๐Ÿ’ฐ My Top Finds, Latest Deals, and Best Recommendations (1/31/26)


๐Ÿ‘‹ Hi Reader,

Happy Saturday! Here are some highlights from today's newsletter:

  • ๐Ÿค” How to earn millions of points & more listener Q&A
  • ๐Ÿ’ณ Increased welcome offers on United & Delta cards
  • ๐Ÿ’ฐ Bank bonuses worth over $10,000+
  • ๐Ÿ›ซ Business class award flight deals
  • ๐ŸŽ Latest gift card deals this week
  • ๐Ÿ“ 100% Back on Paper Mate products at Staples
  • ๐Ÿ› ๏ธ Six reasons to learn DIY skills, and more!

One small favor: if you enjoyed reading, please forward this email to someone else who might too! And if that's you, make sure to subscribe here. Thanks so much in advance!

Chris


๐Ÿค” How to Earn Millions of Points & More Listener Q&A

video previewโ€‹

Check out this week's episode if you want to learn how I earned over 15 million points and miles. I also answer listener questions about spending strategies, credit scores, business cards, cash-back alternatives, and how to decide when a card (or perk) is worth it.


๐Ÿ”’ Take Control of Your Digital Privacy in 2026

Todayโ€™s newsletter is brought to you byโ€ฆ DeleteMeโ€‹

This year, keeping my family safe online is one of my top priorities. When I Googled myself a few years ago, I found detailed profiles with my email, phone number, address, family members, and more. After hours of trying to remove it manually and almost giving up, I turned to DeleteMe, which made the entire process so effortless.

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Get 20% off DeleteMe for you or your entire family at chrishutchins.com/deleteme and start this year safer and smarter.


๐Ÿ“‹ My Past Week

Here's a quick recap of what I was up to last week:

  • I spent a lot of the last week going deep down the ClawdBot MoltBot OpenClaw rabbit hole. For those not familiar, it's a [description]. So far it's blowing my mind and if you want to learn more, there's a ton of articles (like this) and videos (like this) that give more context and I'll be recording an episode soon about my experience. If you decide to play around with this or any other AI tools, please take the time to set things up in a safe/secure way.
  • We ordered a Bambu Labs 3D printer as a holiday gift for the family and it finally arrived (was backordered). With so many things we could print, I'm feeling like I don't even know where to start. We've printed some fun/silly things for the kids, but I think the first real project might be setting up some Gridfinity storage. I don't think I realized some bigger prints take 12h+, which is likely the reason I'm overthinking what we print next. If you have any suggestions, please let me know!
  • For a few weeks, we've been wanting to paint one of the bedrooms in our house and do a full deep-clean of our cars. It seemed like finding the time to knock them out was getting harder and harder, so we decided to outsource to a painter and mobile car wash/detailer this week. As much as I love doing DIY projects myself (see below), it felt so incredible to knock both projects out so quickly. Having been such a saver my whole life it's been hard to learn (and hone) the skill of actually spending money, but it seems to be getting easier with practice. For anyone curious we found the painter or Thumbtack and the mobile car wash/detailer on Yelp.

๐Ÿค‘ Latest Deals

๐Ÿ’ฐ Bank Bonuses Worth Over $10,000+

Bank bonuses are a great way to earn some easy cash, so here are some worth checking out.

Personal

  • โ€‹Up to $3,000 from a Popular Bank: Open an eligible account or upgradeโ€‹ to it before 4/31 and complete qualifying deposits.
  • โ€‹Up to $1,500 from Marcus: Oโ€‹pen a High-Yield Online Savings Accountโ€‹ before 3/11 and complete qualifying deposits.
  • โ€‹Up to $1,000 from Bank of America (Targeted): Deposit a qualifying amount to a new or old savings account before 4/30. Check your email to see if you're targeted.
  • โ€‹$500 from Bank of America: Oโ€‹pen an eligible checking accountโ€‹ before 5/31 and complete qualifying direct deposits.
  • โ€‹Up to $500 from KeyBank (Select states): Open a new Key Smart Checking or KeyBank Hassle-Free Account before 2/6 using promo code KDMA1125โ€‹ and complete qualifying activities.
  • โ€‹Up to $500 from Citizens Bank (Select states): Oโ€‹pen a new checking and savings account before 3/15 and complete the required activities.

