Getting Your Reluctant P2 On Board with Points and Miles

Ever wish your partner would just get on board with points and miles? 

You’re not alone! 

In this episode of the Lazy Budget Travel Tips podcast, I sit down with my husband, Brandon, to talk about his complete 180—from being totally against credit cards to actively strategizing when it’s time for us to open a new one. 

We’ll chat about:

• What the heck a Player Two (P2) is and why having one can double your points game
• The moment Brandon realized points and miles weren’t a scam
• How referral bonuses can stack up big time and make a huge difference
• Addressing fears about credit cards and debt the right way
• How we justify annual fees (hint: it’s all about the value)
• Some of our favorite trips we never would’ve taken without points 

If your partner thinks points and miles aren’t worth it, or if you’re trying to ease them into the game without overwhelming them, this episode is for you! 

Episode Breakdown 

• 00:00 - Intro & why this topic matters
• 00:59 - What’s a Player Two (P2) & why it’s a game-changer
• 04:46 - Brandon’s initial skepticism & first experiences
• 10:17 - The perks of having a P2 (hint: double the points!)
• 12:12 - Credit cards & debt: Breaking down the fear factor
• 14:07 - Our favorite points-funded trips
• 20:50 - Are annual fees really worth it?
• 26:03 - Confidence & discipline: Getting comfortable with credit cards
• 33:25 - Advice for P1s trying to get their P2 on board
• 39:29 - Wrap-up & final thoughts 

Got questions? Join the conversation in the Lazy Budget Travel Tips Facebook Group or hit me up on Instagram @travelingfranklins! 

Transcript

[00:00:00] Welcome back to the Lazy Budget Travel Tips podcast. I'm your host Genni Franklin from The Traveling Franklin's blog, Are you all in on points of Miles and know that having a Player two will significantly boost your earnings, but your P two just isn't on board yet?

Well, you're going to love this episode. 

I'm sitting down with my husband, Brandon, to talk about his journey with points and miles, and we're diving into how he went from being a skeptical, person about credit cards and this whole points of Miles game to now. Being the one to nudge me when it's time to open a new travel rewards credit card.

Hey Brandon, thanks for being here. You must really love me, don't you?

I do, I do. Thanks. [00:01:00] Before we dive into today's conversation, I just want to quickly explain what a P two is, especially for anyone who's not super familiar with the world of points and miles. for anyone who's new, a lot of people talk about points of miles, like a game. the first person to get into it is called the player one, or P one, which would be me and probably everybody who would be watching or listening to this podcast.

they're the ones that do all of the research. They're getting super excited and then wanting to get their partner involved as well, hoping that their partner's gonna be just as excited and gung-ho about it as they are. And that's usually not the case, but we call that person the player two or the P two.

They're usually the person who's a [00:02:00] little bit more reluctant. They don't really fully get the hype and they don't really wanna spend too much time on it, or they kind of just think, that's cute. Why don't you go do that? And I'm just gonna stay over here and just let you do that so you can be absolutely successful on your own as a P one.

Many people have done it. I was doing it for a while. You're probably doing it if you're listening to this. So. Getting your P two on board is really how you're going to be able to kick this game into high gear, and the reason is that when you work as a team, you can double your points earnings with really minimal effort.

For example, we've referred each other for credit cards, so not [00:03:00] only does one of us get a welcome bonus, but then the other person gets a referral bonus. Referral bonuses really, really add up over time. I mean, I know, I think this was last year, maybe it was the year before when we were really getting into the business credit cards.

I knew we were referring each other back and forth. We probably earned like 120,000 points on referral bonuses alone, and that's when one of the banks was giving like 40,000 bonus points for referrals. It's not like that anymore, but still like that's a lot of points on referral bonuses alone. But another benefit could be alternating between applying for credit cards because this helps avoid overloading your velocity, which is the number of credit card applications that you have within a short amount of time.

We always say that you wanna give it like 30, 60, 90 days, but you may have bigger expenses [00:04:00] coming up within that and you may not wanna wait. So having a P two that can then apply for maybe that same credit card that you have so you guys can do the referral bonus or get a different credit card while you are kind of waiting, really helps with your credit score.

