How I went from having no credit at all to using credit card rewards for a free flight

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• When I moved to the US, my credit history vanished - which made it extremely difficult to open credit cards.
• It was especially challenging to open the kinds of cards people use to get flights and hotel stays on points alone, and I knew I wanted to try.
• The first card I was able to open that earned points I could redeem for travel was the Chase Freedom card, and my husband opened the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card and added me as an authorized user.
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When my friends started telling me how they scored fancy European vacations using credit points, I knew I wanted in on the action. The trouble is, my credit score sucked.

Actually, I didn't have one.

I moved to the US from Canada, so even though I had excellent credit history, none of it counted once I moved to the states. So to say it would be a challenge to start travel hacking (earning flights and hotel stays on credit card points alone) would be a challenge, considering most rewards credit cards - at least the ones with the best perks, anyway - require excellent credit.

Although it took me some time, I did manage to do some travel hacking. It wasn't anything fancy - a free flight and hotel stays to visit family across the US - but I'm still happy with the trip.

Intrigued? Here's what happened.

I knew I had to build up my credit score to get the most valuable cards

Like I mentioned, my credit history was non-existent, so I knew if I wanted to score free stuff using credit cards, I had to start building up my credit score by trying to apply to any credit card I could get my hands on over two years ago.

I wanted to get an unsecured credit card (the usual kind) but knew that if push came to shove, I'd get a secured credit card with a lower limit (which operates more like a debit card) just so I could get any repayment activity reported to the credit bureaus.

Luckily, I managed to get approved for a Credit One Bank unsecured credit card. It also offered cash back rewards so I pretty much thought I hit the jackpot. I used the credit for daily purchases like groceries and gas, then paid off the balance every month.

In full disclosure, I do have a husband who has an excellent credit score. He asked if I wanted to be an authorized user on one of his Discover credit cards, but I wanted to see if I could build my credit score on my own - I'm stubborn that way.

Then my husband decided he wanted to open the Amazon Rewards Visa Signature Card a year later. Maybe it was me being impatient or he was really convincing, but I decided to let him add me as an authorized user on his card.

Within a few months, I decided to check my credit score to see how much it went up. By this time about a year has passed since I opened the Credit One card. It was 700.

Even with a high credit score, it still took time to get approved

I decided to try my hand at getting the Chase Sapphire Preferred Card for $95 a year, thinking that since I was already an authorized user on another Chase card (the Amazon Rewards Visa) I might have a better chance of approval.

Sadly, I got denied so I asked my husband to apply and get it instead so I could become an authorized user. Within a few months we nabbed the sign-up bonus points (the current offer is 60,000 bonus points once you spend $4,000 within the first three months of opening it) and were excited to find out we could pool our points with the Amazon Rewards card to use towards travel.

I then decided to try again on my own, and finally got approved for the no-annual-fee Chase Freedom card. I stopped using the Credit One Visa card in favor of my new Freedom, though I use it for small purchases every few months to keep it open.

With the Chase Freedom card, I also earned a bonus within three months (the current offer is a $150 bonus once you spend $500 within three months of opening the card). My credit score kept going up and it hovers around 760 or so now.

A little over 2 years after I started building my credit, I was able to take a flight on credit card points alone

The best news is that both my husband and I had enough points to fly from Jacksonville, Florida to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania to visit friends and family. We also got about five days worth of free hotel stays. The trip wasn't entirely free as we did pay for my three-year-old's flight, but it was still way cheaper than if we were to have had to pay for everything out of pocket.

Yes, it took me longer than what others would have - over two years to get my first "free" flight - but I did what I could to build positive credit history: I made on-time payments and figured out which credit cards I could pre-qualify for before completing the actual application.

And I think being added as a qualified user helped me improve my credit score much faster than if I were to try to do so myself, and helped me get closer to a free flight by giving me access to credit cards I wouldn't have had otherwise.

Learn more about the Chase Freedom from The Points Guy »

Learn more about the Chase Sapphire Preferred from The Points Guy »

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