In my decades of travel, I have found that it was ALWAYS a bad return on investment to spend extra simply in maintaining loyalty and status. To the degree that points/rewards and status was obtained over the course of my normal travel expenditures, I always took advantage of it, but I NEVER chased it, and never spent a substantial premium pursuing it. This is because these programs have always been free to devalue their programs over time, and all of these companies have done so, aggressively.

So I would ALWAYS take a priceline room for a significant cost savings over the same room purchased directly. The points you get for a room are rarely worth more than 10-15% of what you paid for that room. So why would you pay 50% more, just to get a 15% bennie in the form of points?

And of course, when one is not a slave to points from specific companies, one is free to get the best deal, and not be taken for granted by these companies.