How a Couple Can Earn 225,000 Points From Just 1 Credit Card

When a credit card launches a massive welcome offer, most people focus on how many points they can earn themselves. But savvy couples know there’s often a way to double the opportunity.

Right now, the best welcome offer on the most popular travel credit card is back, and eligible couples could potentially walk away with a combined 200,000 points — or more. That’s plenty to cover flights, hotel stays, and other travel experiences that would otherwise cost thousands of dollars.

Let’s go over the 4 easy steps to this strategy.

Step 1: Make Sure Both Partners Are Eligible for the Card

The rarest 100,000-point bonus offer on the Chase Sapphire Preferred card is back for a limited time, and now it creates an especially unique opportunity for couples.

The first thing to understand is that Chase welcome bonus offers are earned per person, not per household. If both partners qualify, they could apply for their own accounts and collectively earn at least 200,000 Chase Ultimate Rewards points after meeting the minimum spending requirements.

To illustrate how the strategy works, we’ll work with a hypothetical couple named Alice and Bob. Before applying, both partners should confirm they’re eligible for the Chase Sapphire Preferred card and its limited-time 100,000-point welcome offer. Here are a few important rules to keep in mind:

• Neither person is eligible for another welcome offer if they currently have or have had a Chase Sapphire Preferred card.
• If they currently have or previously had the Chase Sapphire Reserve^® or Sapphire Reserve for Business℠, they may be eligible for the Chase Sapphire Preferred card’s welcome offer. Chase recently updated eligibility rules to a card-by-card basis, now allowing cardholders to have multiple cards across the entire Sapphire family.
• Be mindful of Chase’s unofficial 5/24 rule. If either partner has opened 5 or more personal credit cards across all banks in the past 24 months, that application is unlikely to be approved.
• It’s recommended that both partners have good to excellent credit scores for the best chances at approval.

If she passes all those checks, then Alice should commence with applying for the Chase Sapphire Preferred card first:

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Chase Sapphire Preferred^® Card

U.P. Rating 

The rating for this card has been determined by our own industry experts who know the ins and outs of credit card products. Bonuses, rewards as well as rates and fees are all taken into account. Compensation from the issuer does not affect our rating. We only recommend products we either use ourselves or endorse.

A fantastic travel card with a great welcome offer, good benefits, and perks for a moderate annual fee.

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Chase Sapphire Preferred^® Card

A fantastic travel card with a great welcome offer, good benefits, and perks for a moderate annual fee.

Welcome Offer

Earn 75,000 100,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.

75,000 100,000 points

UP's Offer Valuation*:

$2,000

Annual Fee

$95

APR

19.24% - 27.49% Variable

Credit Recommended

Upgraded Points credit ranges are a variation of FICO^® Score 8, one of many types of credit scores lenders may use when considering your credit card application.

Good to Excellent

Why We Like This Card

The Chase Sapphire Preferred^® card is one of the best travel rewards cards on the market. Its bonus categories include travel, dining, online grocery purchases, gas, EV charging, vacation homes, and streaming services, which gives you the opportunity to earn lots of bonus points on these purchases.

Additionally, it offers flexible point redemption options, no foreign transaction fees, and excellent travel insurance coverage including primary car rental insurance and emergency evacuation. With benefits like these, it’s easy to see why this card is an excellent choice for any traveler.

Pros & Cons

Pros

• 5x points on all travel booked via the Chase Travel portal
• 3x points on dining purchases, online grocery purchases (excluding Walmart, Target, and wholesale clubs), gas, EV charging, vacation homes (such as Airbnb and Vrbo), and select streaming services
• 2x points on all other travel worldwide

Cons

• $95 annual fee
• No elite benefits like airport lounge access or hotel elite status

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Card Highlights

• Earn 100,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening.
• Enjoy benefits such as 5x on travel purchased through Chase Travel℠, 3x on dining, 3x on vacation homes, 3x on gas & EV charging, 3x on top streaming services and online groceries (excluding Walmart, Target, and wholesale clubs), 2x on all other travel purchases, 1x on all other purchases
• Earn up to $100 in statement credits each account anniversary year for hotel stays through Chase Travel
• Count on Trip Cancellation/Interruption Insurance, Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver, Lost Luggage Insurance and more.
• Get a year of complimentary Apple TV when activated by December 31, 2026 - a value of $156.
• Complimentary DashPass which unlocks $0 delivery fees & lower service fees for a min. of one year when you activate by 12/31/27. Plus, a $10 promo each month on non-restaurant orders.
• Receive one statement credit of up to $120 every four years as reimbursement for the application fee charged to your card for a Global Entry, TSA Precheck^® or NEXUS application.
• Transfer points to leading airline and hotel loyalty programs
• Member FDIC

Financial Snapshot

• APR: 19.24% - 27.49% Variable
• Foreign Transaction Fees: None

Rewards Center

Chase Ultimate Rewards

Step 2: Refer and Earn More Bonus Points

After Alice is approved and receives her card, it’s now time for Bob to apply.

