FrenchLaundry

Different people are looking for different things.

If suite and/or club floor redemptions at nice hotels are of interest, the Fairmont and RC cards facilitate that very nicely.

PaulMSN

I like Carlson and IHG, but I use Hyatt and Hilton, too. I travel a lot in Asia and so need the variety. I have Choice for US stays and occasional European stays. Wyndham also for when I need a US airport hotel because of a forced overnight.

I don't use the Hyatt card itself much, but rather transfer URs from my Ink cards.

picj0007

We are going to NY in July and Ann arbor, MI in May and we are planning an international trip some time next year. We have 3 kids so most higher end hotels won't allow more than 2 people right? So which hotels are best for my family? I have the Ritz card

Campath

I have (or previously held) every hotel card available except the Fairmont and Ritz.

1. Tie between Club Carlson and IHG: The CC credit card is extremely generous with last night free on award stays and 40k points for $75 each year. That's basically almost enough points for 2 nights at a top property. The IHG card is also a must have just for the free night cert for a $49 annual fee with no category restrictions. The Gold and Plat status that come with the 2 cards are pretty worthless but I have frequently been upgraded to suites and received welcome gifts just for having these. Even if you disregard the status benefits, both cards are well worth paying the annual fee for.

2. Hyatt: really good sign up bonus if used at the right properties. For most people the Cat 1-4 cert justifies the $75 annual fee. Plat status is nothing great and adds minimal value but as always is better than dirt status. Occasionally you get some good targeted offers for being a cardholder.

3. Hilton: there are 4 cards. The no annual fee cards from Citi can be churned with minimal limitations and gives you Silver status. The Amex also gives silver but cannot be churned anymore. The Citi Reserve gives 2 nights but has to be used on weekend nights only. Still worth it just for Gold staus alone if you spend even a few nights at Hilton each year. The Amex Surpass has a weaker signup bonus but gives you Gold for a lower annual fee, not to mention the value of Amex offers like Small Business Saturday.

4. Marriott: weakest signup bonus. Only worth it if using the points towards a travel package. Also the annual fee of $85 gets you a Cat 1-5 cert good for 6 months which isn't worth much to me anymore but YMMV. Despite the sign up bonus of 140k, I just don't see the value in the Ritz card.

Don't know enough about the Fairmont program to rank it.

Also for the CC, IHG and Hyatt cards, it might make sense for your spouse to have the same card as well to get 2 consecutive nights at a property and in case of CC to schedule back-to-back (or even back-to back-to-back) award nights for longer hotel stays.

Edit: I forgot to mention the 10% rebate on all points spent on award stays with the IHG card.

HappyKat

You should be able to find it under the Chase credit card forums

adschnei

@campath great post!

Quick question, if my wife and I both get the Hyatt card can we combine our 2+2 free nights? We're spending 4 nights in Tokyo and it would be amazing if we could be at the Park Hyatt all 4 nights under 1 reservation (not having to change rooms!)

Also, for travel to Japan (Kyoto and Tokyo), would any of these cards be better than Hyatt(not interested in Citi Hilton)?

flyer4512

We combine reservations all the time, just call the hotel.

Funny that his thread was bumped, I would say a year later the SPG lost points ( literally) as the person card can no longer be churned...........ever

Hard to beat this hotel we are using our $49 IHG free night certs at for 2 nights in mid July.....close to $600/night

http://www.ihg.com/intercontinental/...&icdv=99504440

eajusa

Hilton still easiest program to rack up the points.

lotrbfme

Churning Hilton would be like MS to get Zimbabwe dollars




One night at Hampton inn Please

eajusa

I haven't churned a HH Card yet. I keep earning thousands of points with little effort.

UVU Wolverine

Hilton I've carried the free Amex for Hilton since I was 19, and I will continue to do so as it's my longest open credit card as well as the lack of an annual fee. I can still find some good values with P+C awards as well as straight redemption nights. I don't really go out of my way to find them anymore though, I usually just stumble across them when I'm looking for a hotel where I wanted to go anyways. Aspirational properties are a horrible value, and I cannot see myself redeeming points for them. The bonus categories for this card are decent as well. Gas and groceries seems to be the main genres for Amex while Chase is airlines and rental cars. Just depends where you put the most spend.

What hasn't been mentioned, and I've brought it up in the past, is the value Amex has with authorized users. I currently have two under my Hilton Amex and it is very easy to see who spends what amount as Amex issues separate card numbers for AU. Chase doesn't do this, but I haven't had any experience with other credit card issuers. I once had an AU on a Chase card of mine and discontinued that almost immediately as there was no way to differentiate spend on statements unless you manually kept track of who spent what where. This alone is a great added perk in my mind as my AU usually spend the $20k/year to get gold status.

Marriott I have this too, and I don't mind holding onto it as I usually find a good value on the annual free night cert. Plus, the the extra spend I put onto it goes towards lifetime status which is nice along with the 15 nights per year. As an everyday card, I think it's probably one of the worst options around in travel cards though.

Hyatt As everyone has mentioned, the initial two free nights can be a great value. The annual free night cert with Hyatt usually pays for far more than the annual fee as well. As Hyatt redemption options for free nights on a point versus point comparison to Hilton or Marriott are less, I can see this being a better idea for everyday spend than the other two, but you would have to be really vested in Hyatt for that to be.

best

Who are the bank issuers of the Marriott and Hyatt you are mentioning?

ComplexAnalysis

They're both from Chase.

exoticfusion

I want to know which hotel rewards/loyalty program or hotel credit card is right for me, where should I ask this? It would be great if there was a hotel rewards sticky in the hotel loyalty sub-forum to ask these types of questions for noobs.

stevento

I've been a miles&points junkie for about 4 years.
In that time, I've done pretty well with award flights, and have been able to get premium awards for 4 people on many routes, and still have hundreds of thousands of miles left over.
I've never been able to do well with hotels though.
And now I am in the middle of a 12-month period over which I will spend approximately $35K in lodging charges alone.

March'15 - 7 nights in Brazil for 4 - no chain hotels
July'15 - 10 nights in Israel for 8 - no chain hotels.
November'15- 3 nights in Iceland for 4 (no nights in KEF) - no chain hotels.
March'16 - 7 nights in Southern Africa for 4 - with exception of CPT, no chain hotels.

My Barclays Arrival+ card averages ~$25K/mo in legitimate business spending, so over the course of a year, I do get about $6K back - but obviously that's not even close.

So I'd like to start using hotel cards a little more than I do now. The challenge is of course that we need 2 rooms (2 teenage daughters), so 3 night stay can easily run into hundreds of thousands of points, and free night certs don't take us too far.
When we pay cash, we typically stay in 4-star/low 5 star hotels, paying ~$200-300/nt.
We've used AirBnB and vrbo with some success too.

Any suggestions for hotel cards that might fit?

Thanks!