Amex Gold vs Chase Sapphire Preferred 2021

hey everyone welcome back to the channel so in today's video we're gonna be comparing two of the most popular annual fee credit cards the amex gold card and the chase sapphire preferred which was just recently updated earlier in 2021 to include some new features now both of these credit cards can be very good if you understand their points or any categories and their other benefits and how those things fit into your overall spending habits so hopefully the information that we're gonna talk about here in this video will be helpful for you to understand those things that way you can determine if one of these cards or both of these cards are worth it for you now let's first start off this video by going over everything that you need to know about these two credit cards and then i'll get into who these cards are best for so the amex gold card comes with a 250 annual fee but it also comes with two annual credits that can really help you to offset the annual fee there's 120 in uber credits that you can use on uber rides and uber eats and then there's also 120 and dining credits that you can use with select dining partners that include grubhub seamless the cheesecake factory ruth's chris steakhouse boxed and participating shake shack locations both of those 120 credits are split up over the course of the year into monthly use it or lose a credits meaning that you're gonna get ten dollars in uber credits and ten dollars in dining credits each and every month and if you don't use those credits by the end of the month then they will not roll over into the next one and you'll get no value from them if you manage to get the full value out of all those credits throughout the year then you can lower your effective annual fee on the amex gold card from 250 per year down to just 10 per year but like i've talked about in some of my previous videos i don't think that everyone out there is gonna remember to use those credits every single month and maybe some other months they're just not getting the full value out of those credits so i think that ten dollars per year as an effective annual fee is a little bit optimistic but i do think that most people will get it close to that range as long as you're remembering to use those credits every month the amex gold card also has some very good points earning categories where it earns american express membership rewards points and i'll explain in just a bit here how you can value those points and how you can redeem those points as well but this card is going to earn 4x points on dining including takeout and delivery forex points on groceries that you purchase at us supermarkets on up to 25 000 per year in spending and then 3x points on flights that you book directly with airlines or on amextravel.com as well as 1x points on everything else 3x points on flights is pretty nice but where this card really shines is in that broader food category where it's earning 4x points on dining and groceries it is important to note here though that superstores and warehouse stores like target walmart and costco do not count as supermarkets so any groceries that you're purchasing there will not get you that 4x points there's also no foreign transaction fees a 100 hotel credit when you book two consecutive nights at a hotel collection hotel through amex travel baggage insurance secondary rental car coverage as well as some standard extended warranty protection and purchase protection now on to a brief overview of the chase sapphire preferred which like i said was updated earlier this year in august of 2021 so let's go over some of those updated features and benefits right now so the sapphire preferred has a 95 annual fee and it comes with one new credit that can be used to help partially offset that annual fee that credit is going to be a 50 hotel credit that you get on each account anniversary year for any hotels that you book through the chase ultimate rewards portal so if you book a hotel through that portal at least once per year then you should be able to get some good value out of that credit and lower your effective annual fee on the sapphire preferred from 95 per year to just 45 per year i do want to quickly mention here though that some people out there will say that that 50 hotel credit should not be fully valued at 50 just because the prices through the chase portal can sometimes be a little bit higher than the same price for the same booking that you find through other platforms but to be honest in my own experience the prices that i've seen in the chase portal have almost always been close to or equal to the prices that i've found for some other bookings at least for the hotels that i buy so i would say that the 50 hotel credit valued at that full 100 value is pretty accurate and for me that 95 annual fee is gonna be effectively lowered to 45 dollars per year for the points earning categories the chase app i prefer it has a few different ones now so it's going to earn you 5x back on all travel that you book through the chase ultimate rewards portal as well as 2x back on all travel that you book outside of that portal you'll also earn 3x back on dining including most takeout and deliveries 3x back on online groceries so that's again not in person groceries and not counting those places like target walmart and costco 3x back on select streaming services that's going to include netflix hulu and spotify and a few others as well as 1x back on everything else some of the other benefits of the chase sapphire preferred include primary auto rental coverage which i've talked about in some of my previous videos and is better than that secondary auto rental coverage that comes with the amex gold card there's also no foreign transaction fees trip cancellation and interruption insurance and a few other travel insurance related benefits as well as your standard purchase protection and extended warranty protections that you'd expect of course there's some other really great benefits on the sapphire preferred when it comes to redeem your points for travel which i'm gonna get into next year when comparing this card to the amex gold card so when it comes to the different ways that you can redeem your points and what those points are truly worth with the amex gold card and the chase staff are preferred we're gonna look at the normal base welcome