In a few weeks, I'm going to Johannesburg for a 30 days for work. They told me my maximum budget on hotels is about $3800 USD (which is about $130/night). What would be the most optimal way of spending this money (limited to accommodation only)?

I'm a new IHG Rewards member with just 5.000 pts from 2 stays, and I'm taking part in the Accelerate program.

My goals would be to become IHG Platinum Elite (40.000 points) to get the free upgrades. Don't think Spire is interesting. After that, either try to do the same for a different hotel chain (e.g. Protea) or convert the rest to miles (Asiana) with the bad 5:1 ratio.

What would be the best bet:
- Do short stays of 1 night per time and buy the additional 3.000 Bonus Point packages for $7?
- Do short stays of max 3 nights to try to get some 'stay 3 pay 2' offers?
- Do longer stays and go for the additional 1.000 Bonus Point packages for $4?
- Buy 35.000 points with the current +60% promotion (25k+10k) for $312 (which seems to be rather expensive)?

In a pure financial reasoning option 1 would be the best, but then I'll be checking-in and -out every day for 10 days before getting my Platinum level . So it's rather a 'quality of stay' question I guess..

But maybe there are better ways to spend the money on accommodation that someone knows of? Maybe a different hotel chain since I'm starting from scratch anyway? All ideas welcome!