And then also. It just helps you double the amount of welcome bonuses that you can earn. So really having a P two and if you're able to implement that into your strategy is really, really huge. So anyways, I just wanted to explain that for anyone who may not know what a P two is, um, but let's get into it.

So, Brandon, do you remember when we first started talking about points and miles and kind of like what your initial reaction was? yeah. So I mean, first of all, you're [00:05:00] welcome because I think I'm probably the best P two, to have. Um, wow. Yeah. but yeah, I think, I was, I don't, I don't remember exactly, but I think it was, 

A few years ago, and it kind of started off kind of what you alluded to, right? It was, you had this idea of, oh, you know, we can do this with points and miles. And I was kind of in that absent mindset of, okay, yeah, that's, you know, that's, that's cool. You wanna test out some credit cards or get some points.

Like, I didn't really understand the, did you think it was crazy? No, I, I wouldn't say crazy. Um, it was kind of, I mean, it wasn't like, you know, you want to go spend a bunch of money, right? Or do something really extravagant. It was like, I wanna make, um, are vacations easier to take?

Or I want to use these benefits. So I, I saw the, the value that you were trying to get out of it, but I didn't really fully understand it. So that's when I was kind of like, you know, I got my other things that I can focus on. [00:06:00] You can, you know, kind of do your thing, right? So, mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. So do you remember 

The first trip that we took when I used points, I couldn't pinpoint it. No. Um, not the exact one, but I'm sure you told me about it. Right. And said, oh well this one we're booking all on points. And I'm like, okay. Yeah, that, okay, cool. Yeah, no, it was a good 10 ish years ago when before we even got married, we were planning a trip to Europe.

And that was the first time you were going to Europe? I think I was, I was going on like it was like an alumni college alumni trip, and I'm like, Hey, do you wanna go to Switzerland? And you were like, heck yeah. I wanna go to Switzerland. And I was just getting into points and miles with credit cards and I was like, oh, well we're spending all this money anyways.

I don't really know what everyone's talking about out [00:07:00] there with like. There's just a lot of complicated strategies out there and I'm like, well, I could just apply for this one credit card, use it for the expenses that we're already doing and see if I earn this welcome bonus. It was 60,000 points at the time.

And then maybe I can, maybe we could do a trip to London while we're already in Switzerland and then hop over to London and then so the Marriott in Kensington, we got that free with free breakfast with points of miles. So Yeah, I think things like that started to make sense for me too.

Like instead of trying to, you know, uh, get a bunch of points to then plan a trip, right? If you already have a trip planned right, and then you're gonna be going on this trip anyways and spending money at the hotel or you know, with kids to do stuff or meals and things like that, then. The money you're gonna spend, right?

You could use a [00:08:00] credit card for that to help start to gain points for the next trip, right? So you can kind of start small, you know, maybe if that, if that works for you, kind of start small that way to see it, um, see it in action kind of thing. Yeah, absolutely. Because for me, and I think it was for it, prob might be for you too.

And like a lot of people, it doesn't really click until you really do it yourself. it was really cool and stuff to see these people taking out all these credit cards and doing crazy things with all these points and stuff. But for me, I was hooked after we got those three nights in London for free.

Like I was in it and that was because I actually did it for myself. what about for you? how did you feel about credit cards before this and at what point did you start paying attention and saying yes, this would work for us? Yeah, so I'll start at the, most recent and then go back in time.

So I think when it clicked for me is similar to, like you said, when you actually [00:09:00] see it, right? Like when I applied for my first card and actually went through, setting up, the bills that I would pay to actually hit that bonus. So you actually see it, in your account, You see the progress you make and then you see the points come in.

Whereas before it was, abstracted away where you're like, Hey, we got all these points. I'm like, I don't see it. I don't know. Okay. it was kind of just in the background type of thing. but where my hesitation was growing up my first credit card in my teenage years, it was, free money to me, right?

And as you grow up and become an adult and actually have. Responsibility, you realize, okay, yeah, this $600 limit I got on a credit card isn't, you know, free gas. It's not free movie nights out with the boys type of thing. It's, uh, you know, something you gotta pay for and if you don't pay for it, then they're gonna charge you, you know, a heck of a lot interest for it, you know, upwards 20, you know, 25%.

So, um, that, you know, we'll get into, you know, how [00:10:00] you need some discipline for that too. But I was hesitant to, to get my own credit cards for that reason, uh, until I built up that confidence and discipline to then do it myself. And then I think we're in a pretty good spot now to, to continue that. Right?

