For me, I scaled back when the game of trying to get to the next level wasn't any better than the lifetime statuses at Marriott and AA that I already have.

I have been traveling for work over 25 years. I went through several phases. First, I really wanted lifetime plt on AA. I am glad I was aggressive and achieved that goal when all miles still counted. The free main cabin extra and 2 checked bags save a bunch of money. I fly out of DFW. When I stopped being ex plt a few years ago, I never got upgraded again.

I was also a big Hilton fan. They gave me some really nice perks as a diamond in the early 2000s - especially on European travel. I am still a long way away from lifetime Diamond at Hilton because I wasn't able to be exclusive to the brand. I travel to a lot of small towns in the US on business, and most of these towns had either a Hampton or Fairfield Inn. So I split stays between Hilton and Marriott.

Finally, I was able to attain lifetime plt with Marriott just in time to be grandfathered into lifetime Titanium. Great decision! I used some flyertalk tricks on this one because I thought it was worth it!

Nowadays, I mainly go after hotel points/certificates. Hotel stays typically cost me more than airline tickets when I travel. For me, all of the devaluations have taken the excitement out of getting lifetime statuses just because I can. The Marriott cards that offer 5 - 50K certificates are a great deal.

If Hilton were to offer a lifetime gold, I might go after that. I'm not going to hold my breath for Hilton to offer that, though.