Join host Justin Vacula and returning co-host Darren Remsburg on this episode of the Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast as they dive into the benefits of MGM Gold and Platinum status for 2025.
Discover how to waive resort fees, enjoy free parking, lounge access, dining credits, and much more using credit card points and miles. Get insider tips on maintaining your status, leveraging status matches, and making the most of your travel rewards.
Timestamps:
00:00 Introduction to Low-Cost Travel with Points and Miles
00:50 Earning MGM Gold and Platinum Status in 2025
01:08 Meetup Events and Social Media Engagement
01:47 Welcome Back, Darren Remsburg
02:27 Status Matching and Cruise Opportunities
05:29 Benefits of MGM Gold and Platinum Status
12:41 MGM Mastercard: Earning Tier Levels and Benefits
22:45 Video Poker Strategies and Tips
26:32 Reducing Variance in Gambling
27:27 Credit Card Issuer Insights
29:13 Maximizing MGM Rewards
30:32 Navigating Casino Policies
32:23 Strategizing for Tier Status
36:14 Vegas Travel Hacks
43:08 Upcoming Travel Plans
47:50 Closing Thoughts and Announcements
Show notes:
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Rough Transcript:
Theme Song: [00:00:00] Travel at low cost with points and miles. Credit card rewards bring the smiles. Many adventures, tales to be told. Make and save money, the world will unfold.
Fight the war on happiness, pick up the gold. Hurdy Gurdy Travel Podcast breaks the mold.
Justin Vacula: You’re listening to the hurdy gurdy travel podcast. I’m your host, Justin Vukula, here to help you travel the world next to no cost with credit card points, miles, benefits, and rewards. Make money, save money, and take advantage of great deals. Thanks for joining me for today’s episode. Earning MGM gold and platinum status in 2025.
With returning co host Darren Remsburg, we talk how and why you [00:01:00] can earn MGM statuses for waived resort fees, free parking, lounge access, dining credits, tier matching, and more. Visit meetup. com slash Philly miles and points to RSVP for monthly greater Philadelphia travel meetups. I host in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania.
The next meetups are January 26th and February 23rd, 2025. Find a link in the show notes for more content between podcast episodes. Follow Hirty Gertie travel podcast on Facebook and X formerly known as Twitter, subscribe to Hirty Gertie travel podcast on YouTube for daily content, including travel videos, clips, community content, and other bonus videos.
Also follow Justin Vukula on Twitter. On Instagram on with today’s episode, welcome to the show, returning cohost, Darren Ramsberg,
Darren Remsburg: Justin, this is becoming a habit. Don’t threaten me with a good time. [00:02:00] Here we go again.
Justin Vacula: All right. We’re recording December 30th, not feeling too well. My voice may be a little bit off and a bit stuffy, but I’m committed to getting this episode out for early 2025 talking about.
MGM gold and platinum status, as we recently talked about earning Caesar’s diamond status.
Darren Remsburg: And what great timing because as soon as you get done with this, you’re going to be off on a cruise. We’re able to book that cruise through one of your many status matching opportunities, maybe even starting with MGM gold or MGM platinum.
Justin Vacula: Oh, yes, I was able to match MGM platinum status at Ocean Casino in Atlantic City, not Oceans Casino, S or apostrophe S, of course. So I was able to match the MGM platinum status to Ocean Prime status. Get a complimentary cruise with MSC, and then I was able to match that offer to Virgin [00:03:00] Voyages and get a complimentary cruise.
I’m not sure if that’s still going to work. We’re recording in December of 2024, but I think in 2025 there will be many cruise matching and status matching opportunities.
Darren Remsburg: I think the key, most everything else, is to have the, have the arsenal available when the opportunities arise. So. If you have the statuses, then you can match around and get the cruise.
Whereas the status match opportunity arises, but you don’t have any status like me, then you’re caught flat footed. I don’t know, Justin, after that last episode with the Caesars card, I’m eager to apply for the Caesars and get back in the Caesars platinum game, maybe even start matching to some other places and take advantage of some of these deals.
So we’ll see after this, whether I’m also going to apply for the MGM card.
Justin Vacula: Yes, the Caesar’s Rewards Visa is inevitable. That was a previous episode we had. We talked about the Caesars Rewards Visa credit card and [00:04:00] also in person video poker play. I released a companion video poker strategy video on YouTube.
So listeners can tune into that. If you’re not subscribed on YouTube, make sure to be there in addition to the podcast. Video poker, you’re going to be playing in person as well?
Darren Remsburg: I will be. In fact, after I saw your video go up, I’m like, hey, I haven’t played video poker for a little while. I better, better take a shot here and just make sure I’m still.
Up to snuff. And so I have video poker trainer or something similar to that on a, on my iPhone as an app played about a hundred hands and happage report was a hundred percent accurate, probably the first time in a long time I’ve gotten a hundred percent on anything, Justin. So I’m happy to take that.
Yeah.
Justin Vacula: You got to give us a shot. As you said, take a shot of the situation, everything
Darren Remsburg: that happened before and all of that, that’s what dictates that.
