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Bilt Cash Summary
(I am a Bilt Advisor and Investor )
First off, remember that every Bilt credit card earns 4% Bilt Cash alongside the points they earn on every purchase. You also earn $50 of Bilt Cash for every 25k Bilt Points you earn that count toward status ( this excludes points earned from a sign up bonus or Rakuten, etc ), but does include those you earn on Rent and Mortgage. I can understand why this makes the program confusing, and certainly not nearly as simple as Bilt once was, but there is a lot of value to be extracted from Bilt Cash if you’re willing to put a bit of time into understanding it. It may actually make the most sense to just using Bilt Cash on partners or housing, and use Bilt Cash to accelerate point earnings up to $25k and simplify your life.
Bilt has made things very clear. They want to reward you for making them your primary card, or at least one that you spend quite a bit on, and not something that you swipe 5 times on small transactions and get to earn 1x points on your rent payment.
I chose the Bilt Palladium card ( uncapped 2x ) since I can easily use the point accelerator to earn 3x on purchases, up to $25k, and I’ve decided I’ll also apply Bilt Cash against our housing payment to earn nearly 4x points total. I’ll make this my primary card to use when I’m not adding a card to my wallet, or certain purchases that could perhaps out earn it ( Amex offers, Chase offers, etc ). Taking into consideration I’m Platinum and likely to earn it again that I’ll earn at least Gold, I’ll use those points to get 75%-100% transfer bonuses making it even more valuable to me. So… Bilt Cash and this new point structure is a winner to me especially since I’ve had a mortgage and not rent for the entirety of Bilt 1.0 and I’ll earn far more points in 2.0 than in 1.0.
Bilt Palladium Card
Personally I think this is the most valuable Bilt Card…and arguably the best super premium card because of it’s earn structure. Receive annual $600 in Bilt Cash/Hotel credits + Unlimited 2x Bilt Points per dollar everywhere + 4% Bilt Cash on every dollar spent.
I’d say this equates to somewhere between 6-8% back on all your purchases and you can easily offset your annual fee with credits.
You can Pay your Rent/Mortage without a fee, but you will need to use your Bilt Cash to earn Bilt Points on your mortgage or rent – see the quick breakdown for more information.
Welcome Offer
50k Bilt points after $4k spend in 3 months + $300 Bilt Cash and Bilt Gold Status
Annual Fee
$495
Points Earned
Two Currencies Earned:
Bilt Points & Bilt Cash
- Welcome bonus (subject to approval):
- 50,000 Bilt Points + Gold Status after spending $4,000 on everyday purchases in the first 3 months + $300 of Bilt Cash.
- Earning:
- 2X points + 4% back in Bilt Cash on everyday purchases
- Earn up to 1X points on rent and mortgage payments
- Benefits:
- $400 Bilt Travel Hotel credit. Applied twice a year, as $200 statement credits, for qualifying Bilt Travel Portal hotel bookings.
- Two night stay minimum
- If you prepay, credit applies to the period you prepaid. If you pay at checkout, credit applies to period you check out of hotel
- $200 Bilt Cash (awarded annually). At the end of each calendar year, any Bilt Cash balance over $100 will expire.
- Priority Pass ($469/year value). See Guide to Benefits.
- $400 Bilt Travel Hotel credit. Applied twice a year, as $200 statement credits, for qualifying Bilt Travel Portal hotel bookings.
- Bilt Cash:
- Redeem Bilt Cash for dollar-for-dollar value toward fitness classes, hotel bookings, Home Delivery orders, Lyft rides, and more. Bilt Cardholders can also use Bilt Cash to cover transaction fees on rent and mortgage payments. At the end of each calendar year, any Bilt Cash balance over $100 will expire.
- Bilt Point redemptions include airlines, hotels, future rent and mortgage payments, Lyft rides, statement credits, student loan balances, a down payment on a home, and more.
