Often I will pick up a card just for the bonus or for a specific travel hack I am planning. Like the Citi Prestige and Premier cards so we could fly to Hawaii on American for free in first class. However, I have a few keeper cards. I'd say my most valuable would be the the Chase Trifecta which is a combination of the Chase Ink Plus, Chase Sapphire Preferred and Chase Freedom. In addition to the 5 points per dollar we get for paying cell phone, cable and internet, we use the Ink card to purchase gift cards at Office Supply stores for 5 Ultimate Reward points per dollar. That way we get 5 points per dollar on most of our spending. We purchase Whole Foods gift cards for grocery shopping,
Amazon, Macy's, Bed Bath Beyond etc. We also purchase Disney gift cards at the Office supply stores and then load them on to the Disney Savings Vacation account for the additional 2% back in Disney gift cards. This way we get 5 points per dollar for annual passes, DVC dues, Disney cruises, Special events and tours at Disney and our
Adventures by Disney trips. Just the Disney gift cards alone will earn us enough in UR points for a couple of flights every year.
The Sapphire gets me 2x on dining and travel plus comes with primary car rental insurance and no foreign transaction fees. The Freedom has the rotating category bonuses which we try to max out and the transfer those UR points to the Ink or Sapphire account. I like that the UR points can be transferred to airlines across all 3 airline alliances. Since we usually redeem for flying in first we value the miles more than the cash option. 50,000 UR points is only worth $625 in travel through Chase. However, transferring 50,000 miles to United will get me one way in first class and that has a value into the thousands of dollars depending on the flight.
The Starwood Preferred Guest card is another keeper card since the points transfer to over 30 airlines. Once we used 12,000 SPG points to stay a night in a lovely resort hotel in Scotland that would have cost well over $300 per night. So I will also use the points for stays at an SPG property from time to time.
We also keep the Club Carlson card but do not use it for spending and earning. I'll buy something with it about once a year. The card gives you 40K points every anniversary year. DH and I each have this card and for the $75 annual fee we have been able to use those points and redeem $1800 worth of free Radisson Blu hotel stays in Europe over the last couple of years. We also have a Marriott card which gives you a free night each year at a category 1- 5 property. That is worth more than the annual fee. I recently added an IHG card which gives one free night at any property each year. Well worth the AF. Hope this helps!