Originally Posted by
A318neo
What's the best use of Bonvoy points?
My guess is that saving points for hotel stays is usually the best use of points for any program. However, if one doesn't use that hotel chain much, then collecting points and transferring them to miles is the 2nd best. The worst is to earn miles for each hotel stay, except if one really almost never stays at that chain. Correct? I ask because I never stay at Marriotts but will soon. I was planning to get points, not miles then stay at Marriotts occasionally instead of trying hard to avoid them, as I do now.
That hadn’t been my experience, my best Marriott point redemptions have been transfers to airlines when I’ve done so when there's a transfer bonus. Even without a bonus it’s easier get more out of 25k airlines miles than 60k Marriott points. But my leisure travel, thus travel on points, is primarily during the less crowded shoulder seasons. I’ve been getting around 1.5 cpp from Marriott point with airline transfer. During most of my leisure travel with last year’s category adjustments a lot of the Cat 7 and 8 properties when we've traveled would have been well under 0.7cpp redemptions.
more than that airline transfer give the Marriott points a floor as protection against devaluation that Hilton points, with a 1:10 transfer ratio and IHG 1:5 don't.