Welcome to the Faith Based Business Podcast with your host, Pastor Bob Thibodeau.

On this podcast, we interview fellow entrepreneurs who are willing to share their stories, their trials, and their triumphs in business, all in an effort to help you avoid the same obstacles and to achieve success faster.

But at all times, continue to rely on our faith to see us through to victory.

Now with today's guest, here is your host, Pastor Bob Thibodeau.

Hello, everyone, everywhere.

Pastor Robert Thibodeau here.

Welcome to the Faith Based Business podcast.

We are so blessed that you are joining us today.

Let me ask you a question.

Have you ever scrolled through someone's exotic vacation photos and thought, man, that must be nice, while your own travel plans barely get past the gas station.

I mean, what if I told you that you could be the one posting those beach pictures without breaking the bank account?

Well, if that's you, you need to keep listening today as we're going to be discussing how you can achieve these dreams.

And it's probably going to be a lot easier than most of us think.

Amen.

My guest today is Tim Walker, founder of Travel Multiplier.

Always a world traveler, a girl, dad, passionate teacher of a game changing concept called travel hacking.

Tim and his family don't just dream about traveling the world.

They do it regularly and for free.

What makes his story even more powerful is this, is that it all began while serving in one of the poorest neighborhoods in Pennsylvania where the idea of a vacation was more fantasy than future.

And today, he's helped countless families tap into that same strategy that transformed his own life.

And he's here today to show us how to do it too.

Amen.

With that being said, help me.

Welcome to the program, Tim Walker.

Tim, it is a blessing to have you with us today, my friend.

Oh, Pastor Bob, thanks so much for having me.

I appreciate it.

Well, the first question I always start with is this.

Other than that brief information I just shared, tell us in your own words, who is Tim Walker?

Yeah, absolutely.

So I live in Wilkes Barre, Pennsylvania.

So if you're a fan of the office, I'm just south of Scranton.

I've been here for 13 years now.

In addition, do what I do on the side with Travel Multiplier.

I'm actually a pastor as well.

So I planted and pastor a church in the poorest neighborhood in my city.

Specifically planted a church that is of and for the poor, really reaching people with the gospel.

Seeing so many lives transformed and so grateful to be able to live and lead to advance the gospel right here in My city and grateful for the opportunity to discover travel hacking, how life changing that's been for me.

And now the opportunity to be able to help other people do it as well with what I do with travel multiplier.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, let's start at the beginning.

What exactly is travel hacking?

And why should every family at least learn the basics of this?

Yeah, that's a great question.

So travel hacking is a strategic process of layering and leveraging credit card rewards for thousands of dollars in free travel.

So you mentioned a little bit earlier about my story.

So the reality was, for me, living and leading in our urban context, on one end, ministry was really exciting.

And we were seeing dozens and dozens of people that Jesus was rescuing out of homelessness, addiction, prostitution, prison, so many different things.

And as exciting as those stories were, it was equally exhausting feeling like we were being crushed under the weight of compassion fatigue.

Where we barely made enough money to live on, we didn't make enough money to travel.

And so what I found was travel hacking was a clear solution, a simple solution really, to that problem.

And while the details of listener story might be different as well, I think that in a lot of ways, everybody has the desire to travel more.

All of us have travel dreams.

And what we often find is travel dreams turn into nightmares when we start looking at the cost.

And so the reality is, no matter who you are, where you're coming from, where you want to travel, there's no need to spend money on that when you could be able to get those dream trips for free with travel hacking.

Yeah.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, I said, how did you earn 3 million travel points though, and launch this traveling movement?

Yeah, absolutely.

So it started out where I found travel hacking and started studying and researching and doing everything I could to kind of piece together all the information on this.

And I kind of went into overdrive.

I was so excited about it.

I was like, here we go.

And so in my first nine months, I earned 1.2 million travel rewards points.

Now, a few years into it, I've earned over three and a half million.

And you might hear that that might sound pretty unattainable, but the reality is that this is really just a simple process of leveraging your everyday expenses and making your money work for you.

So when I first got into it, I started doing it myself.

