How to buy hotel points - All current deals and values
Here are all the current hotel points buying promos, regularly updated.
You’ll also find the points values.
Buying points can sometimes get you amazing luxury hotels for a massive discount.
How about an overwater villa in Bora Bora worth £1400 per night but just 70,000 IHG points?
All Current Buy Hotel Points Promos - September 2020
Hilton: 100% bonus until 25th September
Melia: 40% bonus until 31st October. Buying Melia points stops your points expiring
Hyatt: 33% bonus until 30th September
Bonvoy: 50% bonus until 22nd October and annual limit tripled to 150k
Annual limit: 80000
Point value: 0.35p
Standard price: $10 per 1000 (~0.8p per point)
Notes:
Worth buying during 100% bonus promos, especially for premium locations like Maldives, Bora Bora, New York, or at busy times.
Transfer in from:
Amex: 1MR = 2 Hilton
Virgin Flying Club: 2 VFC = 3 Hilton
Deals history:
Sep 2020: 100%
Jan 2020: 100%
Annual limit: 80000
Point value: 0.35p
Standard price: $7 per 1000 (~0.55p per point)
Notes:
Amex MR points at 1:3 is decent value.
May be worth buying during bonus periods for premium room redemptions at peak times.
Commonly 70000 points for a standard room which would be £425 if buying points, so almost never worth it.
Transfer in from:
Amex: 1MR = 3 Radisson
Deals history:
Oct 2019: 30% bonus
Annual limit: 100000
Point value: 0.45p
Standard price: Sliding scale – $13.50 for 1000 (~1p) at the bottom end, improving to ~0.77p when buying 26000+
Notes:
Frequent 100% bonuses.
Occasional annual limit increases.
Worth buying during 100% bonus promos, especially for premium locations like Bora Bora or at busy times.
Transfer in from:
Virgin Flying Club: 1VFC = 1 IHG
Deals history:
Feb 2020: 75% bonus, 150k limit
Annual limit: 50000
Point value: 0.55p
Standard price: £12.50 for 1000 (~0.96p)
Notes:
Occasional annual limit increases.
The annual limit of 50000 means you need to be earning in other ways to get enough for a decent redemption.
Transfer in from:
Amex: 2MR = 3 Bonvoy
Deals history:
Oct 2020: 50% bonus
Feb 2020: 50% bonus
Dec 2019: 30% bonus
Annual limit: 55000
Point value: 1.2p
Standard price: $24 for 1000 (~1.85p)
Notes:
Worth buying during bonus promos for more expensive properties such as Park Hyatt.
Deals history:
Sep 2020: 25% bonus
Feb 2020: 25% bonus
Dec 2019: 40% bonus
Annual limit: There is a limit of 150,000 per transaction but seemingly no annual limit
Point value: 0.75p
Standard price: €5 per 1000 (~0.42p)
Notes:
Stops expiry.
Regular promotions on Black Friday can bring exceptional value.
Putting a value on Melia points is hard but I have regularly achieved well over 1p. My 0.75p is conservative.
It varies wildly by property according to cash rates, but before booking a Melia I check the points cost.
Even at the standard price it can be a significant saving to buy points.
Not always though. Don’t assume you can get this value at all hotels all the time.
Deals history:
Sep 2020: 40% bonus
Nov 2019: Black Friday discount €3.60 per 1000 instead of €5.00 (~40% bonus)
Annual limit: 10000
Point value: 7p
Standard price: $6.50 for 50 (10p per point)
Notes:
Points value hard to measure. The best I’ve ever done on rooms is 7p in Fiji and Hong Kong.
If it’s useful to you, the best value is up to 7-10p per point on dining. 1000 GC points gets you a $100 dining voucher. You can get $125 per 1000 points if you have Gold status. Depending on exchange rate, 7p is the floor for a GC point value.
Deals history:
Annual limit: 10000
Point value: 0.45p
Standard price: $13 for 1000 (~1p)
Notes:
Deals history:
A note on points redemption value
People argue about how to calculate the value of a point. Take a room where the cash rate is £100 and it costs 20,000 points. The simple calculation suggests that you’re getting 0.5p per point. Each point saves you paying 0.5p.
A lot of people like to consider the points you would earn on that stay, which represents a discount off future stays. For example, as a Hilton Diamond you would earn 20 points per $. That means about £9 back on this stay. So your effective cost would have been £91, and the redeemed points value is 0.45p.
Fortunately at Hilton, reward nights still earn any bonus points from promos or status “My Way” options, but at others that’s not the case. Hilton reward nights count for status, but that’s not true at some others, so you have to consider your targets.
The points you earn varies according to your status, so you have to account for that. Reward nights are refundable, so do you compare against the refundable rate, or would you only actually buy the cheapest AP rate so that’s what you should compare against?
When you’re considering buying points, you should simply be looking for a redemption value that is much more than what you’re paying. If the redemption value is double the purchase cost then you can forget about all the other maths and just get on with it.