Millennial

to inveterate points and miles hoarders. Making the decision to spend that pile of rewards accumulated during the pandemic is one thing. Actually spending them is another.

“Airline revenue systems are intentionally opaque,” Funk said. “So even if your credit card offers the ability to transfer points to partners, your bank literally doesn’t have the mechanisms to guide you through which partner makes sense for a given trip, what the expected pricing should be or even how to book

flights with that program.”

This opacity freezes many would-be spenders in their tracks, making them second-guess whether a given redemption offers the best value. This bias toward getting the most value, while positive on its surface, can lead to a spiral of comparison shopping and waiting for the perfect redemption.

“I just give the advice not to overthink it,” says Adam Nubern, a certified public accountant who specializes in serving digital nomads. “Don’t get caught up in the maximizing the redemption value rat race. Then you have to keep up with the program changes and all that. How

many hours do you spend researching that? Do you want a part-time job as a points maximizer?”

Not only does this “maximizer” mentality lead to more hoarding, it can also make you unhappier. A 2018 study by the Department of Psychology of Chengdu University in China found that maximizers tend to score lower on scores of overall wellbeing than those who accepted “good enough” options.

In other words, those who obsessed over the best purchase were less happy with the outcome than those who took a more relaxed approach, so-called satisficers. The term “satisficing,” a combination of “satisfy” and

“suffice,” is a decisionmaking process that involves collecting enough information to make an acceptable choice. It’s a great way to overcome travel reward overaccumulation.

Take charge of your points

Travel rewards bloggers have long hyped those redemptions that offer the absolute best value. Taking a first-class flight to Asia, for example, might offer 5 cents per mile in value, while an economy flight within the U.S. could yield only 1 or 2 cents per mile. This creates an incentive to use miles for the most lavish, luxurious options.

But think about it this way: Those high-end redemptions only offer more value because the cash equivalent is so high. A round-trip flight to Asia can easily cost $10,000 when paying cash, which makes points and miles redemptions seem like a great value — but only by comparison.

Instead, travelers sitting on a cache of points should keep it simple. Taking a flight to visit family? Use airline miles. Looking for a hotel during a road trip? Use credit card or hotel points. These redemptions might not get many likes on Instagram, but they’ll burn through those quickly depreciating rewards.

Just make sure the redemption

you choose doesn’t offer value too far below baseline. Use an online calculator to compare the value of using rewards or paying cash.

But, when in doubt: Use those points.

“I think, ‘Well, dang, I don’t have to use actual money, so let’s go,” Nubern says. “I try not to get caught up in that decision fatigue. In my mind, I’m not using a dollar, so any kind of redemption is great, and I just go for it.”