Hey FT gurus,

Long time lurker, first time poster here.

I am planning on a honeymoon vacation in the future (not immediate, likely 2014), so I do have some time to my advantage to prepare using a combination of points + cash to make it a great experience without hopefully hitting the bank too hard.

She has her heart set on staying 7-8 nights in a resort with an overwater villa, so places like Bora Bora come to mind immediately.

What is your best recommendation for a strategy over the next 16-18 months to generate as much relevant points to get me an affordable stay there?

Unfortunately, I used a lot of Air/SPG points recently in Maui and Honolulu so I will need to build it back up, but have flexibility to use other/new programs.

Current points:

Alaska: 19K
Chase: 56K and can be converted 1:1 to either:

• Amtrak Guest Rewards
• British Airways Executive Club
• Hyatt Gold Passport
• Korean Air SKYPASS
• Marriott Rewards
• Priority Club Rewards
• Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards
• The Ritz-Carlton Rewards
• United MileagePlus

An option that I am considering is going for Priority Club Rewards to stay at IC Thalasso Bora Bora through generating as much Chase points through Freedom/Checking & 80k priority select visa

The both of us could be doing this strategy as well, and I can estimate we can likely hit 250K - 300K Priority Club Reward points by then. Any issues/downsides/that just wont work?

Sidenote: I do note that on the IC site, you cannot book overwater villas at their bora bora locations anymore with reward nights

I also have the Alaska Air VISA and can leverage one RT $99 companion ticket during the journey down there. Credit score wise, we're both sound at around high 700's - mid 800's, and have consistently gotten CC offers in the mail.

Anyhow, I am more than open to suggestions - but those are the few constraints

To note, I am not looking to spend little or $0 on the honeymoon, and would be comfortable even paying the full cash charge. I just figured, if I am looking this far ahead, I am sure some FT gurus can think of some
programs that I can start now that will help reduce the cost in the future!

Thanks for any help,

-N

Hilton also has a property in Bora Bora, though I'm not sure if you can book an overwater villa with points.

Million Mile Secrets has a good blog post about accumulating Hilton points: http://millionmilesecrets.com/2012/0...s-credit-card/

Hey Nediag,

Amassing Chase URs to transfer to IHG Priority Club doesn't make sense.

If you wanna stay at Intercontinental Bora Bora, using the "buy IHG" trick works better than transferring Chase URs over. You need a 5k balance to execute this:
http://millionmilesecrets.com/2011/0...unt-on-hotels/

The new rate is 70 cents per 100 PC points, so a 40k point night at IC Bora Bora would cost $280 using this method.

Hope that helps!

You may be better off concentrating on using points for the airline tix. I would guess that most of the overwater villas are either not available using points or very limited and prohibitively expensive. I just looked at Hilton and they quoted 172k-192k pts per night, but I didn't see any availability for 5 nights over the next 10 months.

The $99 AS companion ticket can only be used on AS flights and I'm pretty sure they don't fly to Tahiti. Did you mean that you could use it to get to/from Hawaii which might make the trip to Tahiti a little easier/cheaper? You may want to look into trying to get SkyTeam award tix, esp on Air France. Generally, using DL Skymiles would be the way to go, but there's a lot of rumors about upcoming major changes to their program. They may devalue the points before you can get enough to book the tickets. Another option would be to start collecting Amex Membership Rewards points which could be transferred to DL or other airlines including directly to Air France (although they have big fuel surcharges) when the time came.

Have fun planning your honeymoon. My wife and I spent a week in Tahiti a while ago at the Club Meds in Bora Bora (overwater villas or fares) and Moorea. It was a magical trip.

Hilton points are probably the easiest to generate given your time frame. Between the Virgin, Hawaiian (B of A & B of H) and various HHonors cards (Citi & Amex), you and your fiance can each generate 250k to 300k in sign-up bonuses easily. Sign up for the Amex card that gives you gold status within a year of your stay and you should get a discount on the points required for a room. You should have more than enough for a standard room at the Bora Bora/Moorea/Maldives properties (assuming availability, which could be an issue).

Once the standard reward room is booked, you can usually call the hotel and negotiate a cash upgrade to an OWB.

Your bigger problem is getting to Tahiti itself. United does not fly there. You would have to get lucky and try to find award availability from lax to akl then to ppt on Air New Zealand, in many cases it isn't there or if it is it requires two awards.

