Originally Posted by
CJKatl
I was not going to post about this again, but someone emailed me this... by the numbers pulled out of nowhere above it would be harder to qualify under MR than SPG. If using the higher number, 25% of stays were non-BIB, someone who stayed at SPG could have LTP in 500 nights while someone who stayed at MAR would only have credit for 625 nights (500 + 125) and would still be short 125 nights for LTP qualification. By your own numbers MR LTP would require more nights and would be harder to get. Including the time requirement someone who was going to stay fewer than 75 nights a year or who was going to stay in cheap hotels which would not trigger enough points to hit 2M in 750 stays would have an easier time qualifying in SPG. Someone who was staying in more expensive properties and/or more than 60 nights a year (again, using the assumption that an additional 25% would come from cc/rollover/birthday/other) would benefit from MAR rules because they can bypass the ten year wait, but someone staying between 50 and 60 nights a year and/or in less expensive properties would find it easier to qualify under the legacy SPG rules.
Hopefully that puts to rest the notion that LT was more difficult to attain under SPG and drops the subject once and for all.
I would have qualified for MR LT Plat in 5-6 years per my estimation. Rollover nights likely turbocharged that ability in recent years,
As I noted in my own case, had I only used the MR Visa for my hotel stays (and not everyday spend like I and many others did w/the SPG AmEx), I would have still earned 180 nights from the CC alone. That ignores rollover, promotion nights, meeting events, anything else.
Someone spending 50-60 nights a year still may have had an easier time w/MR than SPG - credit card gives a minimum of 15 nights a year, not too hard w/the $3K/night to rack up 5-10 nights more.
And, ignoring your false accusations towards me, the post I was responding to suggested it was a standard for SPGers to spend 250 nights, book three rooms at a time, and make 750. I have yet to see any SPG loyal on this board say they have earned more than my 50 nights from the multi-room booking benefit...Occam's Razor says that it might be a nice benefit once in a while on a vacation trip to book a couple rooms, or maybe book a few for a co-worker, but harder to do en masse.
We'll continue to agree to disagree on the subject since we don't have the data.