Then I started telling some family and friends about it, started coaching them in it, and all of them told me two things.

Number one, hey, Tim, this is really awesome.

Number two, you're really good at teaching this, you should turn this into a business.

So I did.

And that's where I launched Travel Multiplier, where I offer online courses and coaching to be able to help other people unlock the secrets of free travel as well.

Yeah.

Amen.

Amen.

What.

What's the most over the top draw dropping trip that you've booked entirely on points?

And what would that have cost without using points?

Yeah, absolutely.

So it's actually the trip I'm about to take.

My wife and I are celebrating our 10th wedding anniversary this year.

Amen.

And so we are going to travel for two weeks to Europe.

So we are going to fly to Europe in lay flat business class seats.

That's going to help with the jet lag a lot because each of us, if you're not familiar with that type of airline seat, it's like everybody gets their own cubicle and you get like a recliner and an entertainment system and it like folds down into a bed so you can sleep as you're going across the ocean.

Pretty incredible.

And then we're going to spend two weeks in several different European countries.

So my wife really enjoys World War II history.

So we're going to stay in Amsterdam, see the Corrie 10 Boom House, the Anne Frank house, go over to Poland, we're going to see Auschwitz while we're there.

Pretty sobering experience.

Then we're going to go through Prague, get to see a lot of the historical architecture there, hit Vienna and Salzburg, Austria, go to southern Germany where there's a lot of incredible castles and the Alps, and then end our time in Switzerland in Lucerne and Zurich.

So all of that and all the flights, the trains, the European hotels and resorts that we're staying in, I think totaling it all up, it would cost about $25,000 for us to do that trip.

And we're doing it completely free on points.

So I'm incredibly grateful for that and excited for what that trip's going to be like coming up here in August.

And you're probably going to document this and share it as part of your training program too.

Absolutely, yes.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, you know, most folks hear free travel and think, okay, there, I know there's a catch in here somewhere.

I mean, what's the biggest travel hacking myth that you'd love to just bust wide open?

Yeah, absolutely.

So.

So I think the, the biggest myth that a lot of people have is that credit cards are bad or that new credit cards ruin your credit score.

So on one side you got the Dave Ramsey folks who I've taught Dave Ramsey.

I'm grateful for Dave Ramsey.

It's helped a lot of people.

I would just have one point of disagreement with him about the credit cards and the free travel.

So what I teach people how to do is responsibly manage those credit cards.

You're not spending more money than you have.

You're just using your credit cards for your everyday expenses.

So when you go to the grocery store, the gas station, when you're, when your cell phone bill comes due, or your utilities, everybody has a choice how they're going to pay.

Cash, check, debit, or credit.

And the reality is, if you strategically use a credit card, then those everyday expenses could be earning you all kinds of free travel.

And so some people get over that hurdle, but then the immediate second hurdle is, hey, I don't, I don't know about this.

I don't about the whole credit card thing, because if I sign up for a new credit card, it's going to ruin the credit score that I've worked so hard to build and maintain.

But the interesting thing is actually signing up for a new credit card and managing it responsibly doesn't shrink your credit score.

It actually grows it.

So here I am, a number of years into this journey, several different credit cards.

I've signed up for 3.5 million travel points, and today my credit score is sitting at 799.

So it's, yeah, it's been great to be able to.

To be able to engage it responsibly and wisely, paying everything off on time and in full all the time.

But I know that oftentimes this does sound too good to be true.

And so anticipating that, one of the things I did is, if you go on my website, I wrote a short, free guide called the Skeptics Guide to Travel Hacking that walks through so many of the most common myths.

I spend some time busting those myths and then taking it a step further and telling the story of somebody who I've been able to help with my course or my coaching that's actually experienced the exact opposite of what people often think or fear, which has been great.

Amen.

Amen.

Well, there's someone listening right now, feeling skeptical.

What's the very first credit card or step that you'd recommend to get them started safely?

Yeah, absolutely.

So there's really three steps that I say helps everybody get in the game.

Number one is figure out your travel goals.

So travel hacking is not a one size fits all.

There's not limited options or blackout dates or anything like that.

So Dream big.

