Originally Posted by
pinniped
The last big systemwide devaluation was early 2017 (I think). That's when the entire concept of categories was scrapped, but Hilton still promised to keep a "max rate" on each property for a standard room. Those caps are still there - if you go look at most desirable properties in the system and find a standard room, you'll often find it for 95,000 points per night regardless of the room rate. The biggest change for me was down in the middle of the pack properties: places that were once 30k/nt were suddenly 60k. Once every few years I'd do a 5-night top-end HH stay, but throughout the year I used to do a lot of 1- or 2-night 30k stays for your basic $200-250 room. Those awards became a lot harder to find.
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The next shoe to drop, without much fanfare, could easily be that the property caps disappear
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you may not have run into it yourself, but Hilton allows properties to opt out of the cap. The way it shows up online is the standard room/award is available to book with cash but no option to pay with points. Calling in, they'll let you pay with points but it's the standard dynamic rate based on room cost, which can be many multiples of that property's "cap"