The Bilt 2.0 rollout has taught me to question Bilt’s leadership more than ever. They promised a seamless transition to 2.0, but it was anything but. They launched their new cards before finalizing details about Bilt Cash. Then, in the face of negative publicity, they made the terrible spur-of-the-moment decision to add a confusing new option to Bilt 2.0’s already complicated rewards structure.
On the other hand, there’s no question in my mind that Bilt’s new cards can be extremely rewarding for those willing to navigate their complexity. The new cards make it possible to earn Bilt points at an unprecedented rate, and Bilt points remain the most valuable points around (thanks to having the best transfer partners and transfer bonuses). So… here’s the question… Given the many doubts about Bilt’s leadership, is there any reason to believe that Bilt points will continue to offer great value long term? I don’t want to invest heavily in the Bilt 2.0 ecosystem if there’s a significant risk of devaluation or, worse, collapse (as happened with Mesa).
I don’t think that a Bilt collapse is likely
Even with my doubts about Bilt’s leadership, I don’t think there’s a high risk of Bilt failing altogether. If Bilt were solely reliant on its credit card business, then I’d have serious concerns, but it’s not. My understanding is that around one quarter of all apartment rental offices in the United States use Bilt to collect rent payments. That’s a huge customer base in which Bilt apparently collects a small percentage of each transaction. Bilt provides rental offices with tools to help ensure on-time payments, and even to reward early payments. And renters like being rewarded for paying rent. It seems like a great business model to me. If my understanding of its business is correct, I believe Bilt can survive regardless of what happens to its credit card business.
Is it possible that Bilt’s poor leadership decisions will bleed over to the rental office market and wreak havoc there? Sure. Do I think it’s likely? No.
I don’t believe Bilt will willingly devalue points
Bilt has made several negative changes to its rewards program over time. For example, Bilt capped Rent Day double-point earnings at 1,000 points per month, down from 10,000. They also stopped offering points for certain types of purchases (such as tax payments). I can’t remember any examples, though, where Bilt reduced the value of its points. The closest thing to a devaluation I can think of is when Bilt lost American Airlines as a transfer partner. That wasn’t Bilt’s fault (I’m sure that AA pulled out of the agreement), but Bilt made up for it anyway by adding Alaska Airlines as a new transfer partner. Instead, over time, Bilt’s points have become more valuable by regularly adding new transfer partners and preserving 1-to-1 transfers to existing partners. For example, Bilt recently added Japan Airlines as a new 1-1 transfer partner. And, Bilt is now the only transferable points program to offer 1-1 transfers to Emirates (Amex, Citi, and Capital One now transfer to Emirates at less than 1-1, and Chase dropped Emirates altogether).
I’ve heard Bilt’s founder and CEO, Ankur Jain, speak proudly about how Bilt has the most valuable points around. Based on past experience, I believe he intends to keep it that way.
What if Bilt is sold?
I don’t know Ankur Jain’s long-term plans for Bilt, but it’s reasonable to expect he would be open to selling Bilt if the price were right. If that happened, what would happen to our Bilt points? I have no idea. However, I don’t think that it’s likely that Bilt would be sold and our points devalued before we had a chance to react. That is, once we learn about an acquisition, if we have reason to fear the new owner, I expect that we will have time to transfer our points to valuable transfer partners (Alaska, Hyatt, Flying Blue, United, etc.).
Conclusion
Given Bilt’s recent leadership lapses, it makes sense to distrust Bilt. Can you believe everything Bilt says? Nope. Can you count on Bilt 2.0’s reward structure to remain the same over time? Definitely not. Can you expect Bilt 2.0 to go smoothly from here on out? LOL. No. Given all of that distrust, it’s totally reasonable to give up on Bilt altogether. Many have (Here, Stephen Pepper does a good job of explaining why). But… some of us are extreme maximizers. We’re willing to put up with complexity and shifting sands to pursue the greatest value. Given what we know now about Bilt 2.0, I think that the value is there and, for me, it’s worth pursuing. And, I’m confident enough in the long-term value of Bilt points to be willing to put in the effort. Things will change, though. If/when Bilt 2.0 becomes less compelling, I’ll re-evaluate.
The above is not my recommendation to others. Most people don’t want complexity, instability, and risk. If that’s you, then forget about Bilt 2.0. There are plenty of other great options.
See also: My take on Bilt 2.0
Want to learn more about miles and points? Subscribe to email updates or check out our podcast on your favorite podcast platform.