Yeah. Uh, so what would you say your thoughts were when I asked you to apply for your first credit card travel? Uh, I think by, I think by that time I was, I was in it because I had seen the value. Um, you know, from what you had already done. Mm-hmm. And when it was kind of explained to me at the, you know, explain it like on five level, you know, which I'm a fan of, it's, uh, you're gonna be spending this money anyways, right?

You already, you have bills, you have fixed amount of, you know, utilities and mortgage and things like that, or rent, like any of that stuff that you're already gonna pay. If you can pay that on a credit card, [00:11:00] then you, you know, you're already gonna be spending it, so why not benefit from, you know, those repeat expenses that you're gonna have, right?

So that kind of clicked for me. And so when you said, Hey, it's time for you to apply, you know, if we spend this amount in three months, we get this many points. And then I just had the follow up question of, okay, well what do those points get us? Well, that could get us a free, you know, three or four night stay somewhere.

I'm like, okay, well that started to make sense to me, right? Mm-hmm. Yeah, I'm already spending the money anyways. Why don't I benefit from it? So I was like, all right, I'm down. So we have I know that there's a lot of people, like in the Facebook group and a lot of people that I talk to, they will say to me, listen, I'm all into this.

I know that applying for credit cards, it's not gonna hurt my credit score. It actually could improve it. I know that if I have another person appli, like doing this with me, then we can [00:12:00] really double our points earnings and, you know, really not spend more than we already are going to, but my partner is.

Totally and utterly against credit cards. Mm-hmm. And their main reason is they don't wanna get into debt. What would you tell that person? Uh, I mean, I kind of lived that, so, I mean, really what I had to do was I had to build my own confidence and discipline and really that just come down to, you know, growing up around how I, leverage debt.

Right. So, it's just understanding okay, you know, if I can leverage somebody else's money to pay for things that I need to pay for anyways, and then I can benefit from it, then that's what I'm gonna do. Right. And yeah, it's someone else's money for the time being, right?

Like, you [00:13:00] obviously have to pay it back. But you are just leveraging it in the interim. So that kind of the growing up thing, the building up that confidence and actually seeing it happen, I think helped me too, right? Like seeing the actual numbers. So right. if you had come to me, and like show me, okay, here's our bank statement, 

Here's how much we spend anyways, and look at all these points, and then here, let's go into the portal and let's look at a hotel and we can redeem, you know, we got 80,000 points. You want to go on a staycation, to Miami, Orlando, whatever. And look, we can stay for free for three nights at, this regency or wherever, 

You go, oh, you know, I complete the full circle in my head, right? Mm-hmm. So then I can get on board. Um, so I think, I hope that kind of answers the, the question aroundabout way. Was there a trip that we took? 'cause I know you don't remember our first trip where it hooked me. Like, you don't remember that.

You, you remember the trip, [00:14:00] obviously? Yeah. You just don't remember that we did it on points and stuff. So like, what was the trip for you? 

Uh, that was when we went to the ranch in Colorado because I was, I was blown away by the experience there. Like the attention to detail that they had was an intimate setting. We were like completely off, well, not really off the grid, but like out of cell service.

we were pretty off the grid though. Yeah. But I mean, we had running water and electricity, know? Oh yeah, I know. We were in the middle of nowhere and had no internet. Yeah. So when we were in Colorado, that's when it kind of clicked because you were like, look, this is how many points it cost versus how much it would've been dollar wise to spend a night.

So whenever we talk about, you know, that trip, we went out to Colorado and Wyoming, when we stayed at Rawah, we're like, this was crazy, because I think it was what, it would've been like 15, $1,700 a night or something like that. And then we spent like [00:15:00] a ridiculous 17,000 points. I don't, it was ludicrous. the dollar to point ratio 

That we got. Mm-hmm. Um, that's when it really clicked. I saw the value of that. And that was super fun, right? We did horseback riding and fly fishing. So, I mean, we had a blast. Um, that was a good time. Yeah. So, That was Rawah Ranch in Colorado. Yeah. And, uh, yeah, so we used Hyatt points. they no longer partner with Hyatt. it was through the small Luxury Hotels partnership that Hyatt had, just to give people a little bit of background on that redemption because it was pretty cool. so yeah, they're through the small luxury hotels and that was a partnership that Hyatt had.

