My husband and I are members, my parents were also members. In order to understand the full benefit you need to keep up with the information in the magazines and you need to ask for the various discounts because most of the companies will not ask you. Kind of like AAA, there are a lot of benefits out there but you need to ask. Motel 6 gives an AARP discount, but you have to ask to name one place. Kind of like store coupons, if you don't cut them out the store is not going to give the discount to you. Maybe you could go on line and make a list of the various discount areas and then determine if the membership will be a benefit to you. It is for us.