- Earn additional points through Bilt Neighborhood Benefits™ when you use your Palladium Card at Bilt’s network of 50,000+ merchants
- Priority Pass ($469/year value). See Guide to Benefits.
- see rates and fees
We keep an up to date spreadsheet that lists what the highest offers: You can find that spreadsheet here.
Main Cast:
Cards that earn flexible points and should be used on the bulk of your purchases.
Supporting Cast:
Cards that earn fixed points in the currency of the airline/hotel and can not be transferred at attractive rates. These cards yield benefits that make it worth keeping, but not necessarily worth putting a lot of your everyday spend on.
An example of how Bilt Palladium works earning 2x everywhere and 4% Bilt Cash.
You spend $2k a month on all your purchases. You’d earn 4k Bilt points and $80 of Bilt Cash. I value Bilt Points a little over $0.02 meaning you’re getting about 4 cents back via Bilt Poitns and the $80 Bilt Cash. That is pretty amazing return on spend.
This is in addition to the annual $200 Bilt Cash you receive as a cardholder and the semi annual $200 Bilt Hotel credit you receive.
You can use your Bilt Points however you like – transfer them to partners, in Bilt travel, all the ways we’ve spoken of them in the past.
Bilt Cash is a different entity, earned alongside your Bilt Points and can be used within the Bilt network of partners. The card earns 4% Bilt Cash, but you also earn $50 of Bilt Cash for every 25k Bilt Points you earn.
You can use Bilt Cash to earn points on rent ( $30 per 1000 Points on $1000 rent/mortgage ) or you can use it on Bilt dining, hotels in Bilt Travel, fitness classes, pharmacy, and you’ll see the option to redeem dollar for dollar when you pay. The redemption list will continue to grow as the program broadens, but it’s limited to Bilt partners.
- Rent/Mort = $2k = you’ll need $60 Bilt Cash to earn 2k Bilt points
- Rent/Mort = $3k = you’ll need $90 Bilt Cash to earn 3k points
At the end of the day, it’s your choice how you want to use your Bilt Cash. Personally, I’ll be using mine to offset mortgage/rent and make use of the point accelerator option.
Just keep in mind that Bilt Cash expires end of year.
Let’s take a look at it
Annual Maximum Cash Redemptions by Category
Holy Smokes… we have a lot of redemption options for Bilt Cash, and while I think this give Bilt cardholders, and members, a lot of choices, it may take some time to get accustomed to Bilt Cash if you haven’t used it. There are also caps on every single category and stipulations.
Personally, I’d look at all of this, and simplify things for yourself. Look at Bilt now as either a Rent/Mortgage card and use your cash toward that, or use the accelerator up to $25k a year in spend to earn a bonus point. This way you’d simplify your life and know you’re earning the best points on spend.
Remember, Bilt Cash expires on 12/31 no matter when you earned it. You can roll over $100
| Category | Benefit | Frequency | Annual Maximum |
|---|---|---|---|
| DINING & GROCERIES | $1,180 | ||
| GrubHub Delivery | $10/month | $120 | |
| Bilt Home Delivery (Gopuff) | $5/month | $60 | |
| Gopuff FAM Membership | Annual | $100 | |
| Restaurant Partners | $25/month | $300 | |
| Dining Experiences | $50/month | $600 | |
| TRAVEL & TRANSPORTATION | Up to $3,010 | ||
| Hotel Credit (tier-based)* | $50-100/month | Up to $1,200* | |
| Lyft Rideshare | $10/month | $120 | |
| Blacklane (tier-based)* | Annual | Up to $150* | |
