-
So I know that this might be a “how long is a piece of string” question, but bear with me, as the term has been banded around a fair bit lately given the recent re(de)valuations, and I was mulling over what “Avios rich” actually means. I’m not talking about those with 1 million+ points, or who earn most of their avios via flying on business expenses.
For the (I assume) average HfP reader who accrues points through personal CC spend and SUBs +/- a cash long haul trip each year, what constitutes “Avios rich”?
Personally, wife & I have managed to get to ~750k Avios via SUBs/referral bonuses between us & kids, and ~£20-£25 annual CC spend. We will also end up with a 2-4-1 Amex voucher & 3 Barclaycard vouchers by the end of the year. Part of the reason we have 750k is not being able to redeem spend much over the last 3 years. So we seem to have enough Avios to make use of the vouchers on long haul flights, but I am wondering how this will play out in the longer term especially as churning cards seems harder now.
So I know there is no definitive answer here, but I thought it might be an interesting discussion point (or not – we shall see 🙂 !)
I’d be quite interested to know this too. I only got into the points game in November 2021, so I’m very new to this, but consider myself to have built a healthy balance in that time, as between my wife and I, we’ve managed to build up almost 650k avios between us, thanks to massive BC and BAPP offers recently, and over 200k MR mostly thanks to referrals.
We’ve only done 1 long haul redemption, including our toddler, other trips in that time have been cash.
I probably need to look into hotel programmes, as see a lot of comments on these, but we usually prefer going for apartments.
I’m about 5K short of a million, which, quite pathetically, annoys me. I seem to need to book a SH flight or flights every time I approach the million.
I’m happy to start in Dublin or Amsterdam, so find cash fares often make spending the Avios on long haul a bad deal. As a typically solo traveller the old Amex vouchers were of limited use. The new ones and the Barclays ones are more interesting.
I don’t think of myself as Avios rich.
I would consider someone to be Avios Rich if they have more than 3 times the number of Avios that their family might use in a typical year. (Others might have a different opinion on the 3 x multiplier) but surely the measure needs to be relative to one’s needs and not an absolute value?
Cue all the BSDs to come out boasting……
Many Avios rich employ earn&burn strategy, so the current amount of Avios in the account does not mean much. I don’t have much in my account at any given moment, but I have redeemed several millions over the 12-13 years of collecting. In the last 5 years I have also been moving away and diversifying my miles&points portfolio. This makes me also less exposed to Avios devaluations.
I agree with the idea that Avios rich has to be compared to how many you are likely to use.
If you only use them for short haul once or twice a year then you’ll be “rich” with less than those who use them to fly long haul once or twice a year.
If you’re rich it means you don’t have to think too carefully about how to spend them.
In a sense, it also has to be looked at in comparison to how much cash you have to spend. If you are cash “poor” then you could be avios “rich” in comparison. In other words, you’d be willing to spend more avios to save more money, even if you get less pence per point doing so and didn’t have a huge stockpile of avios.
Personally, I’d feel avios rich if I had 500k of them and the means to replenish those as I use them.
I’d be interested in knowing what the largest HfP balance is, and then in about a month, if said person regretted sharing such information in a public forum.
I would consider someone to be Avios Rich if they have more than 3 times the number of Avios that their family might use in a typical year. (Others might have a different opinion on the 3 x multiplier) but surely the measure needs to be relative to one’s needs and not an absolute value?
Agreed. If you have more avios than what you would typically spend in the next 3 years, you are avios rich.
Points richness is the rate at which you have points and vouchers being added to your accounts.
The points cleverest are those that have rising levels of spare cash.
Qatar double Avios to Asia is 300,000 round trip in business so for a family of 4 it would be 1.2m plus about £2200 round trip against currently about £5k each cash fares.
I guess 5m plus and earning 2m a year would be Avios rich ?
It’s surely relative and means in comparison to your cash? If you are a billionaire then your piffling 10 million Avios are nothing – you are not Avios rich in comparison to your ability to get whatever you want via cash. If you are on the breadline then 100,000 Avios would make you Avios rich in comparison to your ability to use them (in that situation you should be getting rid of them through Nectar).
Interesting reading in this thread. For me the notion/concept has always been quite simple. I considered myself avios-rich when my earn/burn ratio results in a net balance that equates to a balance that covers my projected travel plans for the subsequent 24 months.
