want to put in.  There are levels to the game-the deeper you go, the more work it will be.  It will also get that much more rewarding
  - Prioritize transferable currencies (UR, MR, Cap1, TYP, etc) because devaluations happen often and transferrable currencies help insulate a bit.
  - Try to get your partner on board if at all possible, having a second (third, fourth, etc...) player (P2-P100+) is a scaling super power
  - Keep in mind the "burning" side of the equation and use them often.  Points and miles are worthless bits of made up paper dressed up as currency and subject to the whims of corporations that don't have your best interests in mind.  Treat them as such.
  

My general strategy for a (US based) newbie is:

  1. Read above, create a strategy and an ordered list of cards
  2. Sign up for the credit cards and put all your organic spend on those credit cards to meet spend.
  3. Repeat 1 & 2 after meeting spend and gaining sign up bonus
  4. If you have another player available, switch between players every time you meet the spend and get the bonus to lower your velocity and appear "safer"
  5. You might also want to get a (minimum) 2% everywhere card for everything you can't put on the new cards.

It can get a bit difficult as the minimum spend requirements can be high. There are many strategies out on the web that can help with this.

For a couple using this strategy, you'll be averaging ~2 new CC's per person per year (which is very safe) and earning ~7-10ish percent back on most spend. After a year or so of doing this, you should have enough for a vacation or two.

I get it where you’re coming from, but points travel could actually make air travel more efficient by helping fill capacity on planes.

Airlines would otherwise be flying planes with more empty seats without points redemptions. And airlines don’t like cutting routes because they will lost out to new competitors (JetBlue is a great example of a new entrant) or will lose their airport slots.

Thanks, great info.

I never accrued points wiht my CC. Is it really worth it compared to 1-2% cash back? I just collected by flying. You have to ask yourself: What do I want to achieve?

1. Fly free with points

2. Have gold status and access to the lounge, more luggage, faster check-in

1 is hard. It basically makes only sense if you really fly a lot and your company pays for it. 2 is easier, IF you chose the right airlines to collect points. This is a science but take this as a start: https://www.wheretocredit.com/

At one time I had all three alliances gold elite status (or equivalent). But I flew very little for free or discounted with points.

It always depends on your situation. But I had Turkish (Star Alliance) gold. And if I flew via Asia to Europe with Ethiopian Airlines via Addis Ababa (with nice stay overs), TK shitted me with points.

Feedback: if I select business/first as my search, please start by listing business/first flights.

As it stood, it started by listing off flights that were like: 85% economy / 15% business.

That's not what I was looking for.