When it comes to Hilton Honors points, I have an earn-and-burn mentality. I don’t want to keep many of them in our accounts because unless we’re working to a specific redemption, we’ll not have enough points to stay at a nice hotel for several nights.
Instead, I prefer to use them wherever I can, instead of paying cash. Well, unless the redemption rate is so bad that not even I can justify using points.
For example, I was looking for a one-night stay at a Hampton Inn in Pennsylvania. This would be a perfect place to use a free night certificate, but I’m all out at the moment. After that, I looked to use points, and a room with 2 queen size beds will cost 40,000 Honors points.
The same room with a AAA discount will cost $174.45. That’s because this hotel only charges 9% tax, has no hotel fee and no charge for parking.
I try not to redeem Hilton Honors points for less than 0.5 cents each, and this reservation would only be worth 0.43 CPP.
I looked to see if I could use the $300 travel credit from our Venture X card, but the price on the Capital One portal was $20 more expensive.
I have other options. I could book the room and pay for the stay with the Venture X card. I then could use the Purchase Eraser feature to cover the cost at 1 cent per point. The stay would cost fewer points with this method than if I booked through the Capital One portal.
But remember, I’m trying to use my credits before points. The $250 travel credit on our Citi Prestige card reset at the beginning of the year. I’ll earn 3X Citi ThankYou points for the hotel stay and get the money back as a statement credit.
Of course there are other paths I could follow. I could check to see if the hotel earns extra points with Rocketmiles. I could also try to book through an airline portal or see if I could find a lower price and use a best-rate guarantee. For an expensive room, it might be worthwhile, but for a single night at a Hampton Inn, I’m done searching.
However, I will get an additional 2% back by using the Capital One Shopping portal.
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