Justin Vacula: That’s what dictates that. So we were spoiled for years with status matching, but free Caesar’s diamond status appears to be ending [00:05:00] January 31st, 2025 MGM is no longer partnered with Hyatt that died some time ago is now it’s Marriott.
We all got Bonvoyed. So no more free MGM status through Hyatt status matching. So if you’re a Hyatt globalist, you’re not able to get Caesar’s diamond, you’re not able to get MGM. You’re not able to get much matching. So the cure to the lack of status is the MGM MasterCard earning status. But before we talk about the credit card, why bother earning MGM gold or potentially higher?
MGM gold is the sweet spot. I think waived resort fees, complimentary valet and parking. Amphora lounge access at Borgata. I released a YouTube video showing a walkthrough of the. Amphora Lounge. It’s all you can eat food, all you can drink alcohol, premium alcohol as well. Not the watered down stuff that [00:06:00] you typically get on the casino floor.
- 50 in comps or MGM rewards points per guest. So for two people, easy math here, 25 total for you and a guest for the all you can eat and all you can drink. When I’m at Borgata, I only go to the M4 lounge and the buffet in most cases. If one or two of them are open anyway. You can also get in the buffet for a discounted rate of 12 and 50 cents with the MGM gold status.
You and one guest 1250 per once again for 25 total. This is a really good deal. I was recently in Atlantic city around Christmas and they had the buffet going for somewhere around 45 or 50. So getting a discounted rate of 1250. Is fantastic. The Amphora lounge is usually open daily at 2 PM. So you can instead go to the buffet for brunch.
They got rid of breakfast. Now it’s just brunch. I have [00:07:00] a YouTube video of the Borgata buffet as well. Gold status also gives you what they call a 100 dining comp. But in my experience, I was able to go to the MGM rewards desk or the players club. And it would simply add a hundred dollars to my account.
So that would mean more visits. rather than just going to one place and spending 100 on one visit. MGM Gold status also gives you priority line access, and this is a benefit that comes with the MGM Mastercard as well in some places. And I’ve been able to check into VIP rooms in Las Vegas with the MGM Gold status.
Sometimes Platinum is needed. MGM Platinum gives you a suite upgrade once per year. In my experience, I had this at ARIA in Las Vegas. I had a complimentary night booked through the MyVegas suite of games, which we’ll get into later. Complimentary night, I was upgraded to [00:08:00] a Sky suite, which would be otherwise a very expensive hotel room.
Platinum status also gives you later checkout time. I’ve had 2pm checkout time. I’ve also had Other general room upgrades. When I go to Borgata in Atlantic city, I get upgraded to the MGM tower rather than a standard room or a classic room in the usual tower. MGM platinum status also gives you a complimentary annual cruise for you and a guest.
I’ve cruised before with celebrity through this benefit for, I believe it was a five day cruise. MGM Platinum status also gives you a 200 dining comp that you can just add to your comp balance. A 600 flight rebate. This used to just give you cold hard cash and now it’s free play or comps. You simply show them an itinerary with the cash value of the round trip flight.
And they [00:09:00] will reimburse you up to 600. And again, possible status matching, possible cruise matching. A lot of utility comes from the MGM platinum status and a lot of benefits also at MGM gold.
Darren Remsburg: Those certainly sound like fantastic opportunities, Justin. We’ll get into what the different tier levels are here in just a moment.
But I’m curious, you mentioned a couple of different locations, the Borgata in Atlantic City, I know one of your favorites. Tell us more about which hotels are included and where they might be located for listeners that would be interested in taking advantage of some of these.
Justin Vacula: Yes, Borgata, I mentioned.
There’s also MGM National Harbor that’s in the Washington DC, Maryland area, MGM Grand in Detroit. And many properties in Vegas. I mentioned Aria, there’s Bellagio, Mandalay Bay, Park MGM, New York, Luxor, [00:10:00] Excalibur, MGM Grand, many MGM properties, Beau Rivage is also an MGM property as well, so there are many throughout the United States, maybe not as big of a footprint as Caesars, but still lots of MGM opportunities.
MGM Springfield, I believe, another one too.
Darren Remsburg: Yeah. I appreciate you highlighting those. I was just checking out the website myself here. It looks like there’s an MGM empire city casino. That sounds like maybe it’s in New York. All right. Um, I’m asking the, the master all the hard questions here. And yeah, we’re got a grand Detroit national Harbor.
You mentioned Northfield park. Uh, I’m not sure where that one is, but that’s another potential north of somewhere north of somewhere. For those folks that may know where those places are or have an interest in those, looks like Northfield OHIO for those interested. So there’s some good options there.
Previously you talked about the different tier levels and [00:11:00] talked about gold being maybe the sweet spot, platinum offering a number of additional benefits for those that are interested in spending a little more time maybe in the casino or online. We’ll talk about that in a moment. But what are the other tier levels that folks will be moving through in order to get to gold, platinum, maybe even no R.
Justin Vacula: So everyone is Sapphire at a base level. That’s less than 20, 000 tier.
Darren Remsburg: Participation trophy is what you’re saying.
