sosamo

Thank you for the very useful info. My goal is to stay at 5 star hotels when I travel. I only travel like once a year, so I want to make it memorable for my SO.

I just canceled my Fairmont last month. I am using the 2 free nights for The Savoy in London next month.

I guess I will cancel my Marriot card next month, and keep the Hyatt. Both cards AF are due soon.

The Chase IHG is definitely on my to apply list. 70k bonus ( I read that calling Chase and mentioning the 80k bonus is a possibility). And the 1 free night at ANY location is awesome.

I do have the Citi Hilton Reserve (which I haven't used since I met the spending requirement for the 2 free nights, and the AF is coming up next month). The only reason why I never tried for Diamond Status with the 40k spend was because I read that the difference between Gold and Diamond isn't that much.

I definitely would like to focus on Hilton since they have the biggest footprint with Conrad, W.Astoria, etc. But 95k points per night for a Cat 10, which would require about 30k in spend seems a lot. So 3 nights at the Conrad in the Maldives would be 285k worth of points, requiring 95k worth of spend

voodoomonkey

Then again, with Hilton's 5th night free you'd get 5 nights for 380k, requiring $63k of spend at grocery...

iflyjetz

Sosamo, based on your post, I still recommend going with Diamond in the Hilton program. With Hilton, the 'sweet spot' has been Gold, but I've read that Hilton's been cutting Gold benefits. I haven't followed the changes very closely, as I've dropped from Diamond all the way down to currently HHonors Silver.

For IHG, you only get points for the first year. Save them; they don't expire. You won't get your free night until renewal. So this is a program that you won't use during the first year; you'll only want to hit the minimum spend for the points. At renewal, you can look at combining your one free night with a points stay - I'd probably opt for points and cash nights, as they help stretch the points. This may be the free night that you save for a very nice weekend stay somewhere rather than an aspirational trip. I'd only use the free night at Intercontinental or similar properties in the IHG portfolio.


No matter which hotel program you look at, I don't think you'll find any program where you'll earn a lot of free nights at 5 star properties with only credit card spend. I think Hilton's large footprint + Diamond for credit card spend makes it your best choice for hotel cards; perhaps someone will chime in with another option for you.

ILGfly

Granted the Quorvus Collection only has 3 locations so far but $14K spend on a Club Carlson CC will get you one night stay at one of those locations.

If the OP went with the Amex Hilton Surpass instead of Citi he could earn enough for a night at the property he mentioned in less than $16K in spending at a grocery store. I know you warned against Amex MS but I think you're overblowing it. Most reports I've read boil down to as long as you didn't lie about your income on your application you'll pass a financial review you'll be fine to keep going. The exception was the old Blue Cash card but that was a different story since Amex was essentially shelling out large volumes of cash to MSers each month, not IOUs which is what points/miles essentially are. I've been MSing high volumes with Amex for years and only my old Blue Cash got shut down, around the time most everyone elses did, but I've kept going just as hard on my other Amex products. This is just my opinion/experience though.

sosamo

Thanks for the info. I think after my Europe trip in April, I will start Msing with my Hilton Reserve. I should be able to hit the 40K spend before Dec. Of course the Msing world is always changing, so never know what will happen in the future

And for the IHG, that was my strategy. Save the bonus, and wait until the free night kick in to start spending.

sosamo

Thanks for the info. but here in my area (so cal), it's pretty tough just getting 1 or 2 gc from Vons with cc. Whenever I do go to Vons, I just us my OBC. I don't go to Ralphs because of all the fraud going on with US Bank gc.

sosamo

I am very surprise with all the great info I am getting. Didn't expect this tread to get pass 1 page. Thanks again.

farwest101

Get the HH Surpass and MS at grocery at 0.2c per pt. MS $40K and you'll be HH Diamond, which is the most underappreciated top tier status you can get. PM for details, if interested. Don't ever MS HH on anything but the Surpass 6x at grocery (unless you apply for the regular Amex HH and wait to upgrade to the Surpass for a 50K bonus without wasting a hard pull). Churning Citi HH cards aren't worth the hard pulls - way better uses for Citi hard pulls...

If you don't mind mid tier, Carlson can't be beat due to 2nd night free benefit and you book in 2 night increments (get business and personal and you can alternate back to back, effectively making every other night "free")

If you have Inks, can do 5x and transfer to Hyatt. Alternatively, if you have access to low cost MS, 1x on the Hyatt card can make sense, but in that case, I'd put 1x spend on SPG and get more flexibility.

