[QUOTE=shoreline;19933989]Very true about difficulty maintaining gold status with Marriott if I continue with my SPG credit card. I originally started out thinking I would switch my credit card back to MR. The gold rewards are great--I just received them in NYC. Marriott has more locations. I usually use my points in large cities where Marriott and Starwood both have a presence. I can get a lot more nights from 100,000 points in a Westin compared to a similar Marriott.

Starwood points are easier to use: Cash and points almost always get you great value and the added benefit of getting an elite night. It's not difficult to get 3 or 4 cents per point, sometimes much more. With Marriott I refuse to get less than a cent a point, and just won't redeem at many properties. Paying 35K points for a $250 room isn't great value IMO.

Starwood 50 night Plat is actually quite easy: cash and points and points redemption's count, multiple room bookings count as well, as well as extra free nights etc. If you get both credit cards you get 10 nights credit.

The Starwood Amex card is much better for general spend than the Marriott Chase card, which I reserve for Marriott stays.

Agree. I am totally with you.

flanbarr - what am I missing?

In the first post you are leaving SPG because of bennies, property mix, and nicer properties - along with a ressie system glitch annoyance.

Two posts later you are switching back to SPG because they fixed the system glitch. What happened to the bennies, property qualities and mix?

Then back to Marriott due to the great bennies - but your earnings are primarily through the credit card?

You keep mentioning the Gold Bennies at Ren TS being "aplenty". What exactly do you mean by that? I have stayed at the Ren, and was not impressed with the bennie package!

Here are some thoughts -

1) if you do not travel very often, "bennies" should be the least of your concerns. Good pricing (with a free breakfast or other family friendly activity) will pay off far more for you - especially in resorts.

2) "Bennies" only really apply at top hotels in each chain. You mention SPG has no comp to CY - there are no bennies in a CY!

Instead of comparing properties solely on points, try looking at the room size, offerred activities your families will enjoy, hotel location.

You can always use your "points" for airfare!

So you only spent $6,400 in Marriott brand hotels over a FOUR YEAR period? In that context, your posts are not making a lot of sense!

No offense intended to anyone, but IMO, using points for cheap hotels with any chain is a terrible return on value! A 3,000 point hotel at SPG, or a 10,000 point hotel with Marriott brands (for a 2 day stay) to me, is madness! I have historically have spent my points at hotels which run $450/night or more, such as Paris, London, Hawaii. A hotel which would cost 10,000 points would probably sell for less than $70/night MAX, so what's the point of that? However, at a hotel which goes for $700/night (which I have stayed at before on points), and which I would never pay for with my own money, that is a valuable use of points for me, because if not for points, I would not be staying there at all.

When you add to that the MR benefit of 'use points for 4 nights, get the 5th night free,' then the value increases by 25%, and at high $$$ properties, that is huge. That means that I could stay at a $700/night hotel for 5 nights, which would cost $3,500 if I was paying out of my pocket, for 140,000 points, that is a great deal, and a true benefit. That is true without even thinking about travel packages, which make points even more valuable!

[QUOTE=flannbarr;19934144]Since on hotel spend only (meaning no credit card points, no elite points, etc.) you only get 2 points/$ spent at SPG hotels, while you get 10 points/$ spent at Marriott hotels, that means that 10,000 SPG points are approximately equivalent to 50,000 MR points, so it is not a proper/reasonable comparison to say 100,000 points redeemed at a Westin (or any SPG hotel) is comparable to 100,000 points redeemed at a Marriott.

For a proper/reasonable comparison to be made, for 100,000 points redeemed at a Westin/SPG hotel, you must compare 500,000 points redeemed at a Marriott hotel. Before you object, remember that if you spent $50,000 at a SPG hotel, you would have 100,000 points, but for that same $50,000 at a Marriott hotel, you would have 500,000 points. It is never the redemption alone which is comparable, because it isn't, the earning accrual must also be included in the equation, otherwise the calculation is completely faulty.

I agree with Sophie, and further feel that the OP's reasoning is very inconsistent and faulty. Bottom line, if the OP wants status and meaningful benefits for his hotel stays (and credit card usage), since it sounds like the OP does not actually stay at hotels all that much, that maximizing earning and status will require sticking to JUST ONE chain, and ONE CHAIN ONLY. Otherwise, the OP's meager earnings and status will seem even more meager. Or, as Sophie suggests, use points earned for airline miles instead of redeeming for the actual hotel rooms on your family vacations.