Justin Vacula: Yeah. It’s a little bit confusing because Caesar starts you at gold, but gold is a higher level with MGM. So Sapphire starts the MGM ladder here. Sapphire starting up to 20, 000 tier, or a little bit below 20, 000.
And then Pearl kicks in at 20, 000. You automatically get Pearl. Just for having the MGM Mastercard, Pearl gives you the free parking. And maybe some other [00:12:00] benefits, but not too many. Gold 75, 000 tier. Platinum kicks in at 200, 000 tier. And Nowar is invite only, even though I’ve smashed the 200k platinum goal for 2024, I have not received my Nowar invite.
People speculate that it has to be losing lots and lots of money on slots, table games, and other activities that we’re not going to be doing on this podcast.
Darren Remsburg: Absolutely not. That is not the business decision that you are looking for, I know.
Justin Vacula: It would be nice if I can get there in a creative way. But I don’t think that’s going to happen.
So let’s move on to the MGM Mastercard and talk about earning these tier levels, what it takes to do that recording in December of 2024, the current signup bonus on the card is very unimpressive to 10, 000 point signup bonus, a hundred dollars in comps for spending a low [00:13:00] amount, I believe it’s somewhere around a thousand spend in 90 days, super easy.
This is sometimes higher. They might give you a bonus of 15, 000 or 150 in comps, and this isn’t to be confused with tier credits. The tier credits are what you need to get the status levels, and the comps are what you’re using for hotels, dining, and more. Sometimes they do throw in some tier as a sign up bonus, maybe 10, 000 tier.
Usually not too much. You automatically get Pearl status with the credit card. As I mentioned, allegedly you get priority line access. I have seen these signs. If you had the MGM MasterCard, you get a special line with the gold members. This is no annual fee and no foreign transaction fee on the MGM MasterCard.
So the signup bonus is very low. Pearl status isn’t too much of a benefit, although it could save you a lot of money on the parking. If you were to go to MGM casinos a lot. But the [00:14:00] main play with the card here is that you get comps and tier for all of your spend. So you’re spending at MGM properties, you’re going to get 3x comps or free play and tier.
We’ll talk about the comps or free play distinction a little bit later. You get 2x with grocery and fuel purchases and 1x everywhere else. So that’s 2x tier. And comps or free play with groceries or fuel one X everywhere else. Sometimes you get three X for loading to BetMGM So this means that you can use your MGM mastercard as a transaction method on BetMGM and load thousands of dollars, potentially maxing your credit limit.
Even so, if you were to load a thousand dollars, you would get the three X. Tier and the three X comps or free play. So 3000 [00:15:00] tier per thousand dollar load, make the math pretty easy. I say sometimes three X because they announced this promotion. Usually it happens twice a year. Sometimes people get three X, even though there’s no announced promotion, but when this promotion is announced, I maxed the credit limit.
I encourage everyone else to do that. And of course, gamble and gamble responsibly. The three x promo can last for several weeks, so you can potentially double up on this by maxing the credit limit twice in two different statements. The promotion’s so good that you can fly to Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Michigan, other states where BET MGM is.
So 15 K credit limit could get you 90 K in tier just for one promo. So that gets you to gold and almost halfway to platinum status. So even though it’s a low signup bonus on the card, the ability to spend your way to status is [00:16:00] extremely.
powerful In addition to that, the 90 K would be 900 in comps too, right? So 90 K tier, this card allows you to almost double dip on both tier and comps.
Darren Remsburg: Is that correct?
Justin Vacula: You would get the tier and comps. Yes. So some quick math. If you were to max a 15 K credit limit twice or charge 30, 000. To the credit card, you would get, yes, 900 in comps or free play on top of that tier, the 90k tier. So I mention doing it twice to avoid what we talk as credit card cycling.
So if the issuing bank, FNBO, the First National Bank of Omaha, gives you a credit limit of 15, 000 in a statement period, they really only Want you to use the 15, 000 in a statement period. So if you were to run it up, pay it off, and then run it up again, spending 30, 000 in one statement that [00:17:00] could lead to adverse action and get you shut down.
Banks typically don’t like that. So to give another example, if the promotion were to start, say, July 1st, your statement closed on July 14th. You can make those purchases before the 14th, pay it off on maybe the 13th or the 14th. Statement closes, and then maybe on 16th, then you could spend again. So this avoids cycling, it avoids adverse action, and you should be okay to do that.
Darren Remsburg: Just a reminder to listeners that we are in it for the long game, and are trying to avoid all instances of war and happiness together, so. We appreciate the public service announcement on cycling for those that have been in the credit card churning game or that’s an important thing to note and what banks are tolerant of that sort of thing.
Justin Vacula: Yes. And being in it for the long game, you have a full calendar year to get the status, at least if you have the [00:18:00] card earlier in the year. So I don’t think there’s a case or an argument for putting an excessive risk and trying to cycle when you have the entire year. I think gold status is very easy to get.
If you do that three X promo, you do some two X grocery and fuel spend. And if you hit that three X promo twice in a year, if they run it twice in a year, then you’ll get a large way to platinum. So I don’t see a strong argument for cycling when we could just treat it as a marathon.