I like a lot of flexibility and MS hotel points in several programs (typically Hilton, Hyatt, SPG and Carlson) so I can pick the nicest properties wherever I am. Very nice to decide if I want Conrad vs Park Hyatt vs St Regis. Hilton is nice because it has a large footprint, so can typically find a Hilton wherever I am. I've never stayed in a Carlson, but they have decent properties in Europe and I might eventually find a use for the CC points I have.

SpootyPuff

I use MS to fill in the gap of my Ritz card up to $10k to keep gold status.

I stay there enough throughout the year but just below minimums for gold status.

iflyjetz

Calling Club Carlson mid tier is kind of a stretch. They fall into the Choice/Best Western category of budget hotels. I'd venture to guess that Best Western has more high end properties in its extensive inventory than Club Carlson.

I've stayed at every Club Carlson brand except Quorvus Collection. And there are only 3 of those properties, one of which is in Kuwait.
Radisson, Park Inn, Park Plaza, Country Inn. I've even been a Club Carlson Concierge. Club Carlson's brands are bargain basement budget properties. There's nothing aspirational about them. The OP is looking for 5 star properties.

Club Carlson has its niche, just like Allegiant airlines. But when the OP clearly stated that he's looking for 5 star properties, talking about Club Carlson's like discussing Spirit Airlines when a person is looking to fly in F.

littlewinglet

That might be true in the US, but in Europe, all the top tier CC properties I stayed in would be at least 4-stars. Not the most posh but definitely much nicer than average. The Radisson Blu in Sydney was a much better hotel than the Westin, both in terms of service and quality of the room.

iflyjetz

I'm aware that Club Carlson has some better properties internationally. However, a night at the May Fair or G&V is going to run 70K Club Carlson points. The credit card points don't last long at that rate.
Radisson Blu Sydney is 50K points. I haven't been to Sydney so I don't know which properties are good or bad there WRT Westin.

I doubt that Club Carlson's going to have more than one hand's worth of truly 5 star properties in its portfolio. Again, the OP stated he was looking for 5 star. If he stated that he was looking at something less than 5 star hotels, I'd agree that international Club Carlson properties are an alternative. And international Best Westerns are nicer than domestic.

littlewinglet

Who said anything about 50k or 70k per night? I pay half that by having two CC cards and booking alternating 2-day stays, getting every other night free.

edit: BTW, OP never said 5-star, only that it is top category, so they're more interested in the best hotels from whichever chain they go with, AND they asked which cards are worth doing MS on. MSing for free nights is probably the easiest with club carlson, as you get a top-tier night for $5k spend, counting the free night feature of the cards (and discounting the very few 70k properties). Hilton would be close second. All other cards are only worth MSing for status.

iflyjetz

I was the first person to ask the OP what type of hotels he likes staying in; post #42. He answered 5 star in post #46. Please read post #46; if you're open minded, you'll agree that the OP shouldn't be looking at Club Carlson. It not only has a small footprint, it also does not have more than a very, very few properties that fit his criteria.

I don't discuss Porsches with someone who's on a Mustang/Camaro budget. And I don't discuss Mustangs and Camaros with someone who's looking at Porsches and Corvettes. You have to tailor the conversation to the audience.

Edit: we're both trying to help the OP make the right choice. I feel that you're recommending using a monkey wrench instead of a hammer to drive a nail into the wall. Sure, it'll work but it's not the best choice to get the job done.

littlewinglet

Monkey wrench? I don't get this analogy. The question of which card is best to MS on depends on ease of getting top tier night with MS, which for most people means minimum $ of MS per night and Club Carlson fits that requirement.

It is a fact that $5k MS spend for a top tier night is the lowest requirement across any program you can do MS with, and I'm taking into account the 2nd night free feature of the CC credit card. I'm ignoring the very small handful of 70k a night properties but even with those, $7k of MS gets you in...still less than any other hotel card you can MS with.

If OP has specific idea of what constitutes a 5-star properties, than this whol thread is pointless and he should just identify which hotels he aspires to stay in and figure out how to MS in that program....end of discussion.


Also, regarding the footprints....ease of finding good properties to redeem for depends on personal taste, and there's no way to objectively argue one side or the other. Most of the hotel programs have pretty low average redemption rates compared to cost of doing MS, so a large footprint of the Hilton (as an example) is useless if you have to hunt down and arrange your trips around the few properties that give you most value.