| BLADE Airport Flights | 2 bookings/year | $700 | |
| Priority Pass Guests (Palladium only) | $70/month | $840 | |
| Parking | $5/month | $60 | |
| HEALTH & FITNESS | $600 | ||
| Fitness Classes (SoulCycle, Barry’s) | $40/month | $480 | |
| Walgreens | $10/month | $120 | |
| ENTERTAINMENT & OTHER | $720 | ||
| Comedy Experiences | $50/month | $600 | |
| Design Collection | $10/month | $120 | |
| BONUS POINTS & PREMIUM BENEFITS | |||
| Point Accelerator (Obsidian & Palladium only) | +1X on $5,000 spend ($200 Bilt Cash each) | Up to 5 activations/year | |
| Transfer Bonus Upgrade | Variable Bilt Cash cost | Upgrade to next tier | |
| Rent/Mortgage Points | Every $30 Bilt Cash = 1,000 points | Up to 1X of payment | |
| Home Away Benefits (Blue & Silver unlock) | One-time $95 Bilt Cash | Luxury hotel benefits |
Notes:
- * Tier-based benefits vary by membership level (Blue/Silver, Gold, Platinum)
- Monthly credits do not roll over and reset each month
- Some benefits available starting 3/1/26
How I’ll use my Bilt Cash
There are two things I’m looking to use primarily use my Bilt Cash on:
- Rent/Mortgage
- Point Accelerator
Rent/Mortgage
You’ll need to use $3 Bilt cash to buy 100 Bilt Points, offsetting $100 of rent in the process. In order to earn the full 1x points on Rent/Mortgage you need to spend 75% of your housing payment on your credit card. For instance, if your rent is $4k a month you’ll need to spend $3k on your card in order to earn 4k Bilt Points on that rent.
Point Accelerator
You need to use $200 Bilt Cash to earn an extra 1x on $5k spend. Since you earn 4% back on spend, you’d need to spend $5k in order to earn 5k Bilt Points. Effectively, every $5k you spend you’ll get a 1x bonus on your next $5k spend, up to $25k total spend.
One thing to keep in mind, if you’re also trying to use Bilt Cash to offset a housing payment, you’d only earn Bilt Cash on the portion of your spend that is over 75% of your housing payment. For instance, if your housing payment is $2k a month, and you spend $2k per month on the card, you’d earn $80 of Bilt Cash. $60 of that Bilt Cash would be needed to offset your housing payment and you’d be left with $20 of Bilt cash to use elsewhere – in my case, on the Points Accelerator.
How I’m thinking about this in year 1.
The Palladium comes with $200 annual Bilt Cash + $300 at the time of sign up. So I’d be starting with $500 Bilt Cash. Since the max you can do is $25k, and that would require $1000 of Bilt Cash, I’d need to earn an additional $500 of Bilt Cash to hit the max 1x on $25k spend, which would require $12500 of additional spend, and I’m going to get points on housing, so I’d need to spend about an extra $1k per month over my housing payment on the card. I should be able to do this pretty easily since I have multiple businesses and can push that spend onto the card and expense report it to my business.
In the first 12 months, assuming $5k spend and $3k housing payment = 231k points on $60k spend. 3.85x and I’d have an additional $570 Bilt Cash to use on partners. Is that worth $1 to $1 value…No. But it’s a nice addition that I’ll likely spread across hotels, dining, lyft, walgreens, and blacklane.
I also value Bilt Points the highest of any currency and Platinum has had big transfer bonuses.
- 50k Bonus from sign up
- 120k from spend ( 2x $60k spend )
- 25k from accelerator ( 1x 25k spend )
- 36k from housing
In terms of Bilt Cash:
Earnings:
Not taking into account any Rent Day bonuses.