So, pick one and stick with it, or, to paraphrase Yoda "...either do, or do not, there is no try..."

That strikes me as a terrible, awful waste of Starpoints.

Yes, true, especially when you consider that 140K of Starpoints are approx. earning equivalent to 700,000 MR points! AND, for 700K MR points, you can get two, bodacious, 7 day travel packages for only 660K. Is there anything even closely equivalent for the equivalent number of earned Starpoints, which would be 132K?

I am not sure if this is mentioned but since OP has been a Marriott Rewards member since 1986 and only switched 3 years ago makes me wonder how close is he/she to lifetime gold or even Plat?

Thank you for your most recent replies and Happy New Years to everyone. You are correct that I have gone back and forth a but but I think I have it figured out. Let me give you my situation again.

We feel like we travel a lot especially more than most of our friends. The travel is typically for pleasure and not business. Our vacations usuallu consists of:

* January-4 nights at our Disney Vacation Club resort in Florida.
* Early April-7 night cruise or 7 nights in a warm destination
* August-7 night vacation at various locations, usually staying at a Marriott if available. We sometimes vacation in Northern Michigan which does not have Marriott hotels in locations where we often go.
*Long weekend in December-Disney, New York or Chicago

We typically only redeem our points at high cost hotels. For example, we just used points to stay at the Renaissance Hotel Times Square which would have cost us $500+ per night. We used them for a week in Aruba. This summer, we plan on staying 5 nights in San Diego at a category 4 Residence Inn and we are paying cash at $190 per night insterad of using 20,000 per night (16,000 average per night after taking account the 5th night free). With the point cost in Hawaii, we may not use our MR points there but instead may pay cash since there are some decent deals out there.

We spend between $80,000 and $100,000 annually on our credit card. We have primarily used the MR Visa until a couple of years ago when we switched to the Starwood AMEX which is rated as the best credit card by most reviewers. Probably 90% of our hotel points are earned from credit card purchases and the remainder from hotel stays.

We currently have 202,000 MR points and 142,000 SPG points. This summer, we will have about 200,000 points from each program. In my opinion, 200,000 SPG points are worth a lot more than 200,000 MR points. Agree or disagree?

So my plan is to keep the SPG AMEX for most purchases and use the MR Visa where AMEX is not accepted. That will get me 100,000 points in a year which is good for 6-7 nights at some very nice Starwood properties or 3-4 nights in very nice Marriott properties. I will use my MR points on a future vacation where it makes sense--maybe Cancun, maybe Hawaii, maybe Europe. It probably does not make sense to transfer my SPG points to Delta unless the right miles deal come up. A couple of years ago, I was able to secure 4 roundtrip tickets from DTW to Anchorage and Vancouver to DTW for 40,000 miles per ticket roundtrip. That would have cost me $900+ per ticket. So we transferred some points to Delta and got what I thought was a great deal.

I am nowhere close to Lifetime Gold or Platinum because I don't pay for hotel stays often enough which means I will probably be losing my MR gold status soon.

Thioughts? Thanks for your help.

The Renaissance Times Square just gave us a room upgrade, free breakfast daily and 8 appetizers (each worth up to about $20) and that was only a 3 night stay. That seemed pretty good to me.

I think it depends what flight deals I could get using miles but you may be right.

In my situation, I think comparing Marriott at 5X the Starwood points is faulty because I don;t earn points at that ratio. I earn most at a 1:1 ratio from credit card usage. I remember many years ago when we could get 2X points for general credit card usage--now that was sweet.

Agreed. Some may disagree, depending on how they earn their points, but imho SPG points are harder to earn than MR points (receiving fewer per $ on paid stays and only 1 point/$1 on CC spend. But, on the bright side, it takes fewer points for a reward stay.

Do higher SPG elite statuses receive more points for their hotel stays as bonuses?

As a GOLD at Marriott you receive breakfast at any FS property during the week.. Usually this would occur in the Concierge Lounge, where you would also get food in the evening. Because this hotel does not have a CL, they give appetizer certificates.

Looking at your travel schedule - only one trip a year benefits from "status", the Dec trip. in Hawaii, chances are you will stay in a resort - you will not receive breakfast there...unless you purchase a rate that includes it.

Everyone's evaluation of points value/usage is different. An earlier poster spoke of "low end" usage being a waste, but there are travelers who never travel overseas, but need to consistently visit family in East Backwards USA. Doubt they think their usage is a waste!

Seems as if you are thinking things through as to what is best for you, which is smart.