Unless one is committed to another brand, probably Starwood. With the feature that you could transfer it very nicely and with good ratios to airlines.

I have membership in various hotel rewards programs, but have only ever redeemed with Marriott - they seem to give you the most points, per dollars spent, versus a flat 500 points with some other programs. I easily rack up the points each year. In addition, they always seem to offer another way to rack up bonus points, such as "pay with your visa card and earn an extra 5000 points" or "stay 3 times and get an additional 5, 10 or 20 thousand points". Those extras make a difference. I was able to stay at the Marriott in Kauai on my honeymoon for a week. With the other hotel programs, I don't seem to stay enough to earn any points for redemtion . I really don't care about being upgraded, so that perk isn't as valuable to me as free hotel nights.

Different chains give differing points for each stay and charge differing amounts for their rooms, so it probably works out even.

But for those of us who amass most of our points from charge cards, there is no questions that Starwood is the way to go. It requires many fewer Starpoints for a room than any other chain.

Last summer, we spent 5 nights at the Ritz in Maui for 150,000 Marriott points, but 5 nights at the Princeville in Kaui was only 48,000. I could have stayed 15 nights for the same amount!

I'll chime in here on Starwood too. Since our favorite type of vacation is a Biz class seat to Europe, and staying in nice hotels there, we like Starwood the best.

If we need to top up an airline account, there is the transferability discussed above, plus the bonus miles on transfer.

But it is the lack of capacity controls that we enjoy the most. If a Starwood hotel has a standard room available to purchase, you can use points for it. That has enabled us to get rooms when other chains did not have any award rooms available (or only had them at premium rates, such as Marriott "Stay Anytime" -- by using 50% more points).

I know that some have complained that this Starwood policy is not always followed (although some complaints seem to be special events, such as Superbowl or Final 4, which appear to be excluded), but in our experience, we have had good success using SPG in Europe.

I've gotten tired of trying to use Hilton and Marriott points during low season in places, and have them still tell me that they have no awards available.

Like others have mentioned, there is no single answer. It depends on how you earn, how/where you'd like to burn, what kind of hotel you'd otherwise book in a world without hotel points, what kind of vacations you take (e.g., lots of short weekends to big cities, longer resort stays, etc.), and what elite status levels you can attain within each program.

The only somewhat objective places to look for baseline values are Diner's Club and Amex. They offer conversions from their own currencies into all three of the big hotel programs. Unless changes have been recently made, their ratios are 1:3:4 for SPG:MR:HH.

That passes the smell test for me: I usually peg 'em at 3 cents, 1 cent, and 3/4ths of a cent. Looking at my recent redemptions in all of the programs, and comparing to what I would have been willing to spend on a decent hotel room for those stays, it roughly jives. Sometimes I'm tempted to peg SPG a little higher, but then I ask myself "Honestly, would I have really paid $349/nt. for that room? No."

I tend to do my paid business stays at Marriott, with Hilton as a backup.

I use my SPG Amex is my primary-spend credit card, with just enough HH Amex usage (a couple months a year) to lock in Gold status for the next year.

If I need more HH points, I know I can get 'em quickly from my AA account. The AA -> HH conversion is a roughly equal one to me, provided I'm doing a big enough transaction to minimize the impact of the $25 vigorish.

Learn 'em all, play 'em all. The more diversity you have, the more likely you'll be able to find an award room when you want it where you want it.

It all depends on your priority and what you define as convenient. For instance, I used to be with Marriott Rewards mostly because of the multitude of Marriott hotels in the US. But now that I only have select cities to fly to, I prefer SPG because I value upgradeability. Not to mention the flexibility to transfer my points to select airlines.

I switched to Marriott from Hilton and found that I can accumulate many more points; I find the rate of exchange better too--it's easier to get a free room. Marriott has the advantage, IMHO, that there are more opportunities to purchase merchandise.

Exactly, the SPG50 seem worthless to me too. I just trash them as soon as I get them.

You should save them - if for no other reason than to swap them with FT'ers in other countries. Although they are near-worthless in the U.S., there are many parts of the world where they come in quite handy. Some markets don't use "Rack Rate" they way we do here (e.g., the rate they'd charge if the Olympics were held in the hotel parking lot). So 50% off Rack can actually equate to the lowest available rate.

Check out the SPG board for a wide range of SPG50 threads. I seem to recall that they work well in Australia, among other places. And in the U.S., they seem to have value on high-demand weeks in Manhattan, assuming you are willing to pay $300 or more a night for a hotel after applying the SPG50.

Hold on a second.

I love Starpoints as much as anyone, but as a fellow credit card guy, you need to look at your bang for the $CC. I get 4,5, or 6 Hilton points per $CC - 5 from 5X spending on my Hilton Amex, 4 or 6 from my MR Amex, which has been in a perpetual promotion state since November of last year. For enough points for a top-end 6-night award at Hilton, I need to put no more than $43,750 on my cards. Your 5-night award at the Princeville requires $48,000 in CC spending. The wildcard will be how easy it is to get Hilton awards with this new gold benefit. And do top-end Hiltons measure up to a cat 5 Starwood?

Having said that, we were at the Princeville earlier this year - it's a tough act to beat.

Is the perpetual promotion state something that Amex will put in writing and guarantee me on an ongoing basis? If so that's something I might bite on. 6 HH per $ spent would be well worth it for me - as long as I know for sure that I'm getting that on every dollar spent, every day of the year.

Right now, I carry both HH Amex and SPG Amex. I think they are the top two cards for general usage, given both their raw value returned as well as the side bennie of HH Gold status.

I'm sure some folks will disagree with me, but I think the approximate equal levels are as follows. I stress approximate as we all know that the specific hotel market has as much (if not more) impact on the levels as hotel quality. (e.g., the same category might be a dumpy midscale property in Manhattan and a kicka** 4-star property in Asia.)

- HH Cat 6 = SPG Cat 5 = MR Cat 7
- SPG Cat 6 = Marriott Ritz awards

I hesitate to throw Astoria awards in here yet because Hilton is only beginning to build out that brand as its own entity. But they seem to be trying to build something that stacks up against St. Regis and Ritz, at least in select markets.

You have about as good a chance of that happening as the Cubs winning the World Series in my lifetime.

But do the math: based on your valuation, you'd need to spend a little less than $15K while signed up for one of their bi-monthly promotions to cover the $110 annual fee. (There's a promotion going on right now for July & August). If I can sign up for one-2-month promotion a year, it's worth it to me. Is it worth the gamble?

Starwood.. without a doubt. I get to transfer points to miles.. and got the Sheraton in Agra for 2500 points a night!

I find Hilton points to be the most valuable for me. I like the wide variety of hotels in the program; I can rack up points at less expensive hotels and use them for free nights at high end hotels. Also Hilton counts award stays toward elite status.

...And don't underestimate the value of the fact that anybody can maintain perpetual HH Goldness just by spending with the Amex. Gold status has real value: lounge access, pretty good upgrades at most hotels (not suites, but stuff like ocean view at resorts, C-level rooms, corner rooms, etc.), and generally better-than-the-average-joe treatment at hotels. The status is completely on par with MR Gold and almost as good as SPG Plat.

So that in and of itself makes the first 60,000 points you earn from your HH Amex after the start of each year pretty valuable. They are essentially EQM's!