And they no longer have that partnership. That partnership actually went to Hilton. So you can still do that just without Hyatt points. You'd have to have Hilton points. But [00:16:00] we stayed there for three nights and we spent 105,000 points for three nights and $0 It was a luxury ranch experience.

Yeah. So we stayed in a luxury cabin. They had coffee service for us every morning that they brought out to the cabin. We had our own golf cart that we could use for those three nights. We had chef prepared meals for each meal of the day. Uh, they had entertainment for us. I mean, we had like an astronomer, is that what they're called?

Yeah. And that guy that came with the, uh, lady with the fiddle too, right? Yes. Yes. She had like a private Concert. Yeah. that was, that was a blast. Yeah. That was really cool. So, I mean, that's. Definitely an experience that I would say would for anybody be like, okay, yeah, I'm in.

[00:17:00] Yeah, for sure. Yeah. And for me it was just three free nights in London. But it just goes to show that it can be like those three free nights in London for your P two. Right. Like it could be that, where you just have to show them what points and Miles can do for them. And just knowing that you can get.

More for your money. I mean, like with inflation and with things just generally getting more and more expensive. You want your hard earned money to stretch as far as possible, right? Yeah. That's where it clicked for me too you know, I'm the data guy, right?

So I wanna see, okay, I would've spent this much money, but instead I didn't have to because we spent this points and then what did we spend to get those points [00:18:00] money we were gonna spend on shit anyways? Yeah, a hundred percent. 

I'm the si, the silent P two. Well, I'm a little more active now, So what do you mean You're a little bit more active now. Would you just let, let them know? Like what, what you mean by that? Oh, now I'm the one thinking about, oh, like did we apply for a credit card too recent?

can we apply for another one because, um, you know, we have this expense coming up and I haven't, I don't, I don't know which one we should apply for, but I'm thinking about it if we're gonna have to spend, um, some money anyways, because, you know, meat's getting low in the deep freeze, so we want to get a quarter cow or something.

Right. Like, do we need to get a credit card because then we can put it on that and then benefit from, you know, back again. Right. Like money we were gonna spend anyways and just benefit from it. So how long would you say it took for you to get to that point? Uh, well, I mean, if the first trip you did was 10 years ago, I mean, at seven, seven or [00:19:00] eight years.

So, once you showed me it, it was very quick, right? Like once I drew the dots together and built my own kind of mental model, then that was it. So yeah, it was definitely, for us personally, it was definitely a slow burn. But a lot of that had to do with the fact that I was learning it too.

Like I was also wrapping my head around it at the same time. so that's probably why it took so long. I don't think for everybody needs to, which is why we're kind of having this because I feel like if I would've, like you said. Seven years ago been like, look, this is how much money, like this is how I got the points.

This is how much money I would've spent for this hotel stay versus using points. Like if I would've explained that to [00:20:00] you, then you probably would've been on board a lot sooner. But yeah, like I didn't really, back then, I didn't even know what a P two was. To be honest, I was just kind of like doing this.

So I think that's good to have the difference between the P one and P two because I've definitely come to you before and been like, oh, well why I got this thing in the mail. And you're like, well, you know, this and that. And like, they have annual fees, but I'm like, oh, well, if we go to Disney, we can sit in like the grandstand.

So if they have fireworks and you're like, ah, but is it worth it? You know? So it's good to have the P one and P two like, you know, dynamic. I might have ideas, but you kind of are closer to the metal on it where you can say, okay, you know, that either makes sense or it doesn't make sense as far as, you know, the benefits versus the card that we're looking at.

Right. Whether it's a business card or whatever. Right. so yeah. Love the transition into talking about annual fees and there's nothing wrong with annual fees. I know we have a question about like, how do you justify [00:21:00] or explain annual fees to your P two? and I know for me personally, how I, me as a P one, how I wrap my head around annual fees and yea some credit cards have higher annual fees than others.

And it really depends on your lifestyle, what you are willing to do in order to justify those fees. Like if they have a bunch of credits, are you willing to spend a lot of time in making sure that you maximize every credit or are some of the benefits that the credit card has alone gonna just be worth that annual fee?