As a Chase Sapphire Preferred cardholder, Alice can generate a personalized referral link and send it to any friend or family member. If Bob applies through that link and is approved for his own Chase Sapphire Preferred card, Alice can earn a 15,000-point referral bonus on top of the rewards she’ll already receive from her own welcome offer.

Officially, it can take up to 8 weeks for those referral bonus points to arrive in the couple’s balances. With this strategy, Alice and Bob are already on their way to surpassing 200,000 bonus points.

Step 3: Meet the Spending Requirement

Chase has increased the welcome offer from 75,000 points to 100,000 points without requiring more spending to achieve it. However, that spending window begins immediately upon approval, and not just when Alice and Bob activate their cards.

As they wait for their new cards to arrive in the mail (which can take around a week), they need to come up with a plan to meet $5,000 in spending within the first 3 months — per card.

At first glance, spending $10,000 in 3 months may sound unachievable, breaking down to about $3,333 per month. However, it’s relatively easy to meet the requirement simply by shifting all of their normal spending to the Chase Sapphire Preferred card during the qualification period.

The most important thing is to have a plan before applying so that neither partner misses out on their welcome bonus offer. At the same time, they need to avoid spending more than they normally would just to earn the points. Carrying a balance and paying interest can quickly outweigh the value of the rewards earned.

Fortunately, Chase makes it easy to monitor welcome offer progress. Once each card is activated, Alice and Bob can use the Chase mobile app to track how much spending they still have to do to unlock the welcome offer bonus.

Step 4: Combine Points

Since cardholders also earn points on the purchases used to qualify for the welcome offer bonus, both Alice and Bob receive at least an additional 5,000 points from the required spending alone.

That’s because the spending requirement is $5,000. Purchases that don’t fall into a designated bonus category earn 1x points, but the Chase Sapphire Preferred card also offers generous earning rates across several areas, such as 3x points on dining and gas. So if some of the required spending falls within those bonus categories, Alice and Bob could earn well more than 5,000 points each.

Here’s how the math checks out now:

• Alice: 100,000 bonus points from welcome offer, 5,000 points from spending requirement, and 15,000 referral bonus points from Bob’s application
• Bob: 100,000 bonus points from welcome offer and 5,000 points from spending requirement
• Total: 225,000 points

Plus, one of the most customer-friendly features that Chase offers is the ability to combine points with others in the same household. This can be a spouse, domestic partner, family member, or even a roommate. As long as Alice and Bob share the same address and have proof that they live together, something like a rental agreement or utility bill, they can pool their points together (Source: Chase).

Once all of the points post, our hypothetical couple can move all 225,000 points into a single Ultimate Rewards account and redeem them together for a larger trip. Of course, the more they use each card, the more points they accumulate beyond the introductory spending period.

What Can 225,000 Points Get You?

The value of Chase Ultimate Rewards points all depends on how you redeem them.

While cash-back is an option, it’s one to avoid unless you’re strapped for cash. Cash-back redemptions only yield 1 cent per point in value, so 225,000 points equates to $2,250 in that case.

You could also book flights, hotels, experiences, and more on the Chase Travel portal, with points worth up to 1.5x per point for new bookings, so 225,000 points are worth up to $3,375.

However, you can do even better, as the best value typically comes from transferring Ultimate Rewards points to airline and hotel partners. Chase points transfer at a 1:1 ratio to all partners, with the exception of World of Hyatt, which is at a 4:3 ratio for Chase Sapphire Preferred cardholders who got their card after June 15, 2026 (the 4:3 ratio will apply to all Chase Sapphire Preferred cardholders after October 1, 2026).

That’s why we value Chase Ultimate Rewards points at 2 cents apiece, so 225,000 points could really be worth more like $4,500. With the right transfer partners, 225,000 points would be enough for 2 round-trip business-class tickets to Europe, several nights at luxury hotels and resorts around the world, or a combination of flights and accommodations that dramatically reduces the overall cost of a vacation.

Final Thoughts

It’s easy to see why the Chase Sapphire Preferred card is a no-brainer for travelers, especially for those who travel together. This double-up strategy works so well because the Chase Sapphire Preferred card’s annual fee is reasonably low.

While the 100,000-point welcome offer is still around, you can unlock far more value than relying on a single account and create a much larger pool of points for your next trip.