Have any of you used your points for MR merchandise?

I'm eying a $500 retail cost digital SLR camera for 170,000 MR points, but it seems like MR points are worth less for merchandise than for MR rooms.

The camera would cost .0029 per point.

For rooms,
.008 per point for an $80 Fairfield Inn room
.00636 per point for a $159 Marriott hotel room
.0073 per point for a $219 Courtyard Times Square.

I used 152k marriott points to get a 160gb iPod with Bose QC3 headphones. I sold the headphones for 325$ and kept the iPod. I don't know what that works out to be but for someone who doesn't take a lot of travel vacations (and if I do, I still have quite a bit of Marriott points) it's a good way to save money on something you'd otherwise have to buy with cash.

Yes, you'll get most people saying it's a poor conversion ratio.

Heh... I logged in here today to ask a similar question. I'm a double plat. these days with more points than anyone with good sense should have. I got laid off a couple of weeks ago, but have already picked up some consulting on the side to begin in the new year, however I'm stuck without a laptop... and will need one. While all of my history has been in the Windows/PC world, I have to finally admit that a Mac has arrived. It's a great computer on it's own and I've proven to myself that it's now actually a better Windows machine than a PC is.

Saw that Marriott had the MacBook Air for 380K points... that's .0047 per point. But the Air won't handle a couple of the apps I want to run, and Marriott has the "design your reward" option... I got a quote back today:

Base MacBook Pro: 490K points, 1999 retail, .0040 per point
Top end MBP: 700K points, 2799 retail, .0039 per point.

It's really not the points... Even after the 700K I have (according to my wife who keeps track) have enough points for several months at the Hotel Champs Ellysses ( Reward level 7 hotel and my Wife's favorite in Paris). But then I'm not into wasting my points either.

Anyone have any thoughts?? I'm leaning on pulling the trigger for the top end MBP model.

D.

Considering that if one is elite, one can convert 135000 points into $1000 Marriott cheques (.007407), I am not sure I do too much shopping at Marriott online. Since these cheques are like cash at participating Marriott properties, one might actually do better taking the cheques and go shopping with it.

I also like the Mac Air. But with dual core notebooks in the $400 range and dual 2 core in the $700 range, hard to justify the extra money.

I'm not a Mac guy so please value my comments accordingly. The MacBook Air with its limited connectivity and no DVD drive seems like a poor machine for business use. As noted, it's also rather pricey for a 13-inch notebook. If price is not a concern since you're using points, then go with the MBP.

If price is a concern, I'd look at the Toshiba U405 family or wait a month or so and get the new Dell 13-inch Adamo.

I wasn't really considering the MBAir, just including it in the list for comparison purposes as it's actually in the Marriott Rewards Merchandise catalog and wouldn't include whatever premium I'd be paying for a "Design Your Reward" custom reward quote.

I did compare other Windows laptops.... but actually found that an equivelent Dell or Lenovo would only be a few hundred dollars less, and the Dell wouldn't equal the MBP's specs. Even the Lenovo would only come really close... both would have to have a 9 cell battery addition that would make it heavier and have part of the battery hanging off the back (and still get less battery life).

I looked at the gift-card route too... including the Marriott Checks, but those are only really good for hotel services. I don't know of any Marriott property that has general merchandise (including laptop computers).

No, the merchandise rate compares poorly to the hotel redemption rate at retail value, but if you saw how the hotels were reimbursed (32.50/day for a cat 5 property, I accidentally discovered recently), the rates become a lot more equitable.

If you have a zillion points and no immediate redemption plans then sure, go ahead and do it. Years ago, I got my first digital camera this way, and was able to learn what I wanted in my next digital camera without any cash outlay. I haven't missed the points.

Thanks Keeton, I knew that a merchandise reward would be far less bang for the buck (bang for the point?) than a hotel reward... but I've decided to go for it. I'm going to go all out for the top-end MBP, and I'm going to throw in some best-buy gift cards to get software.... not a bad deal for about 20% of my total point bank.

I would never want to willingly spend my points on merchandise as it isn't effective 'value' for points - however it sounds like brassai has a very good reason as to why the laptop would be worth more to him.

All I'd throw in is that you can give your points to anyone by ordering an award for them, and wouldn't you be able to sell all those months of nights in Paris on ebay for much more than $3k? Especially if you did some conversions into airmiles (e.g. the travel award for 250k points with ~120k airmiles would easily retail for 1c/mile - and probably much more?)

Another measuring stick is a $1,000 cruise certificate, which goes for 145,000 points. It's as good as cash and it can be used for any cruise on virtually any cruise line (as long as you go through MR's affiliated travel agent, but they are very competitive).

Many posters feel that this is a poor redemption value, but I kind of disagree. If you can find a great cruise deal (and they abound these days), you can get a heck of a vacation for the points, especially if you live somewhat near a port.

So I always evaluate my redemptions based on the value to ME rather than obsessively calculating points per dollar. You can go crazy otherwise... and end up not having ANY fun with your hard-earned points.

Wish I had so many points to burn....I'd get a Europe Hopper Award

I'd recommend you hoard your MH points and don't waste 'em on a laptop.

I was in a similar situation to you several years ago(laid off), and even though you're tempted, realize that the BIG item is to get back on your feet.

As far as laptops go, find sumpin' really cheap(word of mouth, ebay, etc), go with Windows platform and focus on what's important.

At this point, any cheap laptop should suffice, as you'll likely just need web surfing and document prep for now.

Saved my hotel points, used 'em later after I was back on my feet and never regretted the decision.