- I’d start with $500
- Earn a total of $2400 ( 4% on $60k )
- Earn $150 from Spend ( $50 every 25k points excluding 50k bonus I’d earn 181k points )
- Total $2900
Redeem
- $1000 on Accelerator ( $200 x 5 )
- $1080 on Housing
- $570 on a mix of dining, hotel, Lyft and Blacklane
- I’ll have to double check but I presume I can stack Bilt Cash with Bilt Hotel credit that comes with the Palladium )
Make sure you keep in mind that you can only rollover $100 of Bilt Cash to the next year
Bilt Transfer Partners
Past Rent Day Promos – this is when I transfer points
- November 2022
- United status trial and challenge
- December 2022:
- 100% transfer bonuses to IHG
- January 2023
- Bonus points with Trivia
- February 2023
- 100% transfer bonus to Hawaiian
- March 2023
- Points worth 50% more with Amazon
- April 2023
- Hyatt Trial Status and Challenge,
- Explorist and pathway to Globalist in 20 nights
- Hyatt Trial Status and Challenge,
- May 2023
- 100% transfer bonus to Flying Blue
- June 2023
- 100k Bilt Rewards prize, R/T Virgin Upper Class and Emirate Biz tix
- July 2023
- $10 to $20 Lyft Credits ( $10 for all Bilt Rewards members and $20 for Bilt Rewards credit cardholders )
- August 2023
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Virgin Atlantic/Virgin Red
- 75% blue
- 100% silver
- 125% gold
- 150% platinum
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Virgin Atlantic/Virgin Red
- September 2023
- One rider in each SoulCycle class will get a month’s rent – up to $2500
- All Rent Day Riders are eligible
- You can book your bike, starting today!
- 10 bikes are available per class
- One rider in each SoulCycle class will get a month’s rent – up to $2500
- October 2023
- 5x on Sports Tickets
- Use points to book NFL Suites and Tickets
- November 2023
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Emirates SkyWards
- 75% blue
- 100% silver
- 125% gold
- 150% platinum
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Emirates SkyWards
- December 2023
- 2x shopping
- 10x Bilt Dining
- January 2024
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Virgin, Air France/KLM Flying Blue, and IHG One Rewards
- 75% blue
- 100% silver
- 125% gold
- 150% platinum
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Virgin, Air France/KLM Flying Blue, and IHG One Rewards
- February 2024
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Air Canada, Aeroplan
- 75% blue
- 100% silver
- 125% gold
- 150% platinum
- 50% more value with Amazon
- $5 Lyft Credit
- 75% to 150% transfer bonus to Air Canada, Aeroplan
- March 2024
- NCAA Sweet 16 tournament
- Connect your Bilt Rewards to a partner and get 1k point up to 2 partners.
- NCAA Sweet 16 tournament
- April 2024
- Buy One Get One Fitness Classes
- May 2024
- Use Points on Rent, get 100% back to use in Home Collection
- June 2024
- 5x or 10x on Bilt Dining
- July 2024
- Alaska Airlines Status Match
- Gold = MVP
- Platinum = MVP Gold
- Alaska Airlines Transfer Bonus – capped at 50k
- 25% blue
- 50% silver
- 75% gold
- 100% platinum
- Alaska Airlines Status Match
- August 2024
- Virgin Voyages Experience
- Blade Helicopter promo with party
- September 2024
- Avianca LifeMiles transfer bonus
- All Members 50% bonus
- Virgin Transfer Bonus
- Blue 20% bonus
- Silver 40% bonus
- Gold 60% bonus
- Platinum 100% bonus
- ResortPass Promo
- Virgin Cruises BOGO
- Avianca LifeMiles transfer bonus
- October
- Hilton Gold Status Match til year end
- Keep Gold after 8 nights for all members
- Get Diamond after 14 nights for Blue/Silver/Gold and 8 nights for Platinum
- Hilton Gold Status Match til year end
- November 2024
- 50 to 100% Transfer Bonus to British Airways
- 2x on Groceries up to 500 points
- December 2024
- Amazon Bonuses
- 3x on Groceries
- January 2025
- Accor Status Match
- February 2025
- 20% to 100% Transfer Bonus to Avianca LifeMiles
- 20% Blue
- 40% Silver
- 50% Gold
- 100% Platinum
- 20% to 100% Transfer Bonus to Avianca LifeMiles
- March 2025
- 50% to 200% transfer bonus to Hilton
