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Buy Marriott Points
We have seen all sorts of deals this year when it comes to buying points throughout the pandemic. Marriott has a deal, which if used strategically, could be quite advantageous for future travel. I’m a big fan of purchasing any kind of point as long as you have a redemption in mind, and can save money by doing so. With that said, Marriott has put forth a very good offer until November 8th which increases the normal total from 100k to 150k Marriott Points.
Remember that Marriott uses dynamic pricing so rates will heavily fluctuate from night to night.
In the past we’ve seen a 30% discount as well as a 40 to 50% bonus so keep that in mind when assessing the value of this offer.
Buy Marriott points with a 40% bonus
Normally I’m not a huge advocate of purchasing Marriott points because they traditionally limit the maximum per year to just 50k. Besides shoring up for an award night, there isn’t a lot of potential for arbitrage. Earlier this year, Marriott increased that max to 100k not including any bonus. With this offer, you could accumulate 210k Marriott Bonvoy points for $1875, or a $0.00893 a point.
What’s the cheapest price am I paying per point: $0.00893 per point
This opens up a lot of potential in my mind to seize some great opportunities on high priced properties around the world. Particularly when you hit them during off peak and the point pricing is low comparative to the cash value.
You can transfer between Marriott accounts
You can read all about it here, but this is the long and short
- If your account has activity in it…it has to be at least 30 days old to send or receive
- If there is no activity it has to be at least 90 days old
- You can TRANSFER a max of 100k points
- you can RECEIVE a max of 500k points
Where could this make sense?
An African Safari
I just returned from an incredible stay at the JW Marriott Masai Mara where my buddy and I used between 106k and 112k points per night. The cash rate was nearly $3000 per night, so that is an incredible deal if you were able to buy points to make this redemption possible. We did it for 3 nights and while we could have definitely stayed longer, we felt it was plenty of time and even managed to squeeze
Here is March 2024 in calendar modes
If we look at the 3 nights starting April 4th. It’s around 120k per night, a big higher than what we paid, but you’re getting $9k of value out of them.
If you wanted to buy those points you’d need to do it in a couple of different accounts, maxing one deal with 210k, and then adding in the other 150k from two other accounts. In aggregate, you’d spend $3250 for a 3 night safari vs $9100. Pretty darn good deal.
Couple of things to remember
- You need to have had a Marriott account for 30 days with activity
- If you have no activity…90 days
- It can take up to 7 days for the points to populate…
Overall
Certainly you need to crunch the numbers and make sure it works FOR YOU. But if you have that special redemption in mind this could be a way to make it work for much, much less.
Go here to Buy
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
60k Points after $4k spend in 3 months
Annual Fee
$95
Points Earned
Transferrable Chase Ultimate Rewards
- 60k points after $4k spend in 3 months
- Worth $750 in Chase Travel℠ and way more if you maximize transfer partners
- 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 Bonus
- Every year you keep the card, your total spend will yield a 10% points bonus. If you spend $10k in a year, you’ll get 1k bonus points
- Chase Sapphire Preferred continues to redeem at 1.25c in the Chase Travel℠ and the slew of other benefits remain in tact including Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver ( primary ), purchase protections, etc.
- Points are transferrable to 14 Ultimate Rewards partners
- Redeem in Chase Travel℠ for 1.25 cents per point
- No foreign transaction fees
- Suite of Travel and Purchase Coverage
- Auto Rental Collision Damage Waiver is my favorite
- Get complimentary access to DashPass which unlocks $0 delivery fees and lower service fees for a minimum of one year when you activate by December 31, 2024
- $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.