Many hotels in French Polynesia will not offer a standard award over water bungalow. In the case of my honeymoon.

I and my wife obtained 3 american airlines cards each for 50k sign up bonuses for each card and we are flying round trip business class from IAD to PPT connecting in LAX. We then used Hilton Points to stay at Hilton Moorea and Bora Bora, and paid cash to upgrade to the OWB. There

I did 4 nights in Moorea and 3 nights in Bora Bora in July 2011 using American Airlines miles (from Nashville-LA-Tahiti) and Hilton points for the rooms, so what you are trying to do is certainly possible.

Just a few things to note:

1. I upgraded to an overwater bungalow at both resorts on an award stay and paid about $150 per night so be prepared to pay to stay in the overwater bungalow (give or take $20 per night I would say because it does seem negotiable). I would budget $950-$1100 for 7 nights if I were you.

2. You will have to pay to around $850 to fly from Tahiti to Bora Bora using Air Tahiti for two people round trip (not to be confused with Air Thaiti Nui who is an American partner) because there is no way to get all the way to Bora Bora on points. You could save a few hundred bucks by going to just Moorea instead. You will still have to pay for a flight but it will be a few hundred cheaper for two people.

3. You can transfer from Virgin Atlantic to Hilton at a 1 to 2 ratio and Virgin Atlantic is a transfer partner of Membership Rewards, so 1 Membership Reward point is equal to two Hilton points by going Membership Rewards to Virgin Atlantic to Hilton (Virgin Atlantic to Hilton must be done in 10,000 point increments and the names must match on the Virgin and Hilton accounts and the transfer may take 2-4 weeks)

4. I would get one of you the Hilton Surpass from American Express now (for the person NOT on the room reservation) to get the 60,000 point Hilton bonus and then wait until one year of your trip and get another Hilton Surpass credit card from American Express for the person that the hotel reservation is under. If the 60,000 point sign-up is still available you will get those points but you should also be able to be Hilton Gold for your trip which I THINK will get you free breakfast (it did for us but I can't swear this is till the case)

5. As mentioned previously Hawaii Airlines also transfers at 1 to 2 to Hilton so you could do the Hawaii Airlines card from Bank of America for 35,000 points (which become 70,000 Hilton points) and then also the Hawaii Airlines card form Bank of Hawaii for an additional 35,000 Hawaii points (70,000 Hilton)

6. You will be paying 37,500 per night in points if you are gold (using the automatic Gold of the Surpass card) so 7 nights would should be 262,500

7. Getting the mileage for the flights will be your toughest challenge. I was able to take advantage of the old Citibank 75,000 AAdvantage points credit cards. I will have to let others help you with flight points since I am out of the loop.

8. When I booked the flights I called AA and let them do it. If you end up using AA miles, I found trying myself to be too difficult but others may disagree.

Good luck!

Hi all,

Thank you very much for the responses - I investigated the recommendations and did some extra research on FT and other traveling blogs as well to finalize what I'll be doing over the next year or so in building up associated points.

In the next week, I'll apply using the two-browser trick for the Citi AMEX & Visa 100K AAdvantage points. I believe this will cover and allow me to fly round-trip from SEA to LAX and to PPT, both ways in business class at a cost of 125K AA Miles.

For staying at the Hilton Bora Bora, it looks to cost approx. 280K HHonors points for 8 nights w/ AXON rewards.

After 3-4 months after getting the Citi cards, I will then apply for the Virgin Amex card (45K+5K spend virgin points -> 100K HH) & Hawaii Airline BoA (35K -> 70K HH). Then lastly, about a little before a year of planned honeymoon, I will apply for the HH Surpass Amex card (60K HH) and the Hawaiian Air BoH (70K HH) for a total of approx 300k~ HH.

With that, I will spend another $1300 or so to upgrade to overwater bungalows.

Total cost: $1300 upgrade + $265 in annual fees for the four HH cards.

By massing AAdvantage & HHonors, there shouldn't be an issue right? Any better suggestions/strategies? Churning instead of reapplying?

Thanks for all the help so far,

-N

1) FT is not a blog.

2) Spend less time researching ways to mitigate the honeymoon costs and spend more time getting a prenup. @:-)

3) vaya con dios.

I haven't double checked the miles required but your plan seems to leave you 50k AA miles short. Are you just planning on spending $25k per card to amass those miles, or will you accumulate them through other flights, etc.? Just want to make sure you've budgeted this properly...