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Buy United Miles with an 85% Bonus or 2.03 cents per mile

United is currently promoting their miles with a 85% bonus, which prices miles at 2.03 cents a piece. This sale ends on in a couple week on Feb 27th, 2020 so if you’re interested, you have a week to take advantage. Lemme also be clear…if you don’t have a need for the miles, I wouldn’t speculatively buy them. But, if you’re short, or you’re currently planning a trip and could use the flexibility of having a bulkier account, this is the good deal ( the best is a 100% bonus. Let’s take a look at the current sale which yields a 85% bonus on every mile you buy over 30k miles.

Why would you want to buy miles?

The first reason may be that you just need to shore up an account to get the number of miles you need for a booking you have in mind. This could be a great way to offset part of your travel cost.

Buying miles can also represent a huge savings over the retail price of many flights. This isn’t always the case however, and you should crunch the numbers and double check availability prior to buying. But if the avail is there, and the retail cost is high, it could be a great deal. For instance…with a deal like the current one, you could effectively purchase roundtrip business class to Europe on one of United’s partners for about $2800. Not a bad deal at all, but certainly not a screaming deal.

It may also be the case that you’re populating your account with Chase Ultimate Rewards, and you don’t have enough, or wish to use them elsewhere at a higher valuation than 2.03 cents.

You can buy a max of 175k miles. This includes the bonus.

The offer is tiered with the 85% bonus given on purchases over 30k miles = 2.03c per point.

Buy 5k miles get a 40% bonus
Buy 30k+ get a 85% bonus

If you purchase the maximum miles ( per account) you’ll end up paying 2.03 cents a mile.

Note…if you’re looking to fly multiple people, each account could purchase miles to reach your goal. The 175k is capped per account number and bonus miles count toward that max

Terms and conditions:

Promotional offer valid until 11:59 p.m. CT on February 27, 2020.
Bonus miles count toward the 175,000-mile annual limit per account.
You may purchase up to 175,000 miles per account per calendar year.
Bonus miles will generally be credited to the recipient’s MileagePlus account when the transaction is complete; provided that certain transactions may take up to 48 hours.
Bonuses will be calculated on a per transaction basis only.
The bonus amount applicable to a transaction is shown in the chart.
Transactions may not be aggregated to calculate the bonus.
The credit card used in the transaction will be billed immediately upon purchase.
Mileage rates and other fees and offer terms are subject to change.
Miles purchased are nonrefundable.
Purchased miles do not count toward MileagePlus Premier® status.
All MileagePlus Program rules and terms and conditions apply.
GST/HST is charged to Canadian residents.
Powered by Points to purchase United MileagePlus miles. Transaction will appear as ‘Points United Miles’.
Pricing is only available for purchases made through buymiles.mileageplus.com
For give miles transactions the recipient will receive the bonus miles

One fantastic use is flying from the States to South America.

United prices these flights at 60k each way, or roughly $1200 if you were to buy the points needed. I got really lucky and was able to fly on a 777-200 that had been retrofit with United’s new premiere product, Polaris. It’s head and shoulders above anything else United offers ( Barring their old first class which Elites occasionally have access to in business class ). You can read that review here.