Darren Remsburg: If someone like me was interested in getting back in the status match game and was considering the Caesar’s rewards card, and maybe now the MGM card.
We talked about when to apply for the Caesars card. When would you recommend applying for the MGM Rewards card, irrespective of whether you want the 100 or the 150 bonus, considering that’s really what, not why we’re signing up. That’s not really where the value in this card lies. [00:19:00]
Justin Vacula: Yes. Some might want to wait for a better signup bonus or a higher tier offer, but the problem with that is if you’re in January and you’re able to get the card in January, I’m going to wait.
I’m going to wait. Then it’s perhaps. April, May, June, July, and between January and April, you could have put spend in and got that 10 K tier or extra 50 in comps that they would otherwise give you. So I think it’s best to just get in the game early in the year.
Darren Remsburg: And as we all know, Justin, the answer to really all the problems in the world is, that’s correct.
Justin Vacula: Or credit cards. The two acts of grocery and fuel. We’ve had previous episodes talking about different grocery programs, Giant and Weiss here on the East Coast, Safeway on the West Coast, and even Acme we have here in Pennsylvania, the Kroger, Harris Teeter stores, a lot of grocery stores that sell gift cards that you can [00:20:00] resell or prepaid cards that you can convert to cash in many ways.
Even though it’s only 2x comps or free play, you’re also getting the tier. And I would think that some more of the advanced listeners would want to use several cards to do the grocery spend with. So even though other cards like the American Express Gold card will give you 4x at grocery stores up to 25, 000 in a calendar year, this can be a very good volume play to use other rewarding cards and get these great status benefits.
Darren Remsburg: Yep, agreed. So you talked earlier about, There’s some interesting ways to convert comps to freeplay or freeplay to comps. I’m assuming this does not involve Mavis, a gift card, anything like that, circa 2019.
Justin Vacula: Yes, you used to be able to purchase 500 MGM gift cards inside of Borgata and convert those gift cards to [00:21:00] freeplay.
Sadly, that’s no longer a thing, because that was an MGM purchase, so you’d use the MGM credit card to buy the MGM gift card, and you would get the 3x. But now, you’re simply using the credit card for loads to bed MGM, preferably when it’s the 3x bonus, and then for your grocery and fuel spend. So once your statement closes, that’s when the tier posts, that’s when the, I’m looking at the app here, the slot dollars post.
It’s a bit quirky because initially the rewards from the credit card post as slot dollars. But if you wanted to convert them for more value, you would convert them to the MGM rewards points or comps. But you need to do that in person at the MGM rewards desk or the players club. I say more value because if you were to use it as slot dollars or free [00:22:00] play, you’re giving up some house edge.
But if you were to convert it to comps and then use it for food for hotel stays, then you’re getting the full value. And it’s also interesting to point out that the comps forgive tax on food purchases and potentially hotel. So if they were to charge you a 6 percent tax and you were to get 10 in food and use comps, you wouldn’t pay the tax at all.
The comps would just cover the balance. So the comps have some good value, but if you’re a heavy spender with this card, and hopefully those who get it, well, you’re going to have lots and lots of comps, so I think at some point you would just play through some of the funds in slot dollars and used to be able to play the full pay video poker, at least at Borgata.
But they stopped allowing that. Now you would just have to play other video poker with lesser pay tables. So I did that on my last trip at Borgata. There were some machines near the Amphora Lounge. It wasn’t the full pay 9 6 [00:23:00] Jacks or Better. It was I believe an 8 5 machine. So even then it was still better than playing slot machines.
When you
Darren Remsburg: say full play, Justin, what do you mean by that?
Justin Vacula: The full pay Jacks or Better, the 9 6 Jacks or Better, that’s nine credits. for a full house and six credits for a flush. So the lesser pay tables don’t pay as much. There’s not as much of a return to player.
Darren Remsburg: So when you said, uh, 8 5, that’s, uh, 8 for a flush and 5 for a full house?
The opposite.
Justin Vacula: No, the opposite way. The full house makes more than the flush.
Darren Remsburg: And that’s based on credit. So if you have one credit in, it’s 5x or 8x, that one credit, and you’re playing, you talked about playing a little different kind of game. I don’t know if you wanted to get into that here or had already, did we already talk about that on the last show?
Justin Vacula: No, on the last show we talked about the single line video poker. So this would be the single play or single hand video poker where I was betting 1 for five [00:24:00] credits. You always want to bet the five credits in these five credit games to get a multiplier if you were to hit a Royal flush. So yes, you would be betting five credits.
So if you were to use the free play or slot dollars on the dollar jacks or bidder game, you would wanna play five credits for $5 a hand to get the royal flush multiplier.
Darren Remsburg: And then you had played a a different game that basically we think will reduce variability around a five credit bet or $5 bet. And by breaking that down into 50 or a hundred different hands.
per hand that you’re playing, and that sounds a little bit complicated, but in reality it’s, you’re making the same decision as far as which hands to keep, or excuse me, which cards to keep within your hand, but instead of drawing once, the computer then draws 50 or 100 times, and instead of one 5 bet, it’s 50 10 cent bets, or 100 [00:25:00] 5 cent bets.
Is that correct?
Justin Vacula: Yes, America still loves math. When I was at Hera’s Atlantic City playing video poker to get the diamond status and potentially diamond plus, which is looking really likely at this time, it was penny, five credit, hundred play. So yes, instead of betting 5 on a hand, it was 5 total distributed across 100 hands.
So I’m thinking this is less variance or variability, as you said, because You’re not breaking out on everything. If you were to play the single line video poker, whether at Harrah’s or Borgata, if you were to be dealt a nothing hand and then draw to nothing, you just lose your entire bet. But if you were to be dealt nothing, at least you have more chances on the runouts to get jacks or better three of a kind or other potential hands.
And you get to see a lot more hands. So you’re going to see more Royal flushes. And that’s [00:26:00] a big part of the payout. So maybe at MGM locations, you can use the slot dollars or free play to play a lower denom multiplayer video poker.
Darren Remsburg: That sounds like a good opportunity. I think an interesting analogy, at least the way I’ve been thinking about it is the coin flip analogy, right?
So if you flip a coin once, uh, it’s very easy to lose if you’re betting on heads or tails. If you’re going to flip the coin five or 10 or 50 times, of course, you’re going to see a lot more heads and a lot more tails. Then if you flip it just a couple of times, so you’re just increasing the odds of potentially increasing the samples.
I’m going to make this more complicated than it needs to be, but as you said, really, the, the benefit here is you’re reducing the variance, um, both up and down. So if you were, if you’re going in there trying to gamble your way towards a new car, it’s probably not the way to do it. Although again, Justin and I would not recommend that be your goal, but also it’s less likely you’re going to lose your car [00:27:00] in gambling.
So that’s also a good goal.
Justin Vacula: Yes, and to go back to the coin flip, it would be if we were to flip coins for a hundred dollars a flip, or you could say, hey, let’s do a hundred flips a dollar each. So it’s going to be extremely unlikely that you would lose those hundred coin flips, right? You would win some of them, of the dollar coin flips totaling one hundred versus one one hundred dollar coin flip.
A great analogy. Thanks for that. Okay, to return to the credit card, I mentioned it’s issued by First National Bank of Omaha. This is an obscure bank, I’m not sure why they have this partnership with MGM. You cannot pay this card by phone, many listeners have asked. It might be a good thing that FNBO is issuing the card, because maybe it’s an easier approval given that veterans of the hobby probably don’t have cards with FNBO.
Where if this card was issued by Chase [00:28:00] or Citi, it might be harder to get approved because people might already have cards with them or they might have an extensive credit profile that prevents them from getting approved. So First National Bank of Omaha, I don’t think they’re really strict on the approvals, although in personal experience, I usually wait six months between my applications, at least for the cards that are pulling from the frequent bureaus.
So FNBO. Issuing the card and the Bureau might vary from person to person and maybe even from state to state. So typically I search the MyFICO forums to look for the issuing bank and which credit bureau or bureaus they pull.
Darren Remsburg: I seem to remember there was a travel rewards card from FNBO a number of years ago that has some sweet spots or something and I might have signed up for that even at the time.
I don’t have it. I’m pretty sure I don’t have it anymore, [00:29:00] but I’d have to, I’d have to probably perform an archeological dig to ensure that
Justin Vacula: they do have an Amtrak
Darren Remsburg: credit card. I don’t think that was it though. Although we do like Amtrak around, around the Northeast corridor here, but yeah, I don’t think that was it.
It’s really the three X is, is beneficial for online loading and at MGM properties. So outside of meals and hotel rooms. Can you find a way to load money into machines with the MGM Rewards credit card or has that mostly disappeared?
Justin Vacula: Unfortunately, I don’t believe that’s the case for in person, but surely you can use the credit limit to gamble online Which of course our buddy Dave Ramsey would be a huge fan of
Darren Remsburg: Oh Dave Ramsey reference drink And there’s no way I’m starting to think a little bit like a travel hacker here now, right?
And there’s no way to load the money online Online And then go into the casino and withdraw it in person and then play as a way at work around there, probably somebody along the line wouldn’t like [00:30:00] that.
Justin Vacula: So typically I would think that when most people who are using the online blackjack sites or playing other games, they would just withdraw the funds to their connected bank, checking account.
You can pick an option on BetMGM to pick up the funds at the cage. So if you were to be withdrawing 5, 000, instead of sending it for ACH and appearing in your checking account, you could go in person to the casino and get the cash there, and then use that. It’s a gamble.
Darren Remsburg: Do you think MGM would object to that if you didn’t play through it online?
We know certainly that oftentimes casinos don’t like it when you just deposit and don’t play through. But if you’re instead depositing and then withdrawing at the cage, and then maybe the casino thinks you’re going to play through it in the casino. Do you think that’s a workaround to that limit?
Justin Vacula: I wouldn’t test that, but it’s an interesting idea.
And that sort of activity can just get you banned. [00:31:00] Although it would be a good story to say, Hey, I just wanted to make this money available for in casino play. And I was going to play it there. I think they intend for you to actually play it through at least one time online and then pick it up at the cage.
