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Rising Star
Why would you spend $500 on a credit card when you have zero income? Are you gonna go hang out in the lounge by yourself when none of your friends have access and are hanging at the gate like average travelers?
I really see no benefit to the card, other than I guess lounge access, so no idea why you would spend that much.
Chief
The math to break even straightforward.
At the end of the day, a $250 annual fee isn’t going to make or break your finances, so just go with the Reserve.
I had it and so did a ton of my MBA classmates - plenty of times I’d go out for dinner and everyone would put out that card at the end of the meal. I more than got my money’s worth of annual fees with the travel insurance alone (with so many trips there’s a good chance you’ll get sick or something will happen) and then on top of that saved a decent bit of money on occasions where I used points to book things. All in all the card and the benefits dovetail nicely with the business school lifestyle and you can get a lot of value out of it, especially considering the $300 credit balances out for much of the annual fee
Appreciate your input Mck1! This is really helpful
This is a math question. Calculate your personal expected spending in each category and thus your expected points earnings, and also add up the value of any additional card benefits that you expect to use. If these total to more than the annual fee, then it's worth it. (If there are any other cards you're considering, it's also worth doing this exercise with those to see which card would be the most valuable for you.)
I recently applied and got the CSR, the 300 travel credit drops the fee + doordash credits / membership with the Lyft pink membership takes up a big portion of that 250 remainder. If you plan to spend a lot on travel and food (which are the 3x point categories) then get it. otherwise, you should look at a card that focuses less on travel / food and more on cash back on everyday purchases. (Amex preferred is a good one i think with 6% on groceries). there are some youtube vids that can show you how to optimally use your cards! hope this helps and good luck!
It’s very helpful, thank you M1! That’s a great point about YouTube videos, I’ll have to look some up
I bought the chase reserve card when I got into consulting and absolutely loved it because of all the travel. Now that I’m going to an MBA program I’ll probably cancel it as I won’t be doing enough travel for the points needed to justify the fees over other cards. How much travel do you really think you’ll be doing as an MBA? A few trips will not make the cars worth it IMO.