And a 25% bonus on base points.

I'm not taking any chances.

We only get to spend the points at a nice European location once a year at best, and I'm just not going to walk in and hope my Gold status would work.

28 stays(=Diamond) in the course of a year? Piece of cake.

I'm glad it's a piece of cake for you. Is that because your employer pays, or because they're price competitive where you stay the most?

In my area, Choice properties (giving me 4000 points a night seemingly almost nonstop!) are almost always $80ish a night, often even a bit less, while HHonors properties start at $120ish and even anything close to that can be hard to find many nights. And all my stays are on my own dime. I thus find it hard to justify laying out 28 nights at all that extra money when it's kinda doubtful the money I'll save by using Diamond will make up for that...

(And if it weren't Choice, I'd still get way more points or miles per stay than with HHonors AND pay way less per stay at Priority Club properties.)

Oh, and to top it off, in many European locations I've been to so far, either there's no HHonors properties at all -- and not much Diamond Force can do about that! -- or there's cheap Scandics (which with the new higher Scandic redemption rates post-October will often now make more sense to pay for than get award stays at). How you gonna do a Provence or Dordogne or Amalfi coast vacation using HHonors points (except for Paris or Rome at the connection)?

1. They're price competetive. The Hilton Garden Inn, Quality Inn, and Marriott Fairfield Inn are all $60/night (for me). And they're all on my dime, too.

2. With ~150 nights/year, I can spread the business around. I have a nice bunch of Hilton points, Marriott points, and I'll be burning my current Choice stash next week for a stay in London at a Preferred hotel.

Without that price point, I'd probably be staying at Motel 6 a lot more, since the delta doesn't justify the points with the normal stays. However, when a promo rears its lovely head, I'm all set to pounce once I determine the extra cash outlay is justified by the additional points.

The Preferred aspect of Choice looks interesting. I'm impressed with the list of properties on the Preferred list, as well as the list of more rural and smaller town European props where you can use points and still get a bit of a boutique-y, local experience.

My only problem with Choice is that the only full-service brand they have is Clarion (I think), and I don't see many/any Clarions where I travel. Even if I moved all of my roadtripping-type stays over to Sleep Inn, Comfort Inn, etc., it would be a slow grind for me to get to the 50,000 points needed for 1 night at the top Preferred hotels. (Right now, my roadtripping hotel of choice is Hampton or HGI. Too many skeezy Scarefield Inns out there... :eek: )

At first glance, the credit card looks like an OK product - again, assuming you have your sights set on a specific high-end Preferred property in a location where a bazillion Starpoints can't help you.

I'm not staying at them at all currently, because the standard point return is low compared with the premium I have to pay (over Motel 6, which is literally right next door).

However, they seem to run a promo twice a year where you make 2 stays and get 8000 points. They've done it this Spring, and had a targetted promo (same thing) running right now (I didn't get targetted). They usually run another one in the Fall.

So, with a grinding bit of hotel-hopping (which I know you are no stranger to :)), you could conceivably rack up 300-400K points in a year. That will buy you a nice chunk of time and some very nice properties (check out the Preferred Hotel near Naples :)).

OTOH, you are correct: there is a slew of Choice properties in UK, France, Germany, and even a few in Italy and Scandanavia, but the quality of the properties is hit-or-miss. I went through the trouble of getting a map and plotting the properites (UK and France) so as to lay out a 2-3 week road trip with free stays every night. A bit of work, but that's half the fun.

Cool...your note on promos makes sense. Might be worth keeping an eye on them. I doubt I'll ever go all-out and earn 300k, but if picking up 50-75k is doable with some promo stays and maybe adding the credit card, it might be worthwhile just to diversify a bit.

I have no life. My nights consist of maybe a meal, watch a little TV, read a little, call home, shower, and go to bed.

At least the hotel-hopping keeps it interesting. :)

Pays off, too. :p

Choice for New Zealand
 

If your travel ever takes you to New Zealand, you will find only Choice has enough "choices" for New Zealand, and a lot more "choices" than other chains in Australia, outside Sydney/Melbourne.

HHonor points just become too devaluated that it is depressing to see even a Hampton Inn in Portland, OR would require 20K pts, versus 10K for a Courtyard from Marriott.

While Priority Club does not have the very high end properties, IC in Paris is at a prime location, so does Crown Plaza in London. The HIX properties in UK is very good value if you are doing a touring trip. There are also many Holiday Inn properties in Sydney to choose from.
PC pts also do not expire though the elite status does not come with much benefits.

For our upcoming trips to Pacific NW in August, and UK/Paris trip in September, we use all 3 chains award nights - Marriott, HHonor, Priority Club - but we found HHonor is the least valuable and Priority Club is the most valuable way of using points. One can Hotwire a Hilton at Paris (the one near Eiffel Tower) for $120 but Hilton wants 40K for that property. Granted, the $120 per night would not be at the Tower wing, but neither the award room, unless you are Diamond and are lucky to get the upgrade. IC Le Grand at Paris only needs 30K PC pts and is overlooking the Opera House, and a historical hotel.

Is there a way we could consolidate all the info into a sticky / guide that defines which program has what benefits at a given point of time.

It seems that there are quite a few votes here for SPG for its 25% mileage bonus. What do people think of their nights and flights option? It seems to be to be an excellent deal. Sorry if this is slightly off-topic.

Yes this is a good deal, stay and fly

Sounds like something for the FT Wiki... I haven't used it much myself, but perhaps there's something there like this...

As someone pointed out in one of the previous postings, it all depends what you want to get.

Hyatt and Marriott have Lifetime programs, so once you reach a certain level you don't have to stay 50-75 nights and/or do any matress runs. Also both Marriott and Hyatt offer free breakfasts to their elite members. Hilton and Starwood, as far as I know, offer free breakfast only if there is a Club/Lounge at the hote.

I've had best luck with Hilton: no matter what days of the week I'm there, whether there is a lounge or not, and whether they describe the property as a "resort" or not, they give me breakfast. If it's certificates for a restaurant, they are pretty good about making it for 2 people.

I'd say Marriott is #2. Most props are pretty good about giving me weekend breakfast certs, even though they aren't required to by the terms of the program. (90% of Marriott lounges are closed on weekends.) My beef with Marriott is if it's a "resort", you don't get anything. Some hotels don't actually put "Resort" in the title: you have to look at the property page closely to find out in some cases.

I don't have a good comparison basis for Starwood: I'm Gold there, which doesn't require them to give me breakfast, but occasionally I get a decent upgrade from them that puts me on the lounge level. The Starwood lounges I've been in recently - Westin Bohemian in Orlando and Westin PVR - are quite nice.