Yeah, and I think that the. Answer to whether or not it's worth it is gonna be different for each person and each, credit card as well, because all of them are different. Yeah. For example, the first credit card that I ever had. There's no, we, [00:22:00] especially in this game, it's I have a credit card.

You have a credit card. There's also authorized users, which is a whole other thing that we won't really get into right now. but yeah, if you're an authorized user, that doesn't mean you're a primary card holder. So it's still the primary card holders. But anyways, so the first credit card that I ever got for travel rewards had $95 annual fee.

And I know that I've kind of explained this to you like this before, it's like. It's like any membership sort of, right? Mm-hmm. Like you have a Costco membership, right? You're paying money to spend money somewhere else, and the reason why you're doing that is because you know that it's gonna be worth it to you.

So $95 annual fee for the first year, if I am able to meet the minimum spend for that welcome bonus, then I'm gonna get probably at least a [00:23:00] thousand dollars in travel. So Brandon, as the numbers guy, if I came to you and said, look, we can get a thousand dollars, but we just have to pay $95, what would you say?

I mean that Yeah, that's where, that's where it makes sense, right? Yeah, exactly. And then the other perks on top of it, if you get them right, but then I could see, like if you look at some where it's like, oh, this is six or 700 bucks a year, then that's where it starts to get a little. A little different.

Right. But you'd have to look into more detail as to what that, that offer is, or that card, right. So, right. Yeah. Specifically, like I said, it really depends on the credit card offer. And, you know, $695 is a lot of money for an annual fee. But again, if you travel a lot, and you'll be able to go to those airport lounges, or if you already spend money at the [00:24:00] places that they offer credits, and it's really not gonna be that much of an effort.

For you to be able to maximize. I mean, I was talking to somebody on a podcast the other day and they were telling me that they have an airline credit card that was like a $500 annual fee and they have a fear of flying. and they said that they go to the, every time they fly out, they always fly out of that same airport.

So they can always go to that same lounge. And they said to have that space where they can be before their flight is to them alone is worth it. And sometimes it isn't just about the hard data, it's more about what you hold valuable. we can talk about for you Brandon, like when it comes to flying overseas and really long flights 

you wanna be comfortable, right? So we are going to the UK in October and we spent points for [00:25:00] Virgin Atlantic on upper class, and What if I told you, hey, we had to get a credit card that was a $695 annual fee in order to hit the bonus for us to get those business class flights for pennies on the dollar.

How would you feel about that? yeah, I mean, I'd probably still try to quantify it somehow by numbers, right? Like, okay, if we have to spend, this annual fee, but then if, the points we get are gonna be more valuable than if we just had to pay in cash for the tickets, Because I don't want to compromise on, 

That experience while flying, then that's gonna make sense to me. but you bring up a good point that it might go beyond just the dollar value redemption and dig a little deeper into, your own comfort level. mental health.

Right. when you wanna fly, because I have one of my best friends will not fly. Um, [00:26:00] so he's in that same boat, So, all right. between me and you, how many credit cards do we apply for per year, and how do we kind of space out the cards?

do you know the answer to that? I know the answer, but do you know, I'll take a guess. I think it's about every three months. We try to apply for one and then we alternate, right? Mm-hmm. So, because we both have businesses, if there's, an offer for a business card, then I'll apply for a business one, and then we'll kind of roll with that, make sure we hit the minimum spend, and then once we're in a comfortable place, then I can, refer you to the other one.

And then once we hit that, at least that works for us, right? Is kind of rolling them, rather than, oh, I'm gonna apply for two at the same time. Because then we would have to struggle to hit that minimum spend and have to go find ways to spend money to hit the minimum spend. And I don't think that's a good idea for [00:27:00] us, or in my opinion.

I don't think that's a good idea for anybody who's, you know, trying to justify spending money to hit a minimum spend. is that accurate? Yeah, so I mean, like, that's kind of a, it's like, it's kind of like once a quarter, maybe we get one. Yeah. but that's because we will have like car insurance that we're paying.

Um, and then at the end of the year we have like property taxes, so we usually have bigger expenses coming up, to justify getting a new credit card and then being able to space those out like that. So I would say three to four a year, in the last couple years, I think so. But like we, there were some years there where I applied for one credit card, like the whole year.

