KaiFly

Any tips/ideas?

I am based in Berlin, Germany and dont want to travel too far. Maybe using the new Amazon.com partnership? Or is this a bad deal?

Any ideas highly appreciated!!!

THX

Tokyoite

How far is too far? Within Berlin? Germany? Europe? Middle East/North Africa?

furthermore, what type of vacation would you like?
city/beach/countryside.....

help us help you!!!

KaiFly

Europe and only weekend-trips :/ I dont have time for a longer holiday

...I am not so much into luxury, more into atmosphere (e.g. a bit more romantic) but the german hiltons dont seem to be a perfect fit for this ...I love excellent food, but redeeming for food is not possible, is it?

THX for any idea!!!!

KaiFly

Hmmm... Reichshof Hamburg could be an easy alternative to "burn" the points May be I am going there

...does Hilton offer a "points" against "breakfast" deal? (I assume "no" )

jzafar

Waldorf Astoria Rome Cavalieri was a great use of points for me. I booked 4 nights on points and get 5th night free. As a Diamond, they gave me upgrade from standard award room to Vista Suite. I still can't figure out if this was a double or triple upgrade! Hotel was epitome of what I imagined Roman luxury to be. Beautiful and top notch. Very relaxing spa too.

bearkatt

I booked London (Greenwich) doubletree for 5 nights for 120,000 points. booked 4 got 5th free. good use of points for that city I thought.

bitterproffit

I don't think the Amazon thing is a great redemption value. But they don't expire as long as you have some activity. I think I would use them for weekend trips.

Personally, I would use them for fun weekend jaunts at Hamptons in Warsaw, Hamburg, Amsterdam, etc. I don't really care about the hotel as much as just having a clean consistent place to stay.

If I wanted fancier but not too crazy, then a weekend jaunt to Budapest at the Hilton Budapest.

Charge something at the hotel and you should get a couple points. That transaction should keep things from expiring.

You can use those 300K points for several fun weekend trips.

But, your hotel preferences might be different.

sdsearch

Just figure out how to keep them from expiring, and then simply use them whenever you're traveling somewhere and there's a Hilton property where you're going that works for you.

That's how I'm planning to use my 800,000+ Honors points (over many, many years).

I don't see the need to "use them up".

ptownca

I'm going to burn about 300K during Christmas week in NYC. Almost as good as a Hawaii vaca.

KaiFly

THANK YOU guys for your help/ideas/recommendations Really liked it - will start with a weekend in Hamburg, buy breakfast in the hotel to get some activity and hence make sure that the points won't expire and keep the rest of the points for another trip to Rome next year

BTW: I lost a ton (!!!) of flight-points due to the insolvency of airberlin/topbonus - that's why I am trying now to reduce my points/balances in all other loyalty programs making sure this will not happen again to me... so be careful with saving too many points...

sdsearch

I think you've got the wrong reaction. The key to not losing value in investments is diversification ("not putting all your eggs in one basket"). Do you really think all your hotel programs are going to go insolvent? While relatively smaller airlines have a history of going insolvent occasionally (one here in this part of the world, another there in that part of the world), I can't think of case of that with hotel programs in the past dozen years or more, hotel programs just merge. And meanwhile, diversification means that if you have your miles/points spread around many programs, the risk of losing them all is way smaller than if you have them all in one program.

So why empty out every hotel program just because an airline went "poof"?

Besides if you empty out your points stash now but can't replace those points very easily later, how does that help you later?

(I don't know how you earned those points in Berlin, but the main way of earning tons of Hilton points in the USA without stays just disappeared this year.)

KaiFly

Fair point. Thanks.

Based on my experience bonus points devaluate massively over time and in addition I recently experienced what the risk of merger or insolvency means - so its definitely a personal decision and maybe a very personal unique situation but for myself I am pretty sure that the decision to get rid of most of the points soon makes totally sense. I do indeed believe that saving points for the future is not a good idea!!!

I am massively diversified but what does it help if u dont use them and wait until you loose them or they get devaluated (again)...

btw: All of my points are collected through hotel stays - I am in hotels most of my time, so there will be enough chances to refill the points again

sdsearch

In that case, I see your point. As long as you're traveling so much it makes sense. If you ever get to the point where your travel (at that rate) might stop (whether due to job change or retirement or whatever), that's when you might want to stop "burning immediately" (if you have no other way to "replenish").

Have you already been to Budapest? If not, the Hilton "Castle" is a great location and very nice hotel (and presumably not too far?).

jeffers

Hilton Salalah, Oman.

beltway

You'll get more value (& probably have more fun) redeeming for hotel nights. The DW & I just spent 5 nights in Prague & 5 nights in Budapest at center-city Hiltons. Total cost for this great trip: 285K HH points. Even if you limit yourself to shorter stays (& therefore don't get the fifth-night-free benefit), that's four 2-night weekend stays.