New IHG PointBreaks list coming on Monday

Loyalty Lobby reports that a new IHG PointBreaks list will be live for booking on Monday, April 30, 2018 for bookings between April 30 – July 31, 2018. One Mile at a Time reports that the promotion will go live at 12pm Eastern time on Monday. There are said to be 170 properties on the list, and you can see a small preview of properties at Loyalty Lobby and One Mile at a Time, though we do not yet know which hotels will cost 5K, 10K, or 15K points per night.

The Deal

• New IHG PointBreaks list will go live on Monday, April 30th, 2018 at 12pm Eastern for bookings from April 30 to July 31, 2018
• Direct link to PointBreaks page (currently only showing properties available for booking until April 30th)

Key Terms

• Bookings begin Monday, April 30th at 12pm Eastern
• Maximum of 2 bookings per property (though you can book multiple nights — just a max of 2 separate bookings)
• Should stack with 4th night free on award stays with the IHG Rewards Club Premier or IHG Rewards Club Traveler cards

Quick Thoughts

As you probably remember, IHG revamped their IHG PointBreaks list earlier this year and shook things up with a new structure. For years, all PointBreaks properties were 5,000 IHG Rewards Club points per night. Since it is often possible to buy points for around 0.5 cents each, these properties would effectively cost just $25 or so per night. As a result, the quality of the list had mostly moved toward the lower end of IHG properties and/or locations off the beaten path (with some gems now and then). The plus side was the reliable value of properties for just 5,000 points per night.

The new list now distributes properties in different categories — 5,000 points per night, 10,000 points per night, or 15,000 points per night. Depending on your perspective, there are pluses and negatives. We covered this change as well as the positives and negatives back in January (See: The New IHG PointBreaks Promotion: The Good, The Bad & The Ugly). In a nutshell, there were many fewer 5,000-point properties on the first PointBreaks list after this change. On the flip side, there were some nicer and better-located properties for 10K and 15K. Love it or hate it, this is the new reality of PointBreaks.

IHG says that there will be 170 properties on the list that comes out on Monday. They have only released a short list of properties that will be available with no indication as to pricing (see the Loyalty Lobby and One Mile at a Time posts if you’re curious). As soon as a full list is released, we will post it.

While One Mile at a Time reports that the list will go live at 12pm Eastern on Monday, IHG PointBreaks have historically started at unpredictable times on the morning of the first booking day (often sometime between 8am and 12pm). I’ve also often noticed that individual hotels reflect the pricing before the official promotion page is updated, so if you see a hotel that interests you I recommend pulling it up and refreshing throughout the morning on Monday to catch it as soon as it goes live (though perhaps this time they will go live at exactly noon — we don’t know).

With this list covering the popular summer travel period, it will be interesting to see the breakdown of properties, locations, and most importantly point prices. Remember that if you have one of the new IHG credit cards, the 4th night is free on award stays, so you should be able to book 4 nights for the price of 3, making PointBreaks an even better deal.

H/T: Loyalty Lobby & One Mile at a Time

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