I got the Palladium card based on the idea that as they’d discussed months ago, Hyatt stays through the portal would be elite qualifying. But no — instead, ONLY their version of FHR, “Home Away From Home”, is actually elite qualifying.
instead, you have a “The Edit” style set of credits which require 2 night stays to get elite benefits and qualifying nights at a small set of Virtuoso hotels; even fewer than The Edit, it seems. Or, a Delta Stays type of credit, and I already have way too many of those lying around.
I will almost certainly downgrade this card to an Obsidian after a year.
BILT IS A DISASTER!!!!! REPORT TO BBB (Better Business Bureau
After one small purchase, My new palladium card has been declined and same with Apple Pay and Google pay and using virtual card number. I’ve spent countless hours on w support- they are useless.
And the various promos (TPG etc) don’t work as they should apparently. See if you can get refunded.
I know of two financial reporters working on the story of this epic fail rollout.
Don’t like Bilt especially since it’s someone from another country that owns it sorry that rental company wants to deal with this way of making payments! Not a fan at all and I know it’s all about making money
Earn those welcome bonuses promptly and transfer to high value programs such as Hyatt, Alaska etc. ASAP.
I think there is another risk you haven’t addressed — what stops Chase from doing what Citi did to AA? Especially Chase and Hyatt is going to ‘deepen their partnership’. I am curious when BILT’s current agreement with Hyatt is up to renewal…
AS agreement is recent and BoA seems to be fine about it, so that should be safe in the foreseeable future.
^This. I’ve expressed the same concern before, and thank you for bringing it up again. Hyatt, United, Alaska, jetBlue, Marriott even, all at risk, because Amex, Chase, BofA, Barclays, can do as Citi already did. ‘Exclusivity’ for transfers is on the negotiating table.
I think when BoA absorbs Barclay’s portfolio, that’s when AS will be in play.
Could we at least get through 1 year, no, wait, 6 more months of the 3x Alaska on rent promotion? Like, I’d just like to complete the $60K spend towards the 100K certificate, then I can rest…
“ what stops Chase from doing what Citi did”
Nothing. Bilt is a company with no moat. No IP.
Just remember that Chase, Citi, etc. negotiate exclusive credit card transfer agreements with Hyatt, Alaska, etc. Bilt is not primarily a credit card company (it’s not even a bank). Bilt would probably argue that most of their business comes from members who are renters but don’t necessarily hold the Bilt CC. So Bilt can theoretically maintain these partnerships because it’s a rent/housing/neighborhood loyalty company, whereas Chase/Citi/Amex are credit card companies.
Yes, to a certain extent.
Alaska and Delta fight each other at Seattle for 10 years and Alaska can still have their LATAM partnership; the moment AS launches international, Delta pulled the rug away.
Citi has demonstrated that if they lean on AA hard enough, AA will drop Bilt, regardless of the theoretical loophole. So that argument only stands until the big boys start playing hard ball.
Alaska and Delta are both airlines. Bilt and Citi are not both banks.
And it’s possible that Citi’s new deal with AA resulted in dropping Bilt . Or it’s possible that AA just wanted more $$ for its miles than Bilt wanted to pay when they were negotiating extending their agreement. I’m pretty sure Bilt said publicly that they had a ~5-year agreement with AA and they weren’t extending the agreement. The timing of the end of the agreement and the AA/Citi deal could have been a coincidence.
That could be a coincidence, although I am more inclined that it is not.
Unlike Chase, Bilt doesn’t have a line in the sand saying 1:1 or bust. They already have 3:2 for Accor, so if AA asks for more they can simply change the transfer ratio. Better to have a transfer partner than not.
Citi also has no problem providing 1:1 transfer to AA, which says something about price for AA miles. Granted this is related to the amount of miles Citi commits to buy.
That’s a good point but IMO Bilt points would still be valuable without Hyatt especially if big transfer bonuses continue.
They’d still have value to me because of Alaska, but losing Hyatt would be a *significant* loss. If they lose Hyatt I’d have to reevaluate my spend.
Exactly. I don’t think of my Bilt points for Hyatt. Sure – the option is there. I’m using chase for Hyatt only. Bilt for everything else. Amex fills the gaps.
what stops this from happening is chase does not care enough about this for it to matter. case in point: they cant even get instant transfers to work when all the other banks have had this solved for years. theres no way they would pony up extra $$$ for exclusivity. they are a massive company and credit cards are a small part of their business. they are in “profit and chill” mode, unlike Citi/Bilt/etc. who are actually trying to win market share
After going back and forth a bunch of times, I ended up getting the Palladium card for the SUB, intending to cancel after a year. Since the card will give me Gold status for a year and I’ll likley not ever have status again, my plan is to transfer all my points out whenever there is a decent transfer bonus this year.