Interestingly (at least to me) I was always able to sustain this with relative ease until very recently. Despite some superb earning opportunities in last 24 months I have been unable to take advantage of them for eligibility reasons, or unwilling to do so because the time was not right. The needle on burning for me has also shifted because I am no longer able to redeem on BA to BKK with an amex voucher which was the core element to my long term strategy. The combined effects of these has been to reduce my avios balance to cover projected travel plans for only about 12 months so I feel decidedly avios-poor with only 130k avios at the moment. This has left me feeling a bit disillusioned, contemplating how pro-active I want to be in earning miles and points going forward, and considering whether a better approach would now be to move to a more passive earning strategy combined with booking best acceptable value cash fares on a trip by trip basis. To put this in context, my long term avios balance at any time was typically 300-500k and my largest ever balance (due to cancellations during covid times) was 1 3M.
Agree that it is relative to how much you can spend. I currently have 400k + 100k in CC points, which hasn’t moved much since covid started, and is more than I’ve ever had at any one time in my account previously. I have stopped spending on Amex unless there’s offers because I don’t want to get more avios.
This is because I can’t find anything I am able to or want to spend them on, bar a short haul every few months when it’s better than paying, whereas I used to redeem about 150-250k per year in the past (and never saw the point of building a large balance).
I’m about 5K short of a million,
…
I don’t think of myself as Avios rich.
😳
I’d call that Avios rich. When talking to non-hobbiests any mention of a balance over 100k – in any scheme -causes surprise it seems. > 200k and you’re definitely rich in my book.
Another way to look at this would be “do you think you are 5th or 10th percentile?” of the typical active BAEC account. Fairly sure anything over 100k is unusually high, but that’s just a gut feel, I have no special knowledge.
We hover around 1mill. But spend 350k on a long haul trip each year. Problem is when the balance is too high, the kids start picking at it.
I’m about 5K short of a million,
…
I don’t think of myself as Avios rich.
😳
I’d call that Avios rich. When talking to non-hobbiests any mention of a balance over 100k – in any scheme -causes surprise it seems. > 200k and you’re definitely rich in my book.
Another way to look at this would be “do you think you are 5th or 10th percentile?” of the typical active BAEC account. Fairly sure anything over 100k is unusually high, but that’s just a gut feel, I have no special knowledge.
When I started, with a low income (by the HTP standard) and couldn’t afford the premium cards 100k seems astronomical. But given even with a 241, a return for 2 in long haul business can easily need more than 100k avios. (return to SFO last year was 125k I think) 100k sounds a lot but you can’t do a lot with it. So freedom wise I would not call 100k avios rich. To the point made earlier, I would define rich as you have enough to book whatever trips you want (I’m now limited by availabilities and not avios amount, although that probably says more about availabilities than my stash) and not worried about where my next avios is coming and no need to jump on ever small offer that pops up.
As a rule of thumb, I’d define it as pre-funding two holidays for your usual group.
So, for me, adjusting for 241s, probably 750k plus the knowledge that I have a balance of other stuff I can convert if necessary.
My avios balance is 600k at the moment, peaked 1.5m during Covid; but I have done quite a few trips since them (Maldives, Colombia, Egypt and two trips to Asia, all in business for two adults). I still don’t consider myself avios rich, since I book with cash most of my short hauls (I think it is better using them for long haul and don’t mind flying economy in short flights). I would consider myself avios rich the day I don’t check the cash fares before redeeming avios for all my trips.
Anyone with more than me!
I don’t really care for collecting huge numbers, I enjoy having them, but spend them as soon as I can- who knows when the rules & value will change again? They have allowed up to fly premium for years, which is very much appreciated. Due to Avios reward flights in First being resticted at times, we have visited places we may not ordinarily have chosed to go to. But no regrets so far. Of course the Amex 241 is a real boost for a couple with no kids.
Anyone with 500,000 more than me
Is that 500,001 😉
Like Rob, I like to have enough for my next 2 trips. I also tend to book as soon as award flights are released so I won’t suffer from any subsequent devaluation. Being able to use the 241 on QR would be the Holy Grail of award travel for me!
I’ve become a user of them rather than save them person.
Over the past week I’ve used 3k to save £30 each on two short hauls (so 1p per avios) and 10.2k to save £80 and 8.4k to save £70 on two BA holidays at approx .8p per avios as those wee the best deals offered,
On the short hauls given I’d earn 2,500 avios it’s only actually cost me 500 so an even better redemption rate.
Also using them to discount the costs still means I can use same day change which wouldn’t be available on a full avios booking.
Is that 500,001 😉
How did you guess 🙂
Although I might shortly get st*ffd with some back if BA Holidays is refusing to credit my cancelled flight evouchers for the two short weekend breaks I had in mind.
So I’m eagerly considering @memesweeper’s info that I should be able to dump them on ebay for 80% (and then travel after September with the cash on another provider’s holiday break), or dump them out to Nectar.
BA seems to be wanting to hand more cash over to Nectar instead of making a profit on a couple of short weekend break holidays.
- You must be logged in to reply to this topic.
Popular articles this week:
