What changes have you made due to inflation?

[QuarterMillionMan]

Leisure travel for me by plane got greatly reduced. Monthly flights from Los Angeles to Las Vegas got changed to driving twice a year. Or yearly flights to Hawaii got reduced to once only in March 2023 since COVID.

[disneysteve]

Leisure travel for me by plane got greatly reduced. Monthly flights from Los Angeles to Las Vegas got changed to driving twice a year. Or yearly flights to Hawaii got reduced to once only in March 2023 since COVID.

Hotel prices have gotten insane which is really squashing my interest in traveling. Places that used to be under $150/night are now $300 or more.

[ua_guy]

Hotels (even basic stuff, like Holiday Inn Express) are insane and car rentals are still insane, like $90/day before taxes and all their crap fees, for a sedan.

[QuarterMillionMan]

I've given up looking at rental car prices. Before COVID in Las Vegas $12 - $15 a day for a rental car was the norm. Now like ua_guy mentioned $100 a day. Southwest might have a $49 flight from Los Angeles to Las Vegas but the rental car would kill the good deal to fly so I rather drive my own vehicle to get there. Surprisingly hotels in Tijuana are still cheap so I've been driving there every weekend. Hotels there used to be $20 - $25 a night before inflation but still under $40 a night with inflation. When i retire I'm moving to Mexico if inflation is still rampant.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

My water bill in one year went up about 20%. But our electric bill went up around 50% in one year. Ugh. Very noticeable. My balance billing went form $160 to $223 and it went up again.

[QuarterMillionMan]

Inflation broke the .99 cents only store's model of selling only .99 cents items. Today I went to a .99 cents Only store and saw cases of national brand beers $18.99 (ie, Coors light, Modelo beer, Bud light, etc), Mr. Coffee drip coffee maker $27.99, electric can openers $19.99, and lots of item way over the .99 cents only items of the past. The store no longer only sells .99 cents items. I like having the option of buying items more than .99 cents but before inflation their model was to sell everything at .99 cents or less.

99 Cents Only Stores | Where Deals Come True (99only.com)

[disneysteve]

Inflation broke the .99 cents only store's model of selling only .99 cents items.

Dollar Tree raised their price to $1.25 a while back. Also many of their stores also now have a section of items priced higher than that.

[scfr]

Regarding hotels: Is anyone else working the credit card sign-up bonuses to earn hotel points? Last summer I took a trip, all 4 nights free with points. This winter we'll be going to Europe, where 8 of 10 nights will be be free. DH & I each signed up for a cc where we got enough points to cover 3 nights and booked with a "use points for 3 nights and get the 4th night free" and each of us covered 1 of 3 destination cities. Our 3rd destination we are staying 2 nights, and I found an off-season weekend package deal. We chose our cities, but then adjusted the itinerary based on what was the most economical overall factoring in transportation, hotels, meals (hotels with breakfast included) and even attractions.

P.S. - Both of the trips mentioned above, I started planning at least a year in advance, and the first thing I did was start looking for cards with good hotel point bonuses.

[disneysteve]

Regarding hotels: Is anyone else working the credit card sign-up bonuses to earn hotel points?

No. At this point, I generally have no desire to open new accounts. I made an exception a couple of years ago and got a Lowe's card to save $150 on a new freezer (and 5% on other big purchases like our recent washer and dryer).

For hotels, we currently have over 800,000 Marriott points so we're good for a while.

[Like2Plan]

I've noticed some big jumps in hotel pricing, too. I thought Disney was way out there with some of the prices I've seen lately, but some of the other hotels have really increased, too.

I am a little frustrated with the Marriott hotel Free Night certificates not keeping up. The certificates have a point limitation on them. DH has one that is up to 25k, I have one that is up to 35k and another one that is up to 40k. The inflation creep has been an ongoing problem because a few years ago Marriott allowed us to add up to 5K of our own points in order to make a reservation because the certificates were difficult to use otherwise-last year they increased it up to15k points of our own points to add on to make a ressie. That would make DH's Free Night certificate worth about 1/2 night.

Anyway, I am finding some places as high as 60-88k points per night. We can't touch those with our certificates. We will work with what we have- so, it might mean staying a longer distance from where we would like.
And, we might do what scfr is suggesting--cancel the card with the 25k certificate and get a new one with the 35k certificate (and the introductory points).

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Everything is higher with inflation

[QuarterMillionMan]

Today on CNBC. I find myself spending less but I'm not a high income earner. What about the rest of you (ie, ds, LAL, Drake, ua_guy, Singguy, monkeymama, L2P, fishingguy, or anyone, etc).

[disneysteve]

Today on CNBC. I find myself spending less but I'm not a high income earner. What about the rest of you (ie, ds, LAL, Drake, ua_guy, Singguy, monkeymama, L2P, fishingguy, or anyone, etc).

Our spending is the highest it’s ever been. Kind of hard not to be that way with how much prices have gone up in the past few years.

[QuarterMillionMan]

I guess you're right and I didn't think of it that way. I was thinking before I'd buy take out twice a week and home-cook the remainder of the week. Now zero take outs in a week and I cook at home instead. But maybe twice a month I will get a take-out Panda Express Chinese food or KFC, etc.

[ua_guy]

We're spending less but it's not directly related to the economy or inflation. We're eating out a lot less right now, but that's in the interest of health versus saving money. Grocery spending is up, but that's also slightly offset by prices for certain things going back to normal, as well as buying less of other things. Fuel is also cheaper, in general, but our frequency of RV travel has been a little less, too.