Unfortunately, Alaska and Air Canada are the only two partners that I would feel great about speculatively transferring to. (Well, and Hyatt but there will never be a transfer bonus to them.)
With so many people about to have Gold status from the Palladium, I’ve gotta think that the transfer bonuses at that level will not be as generous in the future. I also think that once people have Bilt cash, the cost of the buy-up to the next level transfer bonus will be higher than we saw with Accor.
The Bilt views its credit cards in the same way an NBA owner views the team. It’s a nice side project but they make their money doing other things.
Exactly, if Greg’s info is correct, BILT has a tremendous business model and a wide moat due to their customer base with rental property owners, 25% of this lucrative market, and I’m sure this percentage is growing daily.
BILT 1.0 was a loss leader to start up the rental property owner business, and BILT was smart enough to get Wells Fargo to fund it.
BILT 2.0 will definitely be more viable, and they really just need to break even or minimize their losses because they use the CCs to grow their rental property owner business.
Exactly. And if they can moderately influence consumer spending behavior, that’s even better. That’s not even considering the CC data that they gather as well. I think they will always stay 1:1 point transfers, but it would not shock me if they lose Hyatt in the next year or two. If Chase and Hyatt add other cards together, one is already confirmed. I think that would be a major blow to the currency.
How valuable would Bilt be without Hyatt? I pretty much only use Bilt for Hyatt at this point.
Hyatt is best for me too, but Alaska is a close second, and JAL is nice too.
I still have a lot of Atmos from my speculative transfer to HA airlines before they closed the Amex portal. I am sure I will rue the day I made this comment when they run out lol.
Me too with the Atmos points, but flying a family overseas in premium economy or business class can consume lotsa points!
FM posted about 50/75K AS points for J/F on AA from US-EZE earlier this year; epic redemption.
Just because it’s valuable TO YOU doesn’t mean it’s the only value to be had. Hyatt has an anemic international footprint, making it a big fat nothing for me.
Take. It. Back. Hyatt has wonderful properties overseas. Brand new Park Hyatts in E. Asia abound!
Nope. I have zero interest in going to E. Asia anyway. Hyatt isn’t even on my radar. If it’s on yours, great! But I was referring to the person who said that because it’s the only value to him, it’s categorically the only value. Period. Bilt could drop Hyatt tomorrow and I couldn’t give even the tiniest mouse dropping.
Wow, I thought I was the only person on the planet in this camp. Hyatt is also a non-starter for me. They can be removed and I wouldn’t like Bilt any less.
Hyatt and Alaska could go tomorrow and it wouldn’t matter to me at all. Oh noes, the card is worthless for everyone if it loses the one hotel brand I like to stay at!! Some people really do think their own personal preferences are everyone’s.
Wells Fargo was the second bank, not the first.
Wait till you hear airlines (in the USA at least) these days are basically just ‘banks with wings,’ who would much prefer you and they not ever even fly, because they make far more money off your everyday spending on their co-branded credit cards and selling points, which they control the value of. Completely unregulated. Kind of a ticking timebomb.
Very aware of that, it actually works well for me, and has for some time.
Likewise. May it last as long as possible.
The Mesa card was founded and run by the same people who put out the also defunct Paceline card. If any blogger had spent 30-60 seconds doing due diligence and informing their readership on that instead of pumping referral links maybe Mesa folding overnight wouldn’t have been so unexpected.
Which is why it’s refreshing when FM or DoC actually scrutinizes BILT, unlike the shills at TPG who are actively invested in it (major conflict of interest, regardless of disclosure or lackthereof.)
They “scrutinize” because of the wide backlash that they were seeing from consumers. It seems FM likes to try and fit with the image of agreeing with consumers to “help them find the best credit card” while basically acting as a used car salesman that will “help you find your perfect used car”. Look objectively at the posts written about bilt by Greg and nick especially….they are still pimping the cards hard even while “pretending” not to.
The rollout was botched and clunky but I think the palladium card has massive upside. I was not in the Bilt ecosystem at all and now I am. I want Bilt to last and if that means putting spend on the card so be it. 3.33x up to 75% of my mortgage payment – seriously? Done. ✅
I got burned by Mesa and barely got my points out. So hopefully Bilt has found a sustainable model. A lot of people complaining about the previous model that didn’t work are short sighted and greedy IMO. No free lunch folks.
