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Beginning March 6 2018, many Marriott properties are changing categories (see: Huge Devaluation – Marriott Announces 2018 Category Changes). As a result, some of the best category 5 hotels will soon become category 6. When that happens, those hotels will no longer be bookable with free night certificates earned from the Marriott Rewards Premier or Marriott Rewards Premier Business credit cards. The story is the same for free category 1-5 nights earned from Marriott’s frequent Megabonus promotions. Luckily, it’s not (yet) too late: Book these category 5 Marriott hotels before March 6 2018.
On the other hand, on March 6 2018, 45 Marriott hotels will drop from category 6 to 5. At that point these hotels will suddenly become available for booking with free night certificates. The question is: are any of these worth visiting?
To answer that question, I used TripAdvisor to look up every hotel that will drop from category 6 to category 5. I recorded the TripAdvisor score and the best per-night rate that TripAdvisor could find for an arbitrary weekend (July 20-22). The idea is that the best new-to-category-5 hotels for using free night certificates will have high TripAdvisor scores, and high room rates so that we’ll feel like we’re getting good value from our free nights.
With that criteria in mind, below are the best category 6 hotels that will soon be category 5…
Worldwide
Here are the top not-in-the-US category 6 hotels that will soon be category 5. Personally I’m most intrigued with Hotel Nassau Breda, Autograph Collection in the Netherlands (you can read about it here)…
South Korea: Courtyard Seoul Namdaemun
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $136
Netherlands: Hotel Nassau Breda, Autograph Collection
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $146
Netherlands: The Hague Marriott Hotel
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $111
China: JW Marriott Hotel Shanghai at Tomorrow Square
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $185
Brazil: Residence Inn Rio de Janeiro Barra da Tijuca
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $102 (this one probably shouldn’t have made the list due to its low price, but then there’s that view…)
United States
Here are the top US category 6 hotels that will soon be category 5. A number of US properties offer good value for free nights (e.g. high ratings and high prices), but few look exciting. The most enticing of these, to me, are the Renaissance Baton Rouge Hotel and the Renaissance Charlotte SouthPark Hotel…
Residence Inn Kingston NY
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $339
Fairfield Inn Portland Maine Mall
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $249
SpringHill Suites New York LaGuardia Airport
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $239
Renaissance Baton Rouge Hotel
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $189
North Charleston Marriott
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $188
TownePlace Suites Nashville Airport
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $179
Residence Inn Lake Charles
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $163
Courtyard Sarasota University Park/Lakewood Ranch Area
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $152
SpringHill Suites Lake Charles Louisiana
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $152
Fairfield Inn & Suites Louisville East
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $141
Renaissance Charlotte SouthPark Hotel
- Trip Advisor Score: 4.5
- Avg Price July 20-22 2018: $119
All the Data
For the do-it-yourselfers, here’s the data I collected on all 45 hotels:
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I travel to Shanghai periodically, the JW Tomorrow Square is not worth the points even at Cat 5. It’s gotten old and dilapidated.
The Courtyard in Anaheim is within walking distance of Disneyland, so a Category 5 is a pretty good deal. Also, the other Courtyard in Anaheim just went to a Category 9! Granted, they’re very different hotels.
Just out of curiosity, when a hotel was changed to a lower category, does it mean a demotion to that particular hotel? How does the hotel category work?
The category determines the point price for booking a free night with points. When a hotel moves to a lower category it costs fewer points to book.
I got what you mean-lower category, less points required. I guess my question is: does the particular hotel care if the category changed? Like the hotel can get more reimbursement for award stay if the hotel moved from cat 5 to cat 6.
Oh, I see. Yes I’m sure they are reimbursed less so they probably do care.
Thanks for taking the time to put this data together… definitely confirms my suspicions that this was one of the worst Marriott devaluations in recent memory, especially when considering the lack of any noteworthy new category 5 properties in the US… the ones listed look quite unexceptional, to say the least. Good article!
Thanks. I don’t know that the US ones are any worse than before though!
It just seems like none of the new ones are in useful locations near any common vacation destinations… they may work for some people in some circumstances, but at least the old list had a few semi-aspirational (using the term very liberally here) properties that could actually be used as viable vacation destinations. The Residence Inn West Palm Beach Downtown is just one example and quickly comes to mind. I’ve stayed there a number of times, and I recall you mentioning it on your list of good cat 5 redemptions in the past. Wish there were more properties like this….