Today’s guest post comes from one of my favorite churning friends, the truly inimitable smugdog. He is spot on with this post, and this is something i wish I learned much sooner. Thanks for the post smug!

You just booked an ANA First Class suite for the cost of a tank of gas or two, or maybe you casually mentioned that you’re paying your mortgage with a significant kickback with a certain card. A coworker’s ears perk up. A brother in law leans in across the Thanksgiving table.

“Wait, how are you doing that? Can you teach me?”

The temptation is immediate. You see waves of referral bonuses in your mind’s eye. You think of the camaraderie, of finally having someone in your real, physical life who understands the thrill of what you truly enjoy but makes other retch.

But take a breath. Step back from the edge of the boat (blog theme joke)
Because bringing a “normal person” into the deep waters is rarely the mutual windfall you envision. More often than not, it is a massive liability.

The Firehose and the Spoon

The reality of modern churning is that it requires a baseline of obsessive, near pathological dedication. When a newbie asks how to get started, our instinct is to point them to the resources that built us, telling them to read DoC, scour MEAB, or listen to long abandoned podcasts. But to a normal person with a normal relationship to money, this is like drinking from a firehose.

They don’t understand 5/24. They don’t know the difference between 2/90 and 1/8 rules. They certainly don’t understand why you’re blindly probing obscure FinTechs with random transactions just to see how they code.

If you bring them into the fold, you can inevitably become their permanent tech support. You will find yourself dragged into a never-ending cycle of feeding. You will get panicked text messages because a $500 gift card wouldn’t auto-drain. You will spend an hour explaining why they absolutely cannot call the bank when a problem arises that for them is world ending but for you is “the cost of business”

And despite your best efforts, they will still sabotage themselves. You’ll meticulously map out a multi-year strategy for them, only to find out they impulsively burned a 5/24 slot applying for an Old Navy store card. Or, like so many of us have experienced, you’ll convince a friend to get a premium flagship card for the sign-up bonus, and years later discover they are still holding the card, ignoring all the credits, and happily paying the $550 annual fee despite your repeated advice to downgrade or close it.

Expertise is Expensive (And Your Time is Limited)

Your expertise is earned through blood, sweat, and shutdowns, either your own or information confided in you. It is built on the anxiety of floating down payment levels of manufactured spend while praying a wire transfer clears, or navigating the very real risks and diligence required to account for bookkeeping your balances across dozens or even hundreds of accounts. Even seasoned veterans “do a stupid” sometimes, overextend and get burned for several thousand dollars on a bad play. If anything the more you get into this, the more that’s going to happen. I’m being dramatic but it really takes a certain type of person to go beyond “I sign up for a card and close it 4x a year to where we’re all trying to get, and its definitely not a normal type of person.

When you try to teach a friend, you are transferring that risk onto your own conscience. If their bank account gets frozen because they pushed too hard, or they trigger an Amex Financial Review and lose their cards, you are the one they will blame.

Time is your most limited asset. Every hour you spend explaining the intricacies of holding multiple browser tabs open to bypass a certain site trigger or walking back something they did when you told them not to is an hour you aren’t optimizing your own velocity.

The Fork

If you absolutely must involve friends or family in the hobby, consider one of these two viable paths:

1. The P2/P3 Complete Takeover: If you have older parents or a spouse who simply don’t care to understand the game, don’t make them learn it. You apply for the cards, you manage the annual fees, you hit the minimum spends, and you keep the points. They get a kickback on what you both agree is reasonable. When they want to travel, you just quietly book the flights for them. You remain the captain; they get to enjoy the view from the deck.

2. Let Them Be: Let your friends be good at what they are good at, and you stick to what you are good at. They might be brilliant software engineers, incredible doctors, or fantastic chefs. Let them shine there. Churning (or whatever we call it now) is our edge. If they want to truly jump in, give them the starting tools and check with them in a few months. You’ll know if they have that same energy you do or if it was a fleeting interest.

We all want to share the wealth, but the ocean we swim in is deep, filled with compliance algorithms, ChexSystems inquiries, KYC gestapos and sudden rule changes. Let the regular brained people stay safely on the shore fishing off the dock. Focus on your own plays, protect your time, and keep listening for the next whalesong. 

– smugdog