- Bilt Blue members 150% Bonus
- Bilt Silver members 200% Bonus
- Bilt Gold members 200% Bonus
- Bilt Platinum members 200% Bonus
- April 2025
- Bilt Blue members 50% Bonus to British Airways
- Bilt Silver members 60% Bonus British Airways
- Bilt Gold members 75% Bonus British Airways
- Bilt Platinum members 100% Bonus British Airways
- May 2025
- Bilt Blue members 25% Bonus
- Bilt Silver members 50% Bonus
- Bilt Gold members 75% Bonus
- Bilt Platinum members 100% Bonus
- June 2025
- Up to 200% bonus to Accor
- July 2025
- Platinum: 100% redemption bonus
- Gold: 75% redemption bonus
- Silver: 50% redemption bonus
- Blue: 25% redemption bonus
- Available across 125+ brands including Macy’s, Ulta, Instacart, Uber, Nordstrom, Nordstrom Rack, and more
- Bonus applied July 1 only, 12:00 AM ET – 11:59 PM PT
- August 2025
- Blue: 20% bonus to Avianca Lifemiles
- Silver: 40% bonus to Avianca Lifemiles
- Gold: 60% bonus to Avianca Lifemiles
- Platinum: 100% bonus to Avianca Lifemiles
- September 2025
- Up to 100% Bonus to Virgin
- October 2025
- Amazon and Rent Credit Bonuses
- Blue: 20% bonus
- Silver: 30% bonus
- Gold: 40% bonus
- Platinum: 50% bonus
- Amazon and Rent Credit Bonuses
- Novemeber 2025
- Up to 100% bonus to Etihad
- December 2025
- Up to 100% bonus to BA, Aer Lingus, Iberia
Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed or approved by any of these entities.
Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card
Welcome Offer
Earn 75,000 bonus points after you spend $5,000 on purchases in the first 3 months from account opening
Annual Fee
$95
Points Earned
Transferrable Chase Ultimate Rewards
- 5x on all travel purchased through Chase Travel℠
- 3x on dining, including eligible delivery services for takeout & dining out
- 3x on select streaming services
- 3x on online grocery purchases
- (excluding Target, Walmart and wholesale clubs)
- $50 Annual Chase Travel Hotel Credit via Chase Travel℠
- The begins immediately for new cardmembers and after your account anniversary for existing cardmembers
- 2x on all other travel
- 10% Anniversary Points Boost
- each account anniversary you’ll earn bonus points equal to 10% of your total purchases made the previous year
- Points are transferrable to 14 Ultimate Rewards partners
- No foreign transaction fees
- Suite of Travel and Purchase Coverage
- Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver is my favorite
- Complimentary DashPass which unlocks $0 delivery fees & lower service fees for a min. of one year when you activate by 12/31/27. Plus, a $10 promo each month on non-restaurant orders
- $95 Annual Fee
We keep an up to date spreadsheet that lists the best ever offers: You can find that spreadsheet here.
Historically 80k is a very, very good offer and hit in both 2022 and 2023. In 2021, we saw the offer hit an all time high of 100k. Who knows if that will ever come back.
Main Cast:
Cards that earn flexible points and should be used on the bulk of your purchases.
Supporting Cast:
Cards that earn fixed points in the currency of the airline/hotel and can not be transferred at attractive rates. These cards yield benefits that make it worth keeping, but not necessarily worth putting a lot of your everyday spend on.
The Chase Sapphire Preferred® is exceptional starter card and offers transferrable Ultimate Rewards, and pairs well with other Chase cards.
If you carry this card alongside Chase’s cashback cards like the Chase Freedom Flex® and Chase Freedom Unlimited® or the business versions: Ink Business Cash® , Ink Business Unlimited® you can combine the points into Preferred account and transfer into hotel and airline partners
Annual fee is quite low at $95 a year + you get a 10% anniversary bonus on points + $50 hotel credit in Chase travel.
The responses below are not provided or commissioned by the bank advertiser. Responses have not been reviewed, approved, or otherwise endorsed by the bank advertiser. It is not the bank advertiser's responsibility to ensure all posts and/or questions are answered.