Anyways, I’m stoked for the new card and can’t wait to start using mine on Feb 7.
I’m with you and love the 3.33X on up to 75%. Then there’s the 25K points available by using Bilt Cash to buy the points accelerator, five times per year. If that’s not enough, throw in an extra 1000 points per month (at least for the rest of 2026) by setting bills to pay on the first of each month for the rent day bonus. It’s a no brainer.
Thank you for at least referencing Mesa; I’d add Celtics (because Cardless is involved). There are a lot of points of failure here (Column Bank, Cardless, Fidem, and Bilt), and no real ‘big’ players, anymore. As I’ve said many times before, and as is objectively true, Wells Fargo was the sugar-daddy for 1.0. It’s now just VC money and vibes. So, earn ’em and burn ’em, fellas. Don’t hoard points. That said, while Ankur’s goons will claim I’m a hater, personally, I’d love for them to stick around, as long as possible, so we can keep milking whatever we can. Churn, baby, churn!
Let’s say that you get your wish and Bilt does stick around and you’re able to keep milking whatever you can. Very successfully. Are they still goons? Why the name-calling in the first place?
Every year, Bilt receives from corporate landlords four times the amount Bilt received from Wells Fargo. Bilt’s net income is over 1.5 times the amount Bilt received from Wells Fargo. So, even if the Wells Fargo money goes away, Bilt is still profitable. You spout about Bilt’s financial health based on an incorrect assumption that it lives on VC Cash infusions.
Tom, the ‘goons’ are the sycophants that ‘hunt’ in these comments sections for any naysayers, then try to discredit and shut them down. Based on the realities of the transition, the skepticism here is warranted. So, how much they payin’ these days, anyway? I do this for the love of the game, but, one hopes BILT pays well.
No, that’s not true. They wouldn’t have added a 3% (Bilt Cash) per-point cost for rent payments if that were the case.
The nerf in 2.0, along with the rocky and somewhat shady rollout, suggests that they may be reaching a financial bottleneck with their VC funding and are struggling to sustain their rewards program. As a result, they may need to restrict how people earn Bilt Rewards to make the system more sustainable in the long term. The 2.1 update appears to be an attempt to make peace with cardholders and encourage new applications. Remember, in order to maintain their valuation and raise more VC funding, they need a large number of Bilt users. That’s why they may be promoting claims such as “83% of cardholders requested a Bilt Card 2.0.”
Most importantly, based on what we have seen and heard over the past four weeks, the company’s actions raise concerns about transparency, which is a significant red flag for any business. Ultimately, many fintech companies struggle to maintain longevity.
You can say whatever you want about the profitability of Bilt’s rent processing business. There have been a lot of companies that have had profitable arms that have still folded because those profitable arms couldn’t keep holding up other unprofitable arms.
The fact of the mater is that the credit card side of Bilt 1.0 was only as successful as it was because of the hugely advantageous deal Bilt had with WF. This has given Bilt the advantage of some market momentum and some runway into this new card-offering launch, but if the new Cardless arrangement does not offer Bilt 2.0’s credit card business enough profitability to stand on its own, there’s a very real chance it could kill the company as a whole by dragging the processing arm of Bilt down with it.
If the leadership team at Bilt was smart, they’d spin their rent processing business off from their credit card business so that even if the card business fails, the card arm is easier to chop off and won’t kill the parent company. I’d be really surprised if we didn’t see some kind of corporate restructuring like this in the near future.
Any comments about Bilt’s profitability should be viewed with extreme skepticism. Additionally, Bilt has spent a ton of time the past year (post Wells Fargo revelations) explaining how little importance the credit card business was compared to everything else. Why then, did they feel the need to spend all this money and energy on the new credit card rollout? If they don’t really need the credit card business, as they said, then why bother? My point being, their actions do not match their words, lots of inconsistencies.
Having said that, Bilt can absolutely make this all work and I’m not personally worried in the short term.
Greg – I disagree with you on the premise of no devaluation. Bilt will not accord a 1:1 transfer from Rakuten after 5/15 for those with no elite status-that is truly a devaluation, maybe not of the points per se, but certainly of the program.
I think we agree there. There definitely have been devaluations to the program and probably will be many more in the future. My point was specifically about whether the points themselves will devalