Why Points And Miles Is A Great Family Hobby
In my experience, it is pretty rare to find a family comprised of multiple points and miles enthusiasts. Usually one person is the primary driver, with the rest of the family following reluctantly, or not at all.
I am lucky that my mom and I share an interest in points and miles. We are slowly trying to convert other members of our family as well. Not only does this give us benefits from having Players 2, 3, and 4 (like referral bonuses, authorized user offers, and pooling points), but I have found many other unexpected benefits to sharing this hobby as a family as well.
Shared Experiences In Both Planning and Traveling
One of the main reasons that families travel together is to create shared experiences. For most people, traveling is the fun part. It is time to spend together as a family. The planning often falls to one person to make executive decisions for the whole group. But if multiple family members are interested in the planning part, it could ease the burden on the primary planner. The planning could even become a shared experience in itself – even more family bonding time!
Shared Appreciation
Involving family members in the process can also create a shared appreciation for all of the work that goes into traveling on points and miles. There are many ways to start involving your family in points and miles. If they are just starting out, try slowly involving them with either earning, maximizing, or redeeming. Obviously this is easier with adults and older teens, but you could get your kids involved too by teaching them the basics of points and miles.
Learning the value of finding a great deal can lead to a shared appreciation for this hobby. Or if your family still doesn’t appreciate the value of a great deal, that free first class ticket just might do the trick.
Teaching Lessons
Not only can involving your family in points and miles lead to a shared appreciation for travel, but it can also teach children, teens, or even adults other important life lessons, like budgeting, time management, and geography. Learning to budget points can easily translate into budgeting with real currency. Creating flight and vacation schedules can teach time management. Additionally, travel provides real world lessons on geography. These are just a few examples of how experience with points and miles can translate to the real world.
Endless Conversation Topics
Things in the points and miles world are always changing. There are always new credit cards, changing award mileage availability, and new teaming partners. As annoying as they sometimes are, these changes keep this hobby interesting. There will always be something to talk about with family with this hobby, which means (hopefully) no more awkward family holiday dinners!
Potential Issues
Although there are many benefits to sharing points and miles as family hobby, there could be potential issues. Overwhelming a newbie, creating burnout, or annoying friends and family by talking about it too much could lead to the end of that shared passion. Try to ease your friends and family into things slowly, and follow their cues on how interested they really are. If your friend or family member is a bit reluctant, this article can give you some tips on how to get them interested.
Points And Miles As A Family Hobby – Final Thoughts
Your travel family might consist of your immediate blood relatives, entire extended family, or even a group of your close friends who frequently travel together. If you are lucky enough to have a family who enjoys traveling, getting them involved in the points and miles hobby could be one more special aspect of that. And if you cannot seem to get them interested, that is ok too! It takes a special kind of person to love all of this.
Do you have family members who are also into points and miles? What has your experience introducing them to this hobby been? Share your experiences in the comments!
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Good article. I wish my family would take interest but they couldn’t care less about this. I come from a line of seasoned professionals in their respective careers and we all do fairly well financial…but even so, I’m the only one who seems to care; even my wife has absolutely no interest.
When I’ve spoken of this hobby to family members they see it as a waste of time and any hours spent putting into this isn’t worth the return they could get if they spent the same amount of time excelling in their profession.
One uncle even summed this hobby up as “stepping over a dollar to pick up a penny”.
Since then I don’t waste my time. I’ve learned, at least in my family, when folks are financially stable and have careers that will always been in demand unless they loose their license to practice, they just don’t see the value in this as they think of their financial earning potential as a constant flowing river.
I’ve even tried to demonstrate how much they could save by doing almost nothing that they aren’t already doing. They don’t get it or they just don’t care to…so I don’t even try anymore.
I just happily carry on.