Darren Remsburg: And in that instance, there’s really no advantage to then picking it up at the cage and playing through it again, right? Because you’ve already earned a three X. You might as well try to find a different way to leverage that.
Justin Vacula: There could be scenarios where, oh, I just don’t want to carry lots of hundreds with me to the casino, or it’s inconvenient for me to go to a bank and withdraw the money, or they’re going to give me all 20s or 50s and I don’t want that.
So maybe if you’re planning on playing poker, and you don’t want to carry the money with you, you can plan to pick it up at the cage when you get to the property and then use that. So that could be one option.
Darren Remsburg: It’s an interesting idea.
Justin Vacula: Could gamble in person, but I just don’t think it’s worth it. If we could just use the credit card and play our way to get the gold and platinum status and then [00:32:00] use those comps for food.
I just don’t really see an argument for gambling in person at the MGM casinos, like playing slots or playing blackjack, anything like that, if we could just have the benefits with the status. Some might say, Oh, I really enjoy playing craps. I really enjoy playing Baccarat and maybe. When I play the table games, I’m giving up a slight edge, but they’re potentially going to give me free rooms or other comps.
Then that gets into the speculative area, but I’m just more likely to do that as Caesar’s Properties, because I can’t spend my way to seven stars, unfortunately, using their credit card, and only gets me about halfway to diamond. So I would focus my play at Caesar’s Properties on tier multiplier days, as we’ve talked about.
And then for MGM, I would earn my tier through the credit card. And the BetMGM activity online.
Darren Remsburg: A good way to think about that, so if you have limited time to play and potentially have a couple different casinos available to you, focusing on the Caesars [00:33:00] casinos, especially during those tier multipliers that we talked about, makes a lot more sense.
Because like you said, you can get essentially tier and comp multipliers with your credit card every day for MGM that you can’t get with Caesars.
Justin Vacula: So when they run that three X promotion with a credit card, that’s a really strong time to max that credit limit. You can space it out, even not just do one deposit of 15, 000.
If that would even go through, maybe break it out and see, okay, well, look, I have three weeks left in this statement. So I’ll space out my play by maybe three days and do a few thousand every three days. So not just suddenly ramp it up. And then maybe that transaction is declined because it looks like irregular spending activity.
We ask, where’s the line you guys are encouraging me to deposit. And I tried to pause it and the transaction gets declined, but maybe best to de risk by spacing it out. So very easy to get status playing during those three X promotions. So that’s a time where I’d be playing blackjack using the credit card [00:34:00] essentially, where I’m giving up about a half percent to the house.
But I’m getting the 3x tier, and then 3x freeplay or comps. Otherwise, you’re just getting 1x on the loads, and at that point it might be quite marginal. But there might be a case for it if, say, your statement closes on January 4th, and you still have about 5, 000 in credit limit, and you’re not going to be going to grocery stores or gas stations like Speedway and buying gift cards.
Then you might choose to get pretty close to the credit limit by loading at one X and you still have a half percent advantage in the comps or free play. And then you’re still getting that one X tier, but ideal world, we would be getting at least two X on our spend with the credit card.
Darren Remsburg: Yeah, I agree with that.
And sometimes even if you stop by a Speedway, it turns out to be a Speedway HUD. You’re stuck again.
Justin Vacula: Yeah, the cashiers just make up rules. I was at an [00:35:00] Acme store, a grocery store, and. The cashier told me, Oh, I’m not sure that we’re able to sell you a 500 gift card because we have new rules for the new year.
And I, I said it with a very straight face, Oh, isn’t it still 2024?
Darren Remsburg: Oh, well, you
Justin Vacula: know, I, yeah, then it was another story of, Oh, I just don’t want to lose my job or get in trouble for selling you a 500 gift card. And at that point, like she, she’s just making up stuff. One of the classic, all right, I’ll come back at another time rather than arguing about it or like pushing the issue.
A little bit more. I did ask if we could have a second opinion on this and she said with quite an attitude that, Oh, the manager is on a lunch break right now. So if you wanted to wait 20 minutes, you can do that if you want. I’m just going to stand here for 20 minutes. Too
Darren Remsburg: bad you didn’t have your wad of hundreds from the casino that you could have just used that instead.
Cause obviously there’s no [00:36:00] fraud there.
Justin Vacula: Yeah. The wad of hundreds is okay, but a credit card with an ID isn’t. It’s pretty great if we could just max the credit limit with a three X. And avoid these interactions sometimes with the cashiers making up the rules. Siding with the war on happiness.
Darren Remsburg: Speaking of fun with phones, Justin, I know you’re famous for your phone army.
And we’ve talked about how the phone army is not all that relevant or helpful in the Caesars world, but I think it is for MGM, right?
Justin Vacula: That’s right. So if you were to earn different rewards, playing the various my Vegas or play studios game. I have several YouTube videos on this. You essentially put slot games on autospin or sit in the lobby of various games like MyVegas Blackjack, MyVegas Bingo, you open gift boxes in the Tetris game, you earn these gold coins in the game, and you go in person at casino to redeem.
