Dropping high annual fee credit cards

If you want a bit of a shock, total up the annual fees you pay on credit cards. The number is staggering. But I always felt I got more than my money’s worth up until this coming renewal year.

Katy and I both carry Amex Gold, Platinum and Hilton Aspire cards. And I carried the Chase Sapphire Reserve for about three years before downgrading it this past year to the Preferred version. I think our reasoning is sound for the upcoming downgrades.

Amex Gold Card

When Amex eliminated the ability to redeem the Platinum and Gold airline fee credit for gift cards, it really cramped our style. We bought American Airlines gift cards for years and this last year switched to Delta gift cards. Now that is no longer available, the Gold card will definitely be gone.

We can’t use the $10 per month restaurant benefit and are not interested in Boxed. So without the airline credits, its annual fee is not worth it EXCEPT for the 4X on grocery and dining. If we manufacture spend $25,000 each in grocery again, that card and fee make still make it through renewal. A retention bonus will probably allow us to keep it another year.

Amex Platinum Card

The Platinum Card airline fee credit was $200 per year and that one is pretty tough to replace. I got a retention bonus last year, so no hope for this coming year.

The thing we’ll miss most about the Platinum card is we each had the Schwab version, which allowed us to cash in our Membership Rewards points to our Schwab accounts at 1.25 cents each. We can live without the Centurion lounges I guess. But we never got to use the Uber credit each month and that stung.

Hilton Aspire Card

The big fee on the Hilton Aspire Card was easily covered with the $250 airline and $250 resort credit. We are going back to Palm Springs this year, so the Diamond status will be nice. But without the airline credit and really a limited selection of eligible resorts for the $250 credit, this is probably the easiest one to eliminate.

Chase Sapphire Reserve

And I downgraded the Sapphire Reserve to the Preferred as we have so many miles that the $300 travel credit there was just extra gravy. We don’t need it with all the miles we’ve got and I’m glad to start thinning the pile so to speak.

We are all at different places in life and in the game. Our travel is declining as we age, and these seem like the right moves for us. If you disagree or have another option on how to get more value out of these high fee cards, we are open to your suggestions and input. OR are there other high annual fee cards where you can still extract freebies that cover the annual fees?

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