Revolving credit card scheme...

[OneSickPsycho]

I was thinking today... Can you use credit cards to pay off other credit cards and manipulate the balance transfer, cash back bonuses, and other various rewards to end up even at the end... if not come out ahead?

My debit card gives me cash back of $0.03 per transaction with a limit of $250 for the year. That's 8,334 transactions per year. I have a credit card that gives me $25 gift cards for every $2,500 I spend with it...

I pay all my bills with the credit card, then immediately pay it off with my debit card in small enough increments to ensure I hit $8,334 transactions for the year... In theory I should save about $450 per year this way...

So what's the deal? If I got enough credit cards do you think it's possible to actually MAKE money through the manipulation of the system?

[Cutty72]

maybe... but that's a lot of fucking work.
and if you miss one payment or something, it's all for naught

[OneSickPsycho]

Originally Posted by Cutty72

maybe... but that's a lot of fucking work.
and if you miss one payment or something, it's all for naught

I was thinking that, but you could treat it like another job... I'd create intricate spreadsheets and shit to track it... ensuring I didn't fuck up... And if I did, what's one finance charge gonna hurt if I'm not really spending any money anyway?

[Phenix_Rider]

It's incredibly impractical and probably very illegal. You should know the house always wins for a reason...

[Cutty72]

Originally Posted by Phenix_Rider

It's incredibly impractical and probably very illegal. You should know the house always wins for a reason...

Impractical, yes...
Illegal? I can't see how??

[OneSickPsycho]

Originally Posted by Phenix_Rider

It's incredibly impractical and probably very illegal. You should know the house always wins for a reason...

I dunno about illegal... If there was a law against using credit cards to pay off other credit cards the country wouldn't be half as fucked in debt as it is!

Originally Posted by Cutty72

Impractical, yes...
Illegal? I can't see how??

And the question of practicality is all relative... How much work... how many hours of your day, week, year would it be worth to you to live your current or even an improved lifestyle, but pocket all of the money you take home from work...

[azoomm]

That's a lot of work for $450 a year.

If you have that much time, why not invest it in something that would return more than that?

[OneSickPsycho]

Originally Posted by azoomm

That's a lot of work for $450 a year.

If you have that much time, why not invest it in something that would return more than that?

Takes me less than a half hour a week... In other words, I pay myself nearly $17.30/hr to dick off on the computer for 1/2 hour a week.

[pickle.of.doom]

Like collecting bottles and returning them

Don't most of them have something in the fine print that balance transfers don't count towards rewards and what not?

[Phenix_Rider]

Originally Posted by azoomm

That's a lot of work for $450 a year.

If you have that much time, why not invest it in something that would return more than that?

I just put two grand in a CD. Only 2.52% interest for six months, but it's guaranteed. It's also five times what a savings account makes. So in six months, my $2,000 becomes a little over $2,300. Zero work. More money longer gets better interest.