Figure out where you want to go.

And so for some people, they love flying.

For other people, they're terrified of flying.

Some people would prefer, you know, a cruise, other people would prefer a resort.

Some people might prefer a house rental.

How so?

Figure out first what are your travel goals.

And then step two is signing up for a credit card that aligns with those travel goals.

The first card that I often tell everybody to get is the Chase Sapphire Preferred card.

That card fits pretty much any travel goal.

And if you sign up for the Chase Sapphire preferred card, you spend $5,000 in your first three months.

You get 60,000 bonus points from that.

So think if you spend $1700 a month on your everyday expenses, you could earn that bonus for the sign up and spending that amount of money.

So when you that's 60,000 points, most people would take that and they would redeem that for cash back.

But where you really get into the real value of this is step three is redeem your points for maximum value.

So most people think 60,000 points, I'll cash it in for $600, cash back.

And that could get you a couple of budget nights at a hotel or maybe a couple of budget flights, round trip across the country, something like that.

But those 60,000 points are actually worth about 12 to 15 hundred dollars in free travel.

And here's where it gets really incredible.

The other thing most people miss is oftentimes when we sign up for credit cards, one person will sign up for the credit card and they'll add their spouse as the authorized user.

Well, there's another way you can do it that more than doubles your points.

So if you sign up for the card on your own, you spend the money, you earn those bonus points, you get 60,000 points.

But then if you refer your spouse to get the exact same car card, you get a 10,000 point referral bonus.

And your spouse can earn that 60,000 point bonus as well.

Now you're starting your travel hacking journey with about 150,000 points, which you could, if you were in a tight squeeze, you could cash that out for $1,500 cash back, or you could redeem that for about $3,000 in free travel and be able to take some incredible trips.

Amen.

Amen.

So if someone has this 100,000 points or whatever on credit card A, but you want to book, you know, you want to combine this with other ones because let's say you got another 100,000 on credit card B and 50,000 on credit card C, how do you combine them Into a trip.

Yeah.

So like the Chase Sapphire preferred card that offers what we call transferable points.

So you're able to transfer them to your spouse, or you're able to transfer them to a number of different hotel or airline partners.

So you might say, hey, I want to fly this airline, or I want to go to this resort, or I want to go on this cruise.

And you and your spouse can pool your points, and then you can take all those points and you can spend them however you want.

So there's a lot of flexibility in those type of points.

Or if you said, hey, on top of that, I want to get an airline card or a hotel card, that would help, you know, kind of level up those points.

You could do that as well.

And that.

That's really how it works.

Amen.

Amen.

Can you share us just a quick story with us about someone that you've helped who thought they'd never be able to travel, but now they can't stop?

Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely.

So.

So there.

There's two that come to mind.

One, I've got mine.

Who heard about this.

He was coming up on his 10th anniversary.

He was pretty skeptical, but he was like, all right, I'll give it a try.

So he did.

And he and his wife enjoyed 10 nights at an oceanfront golf resort, all inclusive, in Cancun to celebrate their anniversary.

It would have been a $6,000 trip that they got for free.

I've got somebody else that they started doing this, and they got to take their family of seven to Washington, D.C. which is pretty cool to be able to enjoy that with their family.

And then recently, they wanted to go on a missions trip, so they got to get free flights to and from Africa.

So they didn't have to fundraise for this trip.

They didn't have to do any of that.

They just got to enjoy their free flights to be able to take a missions trip to Africa.

So all kinds of people use it all kinds of different ways.

I've had the privilege of working with dozens of individuals and families and helping them travel all over the world.

Amen.

That's awesome.

Awesome.

Tell us about your coaching program a little bit.

What's involved with that?

Yeah, absolutely.

So I've got two different things that I offer.

One is a course, and one is coaching.

So the course is actually launching here in July.

And so I've got a new course called Becoming a Travel, how to unlock the secrets of Free travel.

And in that, what I do is I walk you from start to finish, how to be able to enjoy travel hacking for years to come.

So maybe your story is like my story and if you were to take my course, you'll go from feeling discouraged with your inability to afford travel to feeling empowered and equipped to take dream vacations for free using points and miles.

So that, that course is what the majority of people do.

The, the course you could jump into, it's on demand content walk step by step in five to 15 minute lessons.

We're all busy people and so I designed it in such a way where it's easy to, to consume, bite sized, accessible, clear, easy content on the go wherever you find yourself and whenever you have a little bit of time and that takes you all the way through the process.

So that's my course.

The second thing I offer is travel hacking coaching because what I found is some people would say hey I, I've got the time and interest to, to do a, a short course, that, that sounds really great.

And then I found there were other people that are the just tell me what to do types that they were like, hey, this sounds really great, but I don't really have the time or interest in a course.

Can I just hire you and can you just like work with me one on one to tell me what my next step is at each point of the journey?

So I offer that as well.

So in my travel hacking coaching, I work one on one with people where you don't have to learn the system, you don't really have to think about it, you get to borrow from my expertise and I coach at each step of the journey, just telling you what your next right step is from start to finish for your next dream vacation.

Amen.

Amen.

Just a generalized timeline.

If someone signed up for the, the selftaught course, you know that one about how long does it take them to go through it?

Yeah, so the, the course is about three hours of on demand content.

So I often find people go through it faster than they think.

So they get into it and the excitement of them seeing how easy it is and dreaming about the possibilities.

I've had some people buy the course in the morning and they're done with it by dinner time.

I've had other people say hey, I'll buy the course after I'm out of work on Friday and they're done with it over the weekend.

Other people are a little busier than that and they've said hey, I could carve out five to 15 minutes a day and work through that over a two week period really easily.

So it's completely self paced.

So you can go through it as quickly or as slowly as you want or you need.

So, yeah, it's, it's really clear in that way where you can do it in whatever time frame works best for you.

Amen.

Amen.

Do people send you testimonies about how it's impacted their travel lifestyle?

They do.

They do, yeah.

If you go on my website, I've got a number of different, like, pictures and stories and testimonials from people.

Sometimes I've got people that will make a connection and it's not just through the course.

Then we'll even, you know, start connecting outside of that.

And so I had a one guy, he texted me recently, he got into this because he wanted to go to Paris with his daughters.

So he got into this and he started asking me some questions and got him through the course.

He did that and he was like, okay, I'm good for Paris.

And he texted me and he said, hey, man, I gotta be honest.

I, I, I just got into this just because I just wanted a free trip to Paris with my girls.

He was like, now that I went through the course, I'm absolutely hooked on this.

I'm going to be traveling for free all the time now, which is great.

Amen.

Amen.

Tim, this, this has been a fantastic conversation, brother.

And I believe there are people listening to us right now who want more information.

So how, how can someone get in touch with you and find out more?

Yeah, absolutely.

You can go to my website, which is travelmultiplier.com you on social media?

I've got a Facebook page.

I'm also on Instagram as well.

You could go on there.

Or if you want to connect with me directly, you can send me an email anytime.

Timravel multiplier.com I would love to connect, hear any questions you have, talk more, and hopefully help you unlock the secrets of free travel as well.

Amen.

Amen.

I put links all this down in the show notes below.

Folks, Tim Walker's not just selling pipe dreams here.

He's showing everyday people like you and me how to turn pennies into passports.

And have you ever felt financially burned out from ministry or business and just simply long for a way to create lasting family memories?

Tim's approach might be just the breakthrough you need.

Amen.

You can grab his free guide, Busting the Top Travel hacking myths@travelmultiplier.com skeptic and while you're there, check out his book, his trading.

Let him help you travel smarter, live freer, and multiply your impact as you go.

Amen.

Praise God.

Tim, thank you for coming on the program today, brother, and sharing all about this great information that, that you've developed for us.

I do appreciate it so much.

Much.

Yeah, thanks so much for having me.

Amen.

Folks, that's all the time we have for today.

Drop down the show notes.

Get in touch with Tim right now.

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Take care of this right now.

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Get in touch with them right now.

Tim Walker, my son, Pastor Bob, reminding you to be blessed in all that you do.

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Until next time, be blessed in all that you do.

Sam.