Business

  • โ€‹Up to $2,000 from Citi: Oโ€‹pen a business checking accountโ€‹ in-branch before 4/6 and complete qualifying activities.
  • โ€‹$825 from Wells Fargo: Open a new eligible business checking account before 3/3 and complete the qualifying requirements.
  • โ€‹Up to $500 from First Commonwealth Bank (select states): Opโ€‹en a new business checking account before 3/24โ€‹ with promo code FCBIZ2 and complete the qualifying requirements.
  • โ€‹$400 from Wells Fargoโ€‹: Open a new eligible business checking account before 3/3 and complete the qualifying requirements.

๐Ÿ“ฆ $10 Off $35 Costco Same-Day Delivery

Costco is offering $10 off orders of $35+ with the promo code WINTERSAMEDAY26 on same-day delivery until 2/22.

๐Ÿ“ 100% Back on Paper Mate Products at Staples

Staples is offering 100% back in points (up to $40) on Paper Mate products. If you want to stock up on pens, pencils, and other writing supplies, take advantage of this offer before 1/31.

๐ŸŽ Latest Gift Card Deals

Here are some gift card deals I found this week with expiration dates in parentheses.

P.S. If you want to learn how to save and profit from gift cards, check out Ep #212.


๐Ÿ›ซ Travel, Points & Miles

๐Ÿ’ณ Increased Credit Card Welcome Offers: United & Delta

For compliance reasons, we can't mention all the cards by name, but the linked pages have all the details on the increased welcome offers.

United

Delta

  • โ€‹Personal Reserveโ€‹: Up to 125K miles. 100K after $6K spend in 6mo, plus 25K after an additional $3K spend. Offer ends 4/1.
  • โ€‹Personal Platinum: Up to 100K miles. 80K after $4K spend in 6mo, plus 20K after an additional $2K spend.
  • โ€‹Personal Gold: Up to 90K miles. 70K after $3K spend in 6mo, plus 20K after an additional $2K spend. Offer ends 4/1.
  • โ€‹Business Reserve: Up to 125K miles after $15K spend in 6mo.
  • โ€‹Business Platinum: Up to 100K miles after $8K spend in 6mo.
  • โ€‹Business Gold: Up to 90K miles after $6K spend in 6mo.

As always, you can find the full list of best card offers on our โ€‹โ€‹Best Cards Pageโ€‹.

๐Ÿ“ฃ New Airline, Hotel and Points Promos This Week

Business Class Award Flight Deals

Hotel Promos

Airline Promos


๐Ÿ•ต๏ธ Top Finds

๐Ÿ› ๏ธ Six Reasons to Learn DIY Skills

One of our readers (Justin) wrote this very relatable article about the value of learning DIY skills. Building skills isn't just about saving money; it's about gaining independence, understanding how things work, and finding satisfaction in creating and fixing things yourself.

๐Ÿค– Amazon's New Auto Buy Feature

Amazon just launched Auto Buy, which automatically purchases items when they hit your target price. I regularly use the Keepa browser extension to track prices on Amazon and I'm excited to use the Keepa data to set price targets and see what happens.


๐Ÿ’ฌ Parting Thoughts

As always, thanks so much for reading! Iโ€™d love to hear your thoughts on todayโ€™s newsletter, and if you enjoyed it, please let me know why!

Chris

Chris Hutchins

Discover the latest and greatest hacks, deals and recommendations to upgrade and optimize your life, money and travel โ€“ all while spending less and saving more.

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