I have friends in Ireland who want to Honeymoon in September in New York / Maui and Los Angeles (Santa Monica or Beverly Hills). They are looking at doing about 5 nights in each.

FS Maui is the obvious choice but blows their budget a bit for the rest of the trip.

I think they should leave NY and LA till much closer to the time but perhaps book the entry level room at FS MAUI. I thought they could go for FS Maui for $465 through DavidO and compromise on New York hotel to offset the cost.

I would say their budget for 2 weeks is about $300-350 a night and they have asked for my help.

I stayed in L'Ermitage in April for about $300 a night but that was a deal combined with expensive flights (LHR-LAX-Tahiti).
They seem keen on Santa Monica.

I see the Huntley in SM and The Benjamin in NY on luxurylink.com

I usually use a mix of website deals/hotwire/FHR/DavidO/and hotel programs such as SPG and IHG (the 40,000 cash and points trick for the IC Bora Bora - oh yes) but they are not familar with these methods

I have been looking at options like credit cards AMEX PLAT / SPG AMEX etc etc but dont see any that are available in Ireland (I am based in UK and these cards are available to me) where they could use the points given initially towards stays etc

Any suggestions would be much appreciated ?!!