Average Income Of Amex Platinum Cardholder
Earlier this week Monkey Miles reported some interesting figures, including the average income of Amex Platinum cardholders. The Amex Platinum card is, no doubt, the OG of premium cards. It used to mean that you had “made it” in life if you carried one, or so people thought. That shine has worn off some with it becoming more and more accessible to us average folk. The perks have dropped off over the years and the fee has gone up. It may, or may not, get you line cutting privileges at Walgreens though (remember that early pandemic video?). That is why I found the numbers Monkey Miles published so surprising. Although averages can always be misleading since top earners can heavily sway the numbers.
Averages For Amex Platinum Cardholders
- Cardholder’s average household income
- $474,000
- Average household net worth
- $4.3 million
- Cardholder’s average age
- 56
- Average properties owned
- 3.6
Final Thoughts
It would be interesting to see what the median numbers are for each statistic. This is still much higher that I would have expected. It seems like people like us (miles & points folks) still make a small percentage of Amex Platinum cardholders. I am happy to know I greatly reduced the averages on this one…especially the average age – ha!
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OK, so, these are the mobs in the crowded Centurion Lounges?
I know we cannot go by appearance. But…
AMEX seems to be trying to sell itself to retailers as “attracting higher income buyers,” which is a mantra repeated by the agents when I would complain about the difficulty using the card due to higher fees to the retailers.
Not sure this is still valid
Its very possible. Those in the miles and points community tend to think we are some sort of majority. In reality a small slice. And probably 20-25 yrs ago their demographics even higher. What you have to realize per the lounges are this. Many travelers do not have an airlines club membership or access. Its well known the AMEX clubs have the best overall food and drink. So this should not be a surprise that they are crowded. Some of the airports, like Las Vegas for example have really no lounges there. Your omment about difficulty using the card? I dont know where you shop and clearly some retailers and restuarants dont take AMEX, but in the US this should not be a high percentage. Again I mention 25-30 yrs ago things were different per the places that accepted it. Eventually AMEX may limit the number of total visits to the lounges. That will not surprise me.
I wish we could get median numbers on this to see how close, or far off, the numbers are.
Probably because Elon Musk has a plat. The median would be more interesting.
I have a feeling people aren’t being completely truthful even filling out those surveys.
*when
Wow, people standing in line for Centurion lounges don’t look like that demographic, but looks like looks are deceiving!
Wow, that seems crazy high. When I got my Platinum card in 2009, I was 32, made $150k and had precisely one heavily mortgaged house!
As a long time Platinum card holder I can buy the average income and net worth. What I call BS on is number of properties (unless skewed by people that one multiple rental units). We had 2 properties for years (home and Florida beach house) so I can understand something around 2. I have many very wealthy friends and don’t know any that have more than, at the most, a print residence and 2 other vacation properties and many only own 1 (they rent if they want to go on vacation)
Agreed . . . investment properties.
Stunning. At least, just a little bit, when we call the reps might think that we’re one of them.
First average vs. median. Second I wonder how they counted number of properties. Amex doesn’t ask this info directly from clients. Property records are public but matching cardholders to property owners names is close to impossible. Plus so many high net worth people buy properties with LLCs etc. Perhaps they look at how many open mortgages on card holders’ credit reports or had a survey of some sort.
Pretty surprising. Its higher than I would have thought on the demographics. And Amex has been targeting younger cardholders. Those are some high averages. You wonder the average charge volume across customers. Now you know why all the other card companies are making premium cards to go after that market.
To your point, averages vs medians may skew the figures. Not sure how they gathered info on number of properties owned given that info is not a requirement for issuance and legal ownership of property is often unclear from public records. If accurate, it does suggest a large subset of well off cardholders. The annual income figure actually seems low relative to property ownership and est household wealth.
Property count is self-reported from a survey of card holders.
Before anyone gets into a discussion about statistics . . . these numbers are consistent with the top 1 percent of net worth and income households in U.S. large city markets . . . which is where most of these card holders are located.