Yeah. It really just depends on your comfort level and Yeah. You know, it took us a while to get to this point, you know, and I think starting slow [00:28:00] is really what's gonna help with the long term strategy, because I know we've talked about this, we're really in this for the long game and this should be a long game, to be honest.

I mean, you're talking about your credit score and stuff, like you wanna make sure that you have those. The foundations kind of laid down because yeah, I mean, there's a lot of people who are like, oh, I was applying for cards and now I got denied because of velocity and mm-hmm. Or like, oh, I wasn't paying off my credit card statement on time and in full, so now my credit score took a dive or whatever.

You know, you really wanna make sure that you know those things. I mean, we can talk about the, you know, the benefits of points of Miles and how amazing they are all day long. But if you don't have that foundation built prior, then you know you're probably gonna sink pretty quick. [00:29:00] Um, so it's just like. A good idea to just really do what's best for you and in order for you to know that you would need to kind of build that foundational knowledge, which is one of the reasons why I have the podcast and I am, you know, gonna, I'm releasing episodes that are like foundational knowledge and then bringing in people like you to kind of like, also put like relatability there as well because talking about concepts is great, but then you really wanna hear like what real people are doing.

So anyways, I hope that that answers the question long windedly. Well, I mean, most people go on vacation, you know. They try to go once a year, right? So you think even if you apply for a new credit card once a year, right? To build that foundation, like you said, that could significantly take a chunk out of the expenses that you would, [00:30:00] you know, be spending on that vacation.

And you're gonna get that from the expenses you already pay for. So, back to what we're talking about, that's where it kind of clicked, right? Like, if we're gonna go on vacation and I can use points for that, why not use that to my advantage type of thing.

Okay. So

let's talk about like some fun stuff. So like, if you could pick one free flight anywhere right now, where would it be? Japan. Yeah. And we are working on that, aren't we?

We have been, yes. Stashing our points and I'm just doing some research and, you guys will be hearing about all that planning very soon, but Japan is definitely high on the list. And then, like, were, were there any besides Rawah Ranch that you would wanna say that you remember that we used points for that was cool?

Um, [00:31:00] or is that like really the one Yeah, that one sticks out the most just because the, the value I, I think was, was through the roof, right? And the experiences we were able to have there and the fact that we would not have been able to afford it if we didn't have the points to use for it. Right. So we're able to leverage points, we got to.

Have an experience that we couldn't afford. But the only reason we got that is because, you know, we were able to take out cards and, and use the credit on 'em for stuff we were gonna pay for anyways. Um, I did like where we just stayed at the, the Hyatt Grand. But, um, that's just because that was recent.

That was like a little staycation that we had where we went to Orlando and did not go to Disney. So it was nice to just kind of chill, uh, go to the beach and go on the hammock and just kind of hang out and read. So that was nice because it was, hey, we want to do something just [00:32:00] for us.

And you know, we were able to do it without, you know, any cost other than gas. Right. and a night out, uh, and dinner. So, you know. Yeah. I'm glad that you brought that up. So we stayed at the Hyatt Regency Grand Cyprus in Orlando, uh, last weekend, I think. Uh, it was recent. Yeah. I don't remember.

and it was, it was a semi last minute decision. I mean, we had booked it a few weeks in advance, but that's another thing about Points and Miles that I would like to touch on. Is that like, it doesn't have to be for these luxurious trips or business class flights? Yeah, I mean we were just, we had such a busy month, like busy, busy holidays and January came and it was super busy.

Then it was February and we were just kind of like, wouldn't it be nice for us to just kind of just get away and just like relax and it was gonna be [00:33:00] $757. I think I checked when I was booking it was gonna be like $757 to stay two nights at the Hyatt Regency Grand Cyprus. But we paid $0 and that's thanks to Points and Miles.

So like just being able to do that. Is pretty priceless to me. Right? Yeah. You know? Yeah, I agree. So that was pretty cool.

Brandon, so for anyone who's listening to this, if there's one piece of advice that you would give a P one or their P two, if we were add a a Points of Miles meetup, which you figured out that that was a real thing a couple years ago.