bonus offers as an example now both of these cards have had some very high signup bonuses throughout the course of 2021 with the sapphire preferred being as high as 100 000 points and the amex gold card being as high as 75 000 points but for the sake of this video we're gonna look at a standard welcome bonus offer of 60 000 points for each of these credit cards because that's the current welcome offer out there right now for the chase sapphire preferred after chase recently lowered it back down from 100 000 points to that 60 000 points and the amex gold actually does still have a 75 000 point offer out there right now but 60 000 points tends to be the standard offer for that card too so like i said before the amex gold card earns membership rewards points which can be earned by a few other american express credit cards out there as well and when redeeming those membership rewards points there's going to be a high focus on transferring those points out to one of american express's many travel partners because that's going to be where you get the most value for this points so let me explain why okay so when you're redeeming 60 000 membership rewards points here are a few of the main options that you have you can redeem those points by transferring them out to one of american express's travel partners like i mentioned where you'll get close to one to two cents per point so those sixty thousand membership rewards points become worth somewhere between six hundred dollars and twelve hundred dollars on average now i like to value my points more conservatively more in that one to one point five cents per point range and i recommend that you do the same because in order to get two cents per point or higher you're usually going to have to book things such as longer international first class or business class flights or maybe something like a luxury hotel stay and for me those are things that i'm not really doing much of right now first of all i'm not really traveling internationally too much because of the different things that are going on in the world but even if i was i'm not really flying first class or business class flights i usually just book those economy or cheaper seats because i'm really just trying to offset the travel cost associated with going to new places and then using those points to essentially travel for free so for me personally i'm not getting that two cents per point or higher but i know that a lot of other people out there like to do that so just ask yourself what you want to be using those points for and then value those points according to your own situation now if you're not transferring those membership rewards points out to those travel partners then what you're really doing is devaluing the points in your account since you're only going to be getting close to 0.7 cents per point for any travel that you're booking through the amex travel portal sometimes you can get close to one cent per point for certain flights but i personally don't use my points for these things since i know i can get more value out of transferring those points out to those transfer partners so those options at that 0.7 cents per point valuation make that 60 000 point welcome bonus only worth somewhere between 420 and 600 depending on the type of travel that you're able to book through the travel portal layer with american express so again not a great option you can also redeem those membership rewards points within your american express account for a statement credit but this is going to be the worst option out of everything in this video because you're only getting 0.6 cents per point for that statement credit so those 60 000 membership rewards points that you're getting as a welcome bonus are only going to be worth 360 dollars so again you're much better off transferring those points out to the travel partners instead of doing something like a statement credit you can sometimes also use those points for shopping at places like amazon.com so maybe you'll see that you can pay with points at checkout but i would not recommend this because you're only going to get close to 0.7 cents per point there or sometimes you can buy gift cards where you'll get close to one cent per point when you buy these gift cards through american express so again good options for some people but really not getting the most value out of your points there overall from those examples hopefully you get the idea here that transferring them out to those travel partners is your best bet for getting the most value because that's what i recommend that you do and that's what i do so if you don't really travel that much or if you don't think that you want to figure out how to transfer those points out to those travel partners in order to get more value then maybe the amex gold card is not the best idea for you to get all right next let's look at the chase sapphire preferred and see what redemption options you have here with your chase ultima rewards points and right off the bat i will say that the chase alpha preferred has much more flexibility when it comes to redeeming those points than the amex gold card has so the sapphire preferred has a really cool feature where you can redeem your points through the chase ultimate rewards travel portal at a fixed rate of 1.25 cents per point that means that your 60 000 point welcome bonus is going to be worth 750 when you're booking travel through that portal for things like flights hotels or really any other kind of travel that the portal offers but like the amex gold chase also gives sapphire preferred card members the option to transfer those points out to one of chase's travel partners and you're gonna be able to do this at a one-to-one ratio to one of the many partners that chase lists on its website now the list of chase's transfer partners is pretty nice although american express technically does have a few more different options than chase does but redeeming those points through the transfer partners with chase is a good way to try to get more than 1.25 cents per point that you would typically get if you redeem those points through the portal like the mx gold transferring your points out to those partners on the sapphire preferred is gonna get you close to one to one point five cents per point at least that's what i found but you can get closer to that two cents per point like i mentioned