Originally Posted by
birdseye
First of all, there are no Marriott properties in Munich, and the ones in London will cost lots of points. You could use a Cat 4 free night certificate at the London Gatwick Courtyard, (it and the other cat 4's near London are too inconvenient for sightseeing) and you can combine points between spouses at the same address at the time of redemption with Marriott, I would guess they would let you combine points for a honeymoon. You get the 5th night free with a Marrriott reward. It looks like the central London hotels are cat 8, 40,000 points a night, there is a cat 7 in Kensington, which is well connected by the tube but feels like you are way out in suburbia when you are actually there, and a cat 6 in Regent's Park.
If you are avoiding Chase, look for cards with Amex, B of A, and Citibank. Which means Hilton or SPG points. Do your research, figure out which hotel option you want in Munich, then we can advise on how to earn those points.
It is always good to look up hotel options in the cities you want to visit before picking a hotel loyalty program.
I'd agree with this, also with both SPG and Hilton you should look at leveraging their extended stay offerings. SPG has buy 4 get one free night (including points redemption) and Hilton has AXON/GLON bookings that will reduce your costs. AXON7, for the top Hilton would mean 4 nights for 145K miles instead of 200K in a top Cat 7 hotel.
SPG miles are harder to come by, best strategy would be you get a card, then introduce your wife via the Amex website by sending a referral link. At the moment bonus for this card is 25K (rumor of 30K coming soon) and then 5K more for the referral of your wife. That would net you 55K-65K SPG which would be a start, though you would need some more...
Hilton... get the Surpass card, Citi card (no fee for 40K) possibly also the Citi hilton with fee for 2x free weekend nights and some cards that txf to hilton for 1:2 pts like the BOA Virgin.