Let's say we're at Points of Miles meetup and we're talking to a P one and a prospective P two, if you could give either of them or both of them advice coming from us, um, now [00:34:00] that I believe that we are a pretty successful team at this, what would you tell them? Well, 

there's kind of two parts to that answer from me, right? Like, so to the P one that's trying to get into it or go into the meetups and thinking about how to do it, uh, it can definitely be overwhelming. I mean, I was overwhelmed when I went to some of the, things we've been to and listened to people talk about it, and it's like, I don't know, half the stuff they're talking about.

But, so for the P one, I would say it doesn't have to be, you know, zero to a hundred, right? Like, you can just start very small. Like we were talking about one for the year, right? And it's the money that you're gonna, spend anyways, right? And I don't know, I'm gonna butcher the quote, right? But it's like, you know, every journey starts with a first step or something like that, 

You know, every staircase is built one step, but that whole, you know, that whole stuff. So like, you just gotta start, right? And then when you see it. Actually happen, [00:35:00] then you're like, oh, I can do this. Right? Like, I got this. Okay. And then it's gonna snowball from there.

And then I think that kind of rolls into the P two is, uh, if the P one's trying to get the P two involved, uh, show them the proof kind of thing. Be like, look, you know, I've been looking into this, you know, if we, you know, spend this money and we can get this back, then, you know, that trip you want to go on, or we wanna take the kids, right?

Like, we can do that without spending that additional money that we might've been concerned about doing because, um, you know, we didn't have the extra funds. Well, this is a way to supplement that. And then once they see that, then they'll gain the confidence as well and hopefully get on board. Um, so that's kind of my take on it because that's what works for me.

I like to see, see the proof right. Um, the proof is in the pudding. Yeah. I mean, you can talk about the concepts, right, and the theory behind it, but actually seeing it [00:36:00] happen and experiencing it for yourself, I think that's where it, it kind of clicks, so, yeah, totally. And then like for anybody who says, well, you know, it's really hard for me to have a credit card and treat it like a debit card.

What would you say to them and like, how did you kind of get over that? Because I know that that's what you said in the beginning is that you were like, well, it's free money, you know? Yeah. I mean, for the longest time I had to use a debit card because I had to be strict with myself and say, I can't use a credit card because if it doesn't come out of my bank account right away, then I.

don't see it. Right. So it, I just had to, I just really had to grow up with it, um, and kind of build that self-discipline around my money in, in finance, because at least the, you know, public high school [00:37:00] I went to in college, I went to, they didn't teach you about financial literacy. Right. You kind of had to learn that on your own or, or, you know, experience it and live through it.

So I kind of had to grow up in that regard as far as, um, just being disciplined about spending money on things that you were gonna spend anyways. 

But as long as you pay your statement balance off 

On time and in full, you don't get any credit card debt. And it's something that takes time. I mean, you, you probably went many years in your twenties just using your debit card. So, I mean, and if it takes time for your P two, whoever's listening, if it's gonna take them time to kind of like learn that discipline, be that example, show them that you can do it and.

[00:38:00] Eventually it may click for them. And I know that listening to this, you may think, oh, but I don't have this time. I wanna earn all these points. But you can't push somebody to do something unless they want to do it. And, and one of the things that I've heard from other successful teams, and also what worked for us, is to just be that example.

Show them, you know, it's better. I think it works better to show than to tell, you know, instead of yeah, show and tell, like you wanna show them instead of just telling them. So just be patient and focus on you first before you can focus on that other person. Make sure that you know what's going on and you are comfortable, and then it'll be a lot easier to get your P two on board.

Would you agree? Yeah. And, and to that point, one of the things that you [00:39:00] showed me was also like your credit score, right? And I'm sitting there going, well, I'm just using my debit card that's not helping my credit score. And that also takes time too, right? So getting, getting that discipline and that confidence to then, you know, over time build up your credit score, right?

Because you know, you're, you're actually using a credit card rather than just your debit card and you have that confidence, then, um, you can start to build that back up. So, yeah. Totally. 

well thank you Brandon, for joining us today. You gave us a lot of really great information. I hope you enjoyed it. I did, I did. Thanks for having me. And then for those who are listening, I hope you loved this episode and it gives you the confidence to get your Player two or your P two on board with this whole Points and Miles game.

And remember, keep it simple, keep it fun, and [00:40:00] keep exploring. Make sure to subscribe to the podcast, leave us a review and we'll see you in the next episode. Thanks guys.