Mouse Money!

Happy Labor Day, everyone!  I hope you are getting to enjoy a little time off from work.  This past month has been especially crazy for me, so I am particularly thankful that I get a day to relax and focus on my family.  But... you really don't care about that, do you??  Let's talk gift cards!

So far, I've outlined some easy ways to make cash from point-earning sites that allow you cash in for gift cards.  Hopefully, you've poked around them enough to see that there are some pretty decent options for gift cards - Amazon, Walmart, Paypal cash, lots of retail stores & restaurants. All of those are awesome, but if you are on a quest for Disney cards specifically, you won't find them there.

So how you do you convert SB or Perk points to Disney?  In one word - TARGET!  Because these sites don't offer Disney cards directly, you have to use Target as a middle man to get them.  It's a few extra steps, but hey - free!!! Actually, better than free, because you can get a discount on those Disney cards, making your Target cards go further.

I'll take you step by step on how to do it! Let's go...

Step 1: Get a Target Red Card.  Red Cards are Target's in-house credit or debit cards.  You can sign up for them at any Target store, or online here.  The Red Card gives you an additional 5% off all of your Target purchases (in store and online), and free shipping for all of your online orders.  If you are a Dave Ramsey type who doesn't want any extra cards, I will set your mind at ease now by telling you that you will never actually charge anything on this card if your goal is earning Disney gift cards!

Step 2:  Download the Target app on to your smartphone.  This is different than the Cartwheel app (You should get that, too - some good deals!  But not needed for Disney cards).

Step 3:  Cash in for Target cards from SB/Perk or similar.

Step 4:  When your Target gift card shows up in your inbox, pull it up and find two numbers - the gift card number and the access or PIN number.  The gift card number is a 15 digit number that should start with 041.  The access number is an 8 digit number.

Step 5:  On the Target app on your phone, use the menu to find "My Accounts" and then "My Gift Cards."  Follow the prompts to enter in your gift card info - your gift cards will now be saved to the app.  THIS IS IMPORTANT!!!  For whatever reason, if you buy something from Target online, they limit the number of gift cards you can use to 4 max.  If you are cashing in for smaller
increments (which, as mentioned earlier, is probably a good idea since there is never any guarantee these sites will continue as is), you'll need to do something to use them together as one payment.  But never fear!!!  Target is amazing and has a way to do that.  Once your gift cards are entered, scroll down on the screen and select the option "Combine."  That will allow you to check all your smaller cards and turn them into one card - and one form of payment!!!  If only the Disney corporation itself would catch the snap of how wonderful an option this is!!!  But I digress...

Step 6: Go to Target.com and SIGN IN!  Be sure that you have made your Red Card your default payment option on your Target account.

Step 7: Find the $50 Disney gift cards (search feature works great for this purpose).  Add 1, 2 or 3 of them to your cart - 3 is the max Target will let you order. But you can order as many different times as you want.   Once you put them in your cart and go to checkout, you'll see that your Red Card discount is automatically applied!  Which is cool. because you are paying with gift cards, not a Red Card!  So you get the bennies of the Red Card (5% off and free shipping) without actually using it.

Step 8:  Beneath your order summary, click the option "Pay with a Target GiftCard".  This will bring up a screen that asks for the gift card number and access number that is saved on your Target app.

Free gift cards are even better than a cute puppy in your mailbox.

Step 9:  Click "Complete Order" and wait about a week for your FREE Disney cards to arrive in the mail.  I must say, nothing quite compares to the surge of joy I get when I open that mailbox and see the padded Target envelope in there.  Come to Mama, free Disney gift cards!

Things to know: the Disney gift cards go in and out of stock online (in fact, while I am writing this, they are not available).  They usually come back within 3 or 4 days, so you might have a short wait.  If you are having a gift card emergency and cannot wait, you can go to a Target store, pull up the bar code of your gift card from the Target app and buy them there - they are always available in the "impulse purchase" section right by the cashiers.  However, the Red Card works differently in stores - you only get the 5% off of what you actually charge to your card, so you are losing that additional 5% off that way.  Still great, but a tiny bit less so.

Questions?  Comments? Ask away!  I am off to eat some steak in a cattle car at Wild Country Meats, an Oklahoma tradition!  Jealous, aren't you?

My next post will be about a couple other earning sites - not nearly as good as Swagbucks and Perk, but still free money!