before when you're booking something like longer international first class or business class flights that makes those sixty thousand points worth somewhere between six hundred dollars and twelve hundred dollars when transferring them out to those partners again all depending on the type of travel that you're looking to book and the amount of work that you're willing to put in to get the most out of those point valuations chase has also been offering a feature called pay yourself back which was originally just meant to be a temporary feature but it's now become this ongoing thing where chase is rotating in these newer categories every few months or so and the way this works is you can use the points within your chase account to pay yourself back for any purchases that you make on your sapphire preferred card and you use those points to pay yourself back at a rate of 1.25 cents per point so as of the filming of this video in late october of 2021 the categories where you can use your points to pay yourself back are going to be airbnb away travel and then towards select charities and those airbnb and away categories are only active until march 31st of 2021 so we'll see if chase decides to add any other categories where you can pay yourself back later on additionally chase also gives you the option to redeem your ultimate rewards points for a statement credit at a value of one cent per point you can also usually buy some select gift cards at a value of one cent per point as well compared to the amex gold cards statement credit redemption value of 0.7 cents per point i think that it's really great that chase gives you that floor value of one cent per point to redeem for a statement credit because i know that that's essentially like a cash equivalent to me if for some reason i'm not able to use my points to redeem for travel i could always just swipe that sapphire preferred card and then use the points in my account to pay off those purchases at a value of one cent per point okay so that pretty much covers all that you need to know about these two credit cards but now let's get to the most important part of this video which one is right for you well for the amex gold card i'd say that if you know you're gonna be using those uber credits and those dining credits as well as if you travel maybe a couple of times a year this card is sort of a no-brainer for you because those credits are gonna bring your effective annual fee from 250 per year down to close to just 10 per year and you're also getting those better redemption values for travel when you're transferring out your points but the downside is that you do have to figure out how to transfer those points out to the travel partners in order to get those good redemption values and you also have to remember to use those monthly credits or you're going to lose that value for the chase sapphire preferred this is going to be a good card for you if you don't want to have a high annual fee and if you also want to have some flexibility and how you can redeem those points that one separate point floor value when redeeming those points for a statement credit as well as the 1.25 cents per point fixed rate when redeeming those points for all travel through the chase portal are both very good features because it means that you don't have to work very hard to make sure that you're at least getting some value from those points i also recommend that you get the chase sapphire preferred if you're willing to get two other no annual fee credit cards alongside with it that work very well together which are the freedom flex and the freedom unlimited and these all work together in a setup called the chase trifecta which i made a video about recently that a link up here if you want to go check that out but this is a good setup that covers a whole bunch of different points earning categories and they allow you to combine your points all with sapphire preferred to redeem them at 1.25 cents per point through the travel portal or to get more value by transferring them out to some of those chase partners the primary auto rental coverage that the sapphire preferred offers is another really nice but underrated feature of this credit card and it's something that could potentially save you a lot of money if you find yourself renting cars a lot i also think that the average everyday person like myself can get a lot of good value from having both of these credit cards and that's what i have i have the amex gold card to cover my food expenses like groceries and dining out then i have my chase sapphire preferred along with those two other no annual fee chase cards and a chase trifecta setup to cover a variety of different points earning categories that way i'm maximizing the amount of points that i'm getting from those two systems with chase and american express i can use my chase points to transfer out to those travel partners or at least get 1.25 cents per point through the chase portal and then i can use my amex points to transfer out to those partners and get even more value in many circumstances so overall the amex gold card and the chase sapphire preferred are really good credit cards for many people out there especially if you're looking to reduce or offset some of your travel expenses but let me know down in the comment section below if you have either one of these cards or if you're considering getting them also be sure to go ahead and check out some of the other videos that i have here on this channel about these two credit cards that i'll put on the screen right now and be sure to go ahead and subscribe below as well for more content just like this as always thank you so much for watching i hope that you have a great day and i'll see you in the next video [Music]

Channel: Daniel Braun

Views: 58,744

Keywords: amex gold vs chase sapphire preferred, chase sapphire preferred vs amex gold, amex gold, amex gold card, amex gold review, amex gold benefits, american express gold card, chase sapphire preferred, chase sapphire prefferred, chase sapphire preferred card, chase sapphire preferred review, chase sapphire preferred benefits, amex vs chase, credit card, credit cards, best credit cards, best credit cards 2021, best travel credit card, amex gold vs csp, daniel braun

Id: AxiQrLkvAAE

Length: 13min 58sec (838 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 25 2021