Originally Posted by
jturn00
I'm trying to get other FT members thoughts on redemption of points vs paying.
Option 1. Pay for suite at Marriott casamagna in Cancun pay using points. 345,000 for 7 nights
Option 2. Pay for suite at $203 per night with 25%off food. (For family of 4 we are thinking we are going to eat at resort most of the time) for 7 nights this is close to $1500
Part of me says just use the points and not spend the $$. But I'd hate to not get a good redemption value.
As mentioned above, it depends on everyone's particular situation. I travel for leisure and pay for all of my stays, 50-75 nights/year so always strive to get 1¢/pt or better return which is difficult to do. For straight point redemption I stick to a 5-night redemption which is the only way to achieve that goal. But more often, I make an exception to that rule for
Hotel + Air Travel Packages (TPs) as I'm getting ready to redeem 360K for 120K AA miles and a 7-night certificate for category 8 hotel. When broken down that translates to
120K MR points for 150K AA miles* (includes 25% promo bonus) and 240K MR points for a 7 night stay at Sydney Harbour Marriott. The hotel stay would have been $2100 otherwise, so for the 240K value of the category 8 hotel cert it yields a return of 0.875¢/pt.
Assuming the $203/night you quoted includes the 19% tax, then your return is 0.41¢/pt (142100¢/345000); or if the $203/night you quoted doesn't include the 19% tax then your return is 0.49¢/pt (169100¢/345000).
Now if you make a boat load of points every year from work stays and only have limited opportunities to use them, then this may be a great deal. One reason I mentioned my travel pattern is that for me, it is not, because I have to weigh it against the other dozen stays that I'm paying for and have planned for the next couple years. I find I rarely use points for straight hotel stay redemption, but instead tend to save them for
Hotel + Air TPs and then almost always use them in conjunction with a miles promo similar to the
AA 25% bonus miles promo that id going on now through June 15. In the past, a few years ago, US Airways prior to their merger with AA was offering 50% bonus which was the last time I did a TP.
For more discussion of TPs check out this thread:
http://www.flyertalk.com/forum/marri...-packages.html
I hope that helps.
*
Note that as a Plat using my MR credit card for hotel stays, I earn 20 MR points/$ spent. This ends up yielding me 25 AA miles for every $ spent at FS Marriott properties. Best bang for any hotel points IMO.