And especially in Las Vegas, they have rewards like [00:37:00] 25 off of 50 food, buy one get one food offers, 20 off of 40 food offers, So you can stack the MyVegas rewards with the comps that you earned from the MGM credit card, pay zero tax, and have a more discounted meal. Several meals.
Darren Remsburg: Sounds like the wins are continuing for you, Justin.
Justin Vacula: Yes, you could use the MyVegas rewards for complimentary nights, complimentary cruises, The food discounts and much more. So it’s nice to have the capital dollars and deploy the capital dollars of the MGM comps and use them in conjunction with the my Vegas food deals, because with some of them, I wouldn’t spend 40 on myself, but if they’re giving me a 20 off of 40, then that seems a lot more appealing, especially when I’m using the comps.
That makes sense. And [00:38:00] two people can eat for 40 in many situations.
Darren Remsburg: Yeah. A number of outstanding deals. I know people talk about how Vegas used to have all these outstanding deals for meals. And I have not been lately, but it seems as if some of those things have. I’ve gone by the wayside unless you’re playing some of these games up front or have comp opportunities like we’ve been talking about the last couple of shows.
Having been to Las Vegas a couple of times, certainly not as many times as you, but it’s still I think a great destination in a variety of different ways. And as we’re all about saving money, traveling for a little less, but still having a great time. And again, I think this episode is another great opportunity for folks to learn about what you’ve been doing and how they can employ similar techniques.
Save a little money on their vacations and maybe have the opportunity to therefore travel a little more.
Justin Vacula: That’s right. Vegas is only expensive if you’re unprepared, but if you prepare by getting the MGM MasterCard, you play the MyVegas games and that’s play in air quotes because it’s very little [00:39:00] effort.
I boot the games in the morning, boot the games in the evening, run the games in browser tabs, and it’s really easy to earn a million gold coins a month as past podcast guest, Tammi Had stated, and I of course do that super easy to earn the reward. Super easy to save in Las Vegas. And we might even have Venetian or the Venetian joining the world of Hyatt program.
So there might be some more opportunities there, but past podcast guest, Adam Bauer slash travel fan boy assured us that it will not be a category four Hyatt for those
Darren Remsburg: easy certificates. Shout out to Travel Fanboy.
Justin Vacula: The over under at 5.5 category, six category, five, maybe category eight,
Darren Remsburg: who’s setting the line on that?
Justin, are you taking that action?
Justin Vacula: I am not at this time. All right. Any other thoughts on the [00:40:00] MGM program and the power of the MGM? It’s
Darren Remsburg: interesting. The MGM program seems to have. Obviously some different opportunities compared to Caesars rewards. Certainly the most appealing one is the opportunity to spend towards status and comps in the same dollar spent.
And I think that’s really attractive for a lot of folks, including me and even something like Caesars where you really, you have to spend some time. We don’t have to, but as we talked about last time, the real opportunity for that card in that program is spending time in the casino, playing probably video poker at a time when the tier multipliers are available.
It’s not 10 X, right? It’s not five X, but for three X or two X, you can do the same thing and never have to leave your house. Which as you and I have both become fairly accustomed to is a great way to manufacture points, miles, comps, tier. All those sorts of things.
Justin Vacula: So lots [00:41:00] of opportunity. And I think it’s also worth noting that I think it would be silly to go for MGM platinum if you don’t plan on being an MGM casinos that often, if you were to go to Vegas, maybe once a year, eh, probably not going to be worth it unless you want to have a really grand trip and have all these comps and free play, and you’re going to go on the cruise.
But I think it would be tragic to spend your way to status. And not use the benefits. So we don’t want to be blindly seeking status. We want to have reasons for going for it. But for me personally, in Pennsylvania, about an hour and a half from Atlantic city, going to Borgata, going to Vegas many times throughout the year, definitely getting tremendous value with the MGM MasterCard.
And I’m really eager to see the status matching opportunities that are going to come in 2025.
Darren Remsburg: Yeah, one of my daughters has really turned into kind of a beach lover. She’s more or less the [00:42:00] only one in the family that really enjoys that. But I wonder if something like this would provide some opportunity to, a good excuse, right?
To hit the Atlantic City just for the weekend, have some comp rooms, maybe not on the weekend, but have some of those other benefits that we talked about. Make it a little easier to get in and out of town, check in a little faster. Have a pretty cheap place to eat and drink, those sorts of things. And, uh, yeah, and then a lot of what I do, a lot of, I think what many people do is, is for themselves, but also for their family to travel and enjoy some of the things.
So, it’s an interesting proposition, certainly Atlantic City in the summertime is a lot of fun.
Justin Vacula: Yes, and during the summer it’s traditionally more expensive too, and the comp nights typically. Aren’t available. So if you were to have the MGM comps and use that for hotels, that’s an option. Perhaps you would stay at Harrah’s Atlantic city to be close to Borgata, or maybe you would stay slightly out of the city.
Galloway, New Jersey. I was looking at has a [00:43:00] Wyndham property. There’s a Wyndham property right on the boardwalk if there’s availability. So you have so many options.
Darren Remsburg: Indeed. Before we start getting into the summer, what, what exciting new year’s plans do you have, Justin?
Justin Vacula: Yes, I’m going to be going on an aparama spree, January 1st, the ball drops, the credit card applications go in.
You love to hear it. Yes, so looking at applying for six credit cards, maybe more. I’m going to create a video of this experience. I’ll just redact the personal information in the applications and you’ll see what the outcomes are. Hopefully some instant approvals. But it’s probably going to be a lot of pending under review or something similar, but I’ve been waiting about six months now.
So I’m ready for new cards in the new year. And I think for you cards are going to be coming out of your safe as the year resets. [00:44:00] And so do various high spend goals and spend opportunity that creates more meaningful spend. On many credit cards. That’s
Darren Remsburg: right. Uh, January 1st is, uh, the day that we all sleep in a little bit.
Cause maybe you stayed up the night before a little too late, and then you get all your Amex cards, your platinum business cards, your personal platinums. And you start firing away at those travel bank opportunities at Dell credits at, at all the things. Hilton gift cards now, apparently. I can’t wait to get to the Maldives and swipe 360 of these 50 gift cards to pay for my supper.
It’s going to be amazing.
Justin Vacula: Although I’ve heard that I think domestically that they’ve had the most success domestically but some international places have said, Oh, we don’t accept these. So that’s some negatives there. But I do understand the intention of your joke. But just to clarify, I,
Darren Remsburg: for a variety of [00:45:00] reasons, just traveling with, with a shoebox full of, I’m just imagining this in my head now, a shoebox full of Hilton 50 gift cards would be amazing.
Justin Vacula: I do have Flues, as you mentioned, sent me a special scented candle and there is a satchel that came with that. So I can use the satchel from the scented candle to hold the Hilton gift cards. I’ve been using them for prepaid cards, actually, but I can add the Hilton. It’s all coming
Darren Remsburg: together, Justin. It’s all coming together.
Justin Vacula: But they told me I couldn’t light a candle in Harrah’s Atlantic city. They claimed it was a fire hazard to which I responded. Oh, people are lighting cigarettes and wouldn’t that be a fire hazard? And I didn’t get a real answer to that other than, Oh, that’s the policy. We don’t make the rules, you know?
Okay. Who makes the rules? Yeah.
Darren Remsburg: Like
Justin Vacula: apparently today the
Darren Remsburg: cat makes the
Justin Vacula: rules. Um, the cigarette smoking gives them the money though. All this, all the casinos could agree to be non smoking, but they realized they would lose money. So I think they’re going to continue that [00:46:00] trend at the expense of the non smokers and especially the staff, the dealers and, and much more.
Darren Remsburg: Yeah, you gotta think at some point they’re gonna, they’re gonna cut that out, but I’m surprised it’s lasted this long to be honest.
Justin Vacula: Yeah, some other states have designated smoking areas that you must smoke outside or there’s a whole separate room to do it, but no, no scented candles from Flues at Harris Atlantic City.
You can’t have those. Maybe in the smoking hotel rooms, I don’t know, I’ll find a use for it, but thanks Flues for the candle. It was, it was very nice. Shut up. We have here, January 4th, I’m flying to Miami. I’m going on a Virgin voyages cruise. We mentioned earlier, this was from one of the match opportunities, thanks to MGM and other statuses.
So lots of travel coming in 2025 Virgin voyages cruise early in the month. It’s going to be Atlantis Bahamas after the [00:47:00] cruise. And then Atlantic City towards the end of January. So a lot’s happening. And then after Atlantic City and after the Greater Philadelphia Travel Credit Miles and Points meet up in Willow Grove, Pennsylvania, back to Las Vegas.
Darren Remsburg: Of course. I know how you feel about Las Vegas and all the opportunities that arise there. So we’re just thankful to have you in Pennsylvania for as long as you’re going to stay.
Justin Vacula: As long as the online blackjack continues, I’ll be in PA is my idea. Yep. That makes sense. Thanks. I might be even considering going to New Jersey more often in 2025.
To play online blackjack and get closer towards the Caesar status and potentially get the seven stars status partially through the online blackjack.
Darren Remsburg: Got to find a card that multiplies New Jersey tolls. That’s the key right there.
Justin Vacula: Pay the toll. It’ll be worth it. Yeah,
Darren Remsburg: absolutely.
Justin Vacula: All right. Any closing thoughts?
No,
Darren Remsburg: always appreciate the opportunity to, to record with you, Justin, talk through these things. I, it’s always an education for me as well, and appreciate the opportunity to learn. [00:48:00] So look forward to the next opportunity after you get back from your cruise. Maybe.
Justin Vacula: Yes, thanks for coming on once again and chatting.
Thanks for listening and stay tuned for future episodes. Some closing announcements. Early bird ticket sales for Zorkfest 2025, a Miles Points gambling event, are now live at zorkfest. travelzork. com. I hope to see you at Zorkfest 2025 in Las Vegas from December 5th through December 7th. I’m also looking forward to other events in 2025.
Zorkfest 2025. And how to successful 2024 speaking at events with award travel, one on one travels, or frequent traveler university, and both Chicago seminars events. If you’re an event organizer and would like to have me speak at your 2025 event, please contact me, visit meetup. com slash Philly miles and points.
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