I think you may be ok making $2k in purchases from the mint if you just don't abuse it. Or, spend what you can on the card for the first two months and make the rest up in Mint purchases during the third month to get to $2k in total spend if it looks like you will be short. I dunno, I've never done the mint thing but a lot of people do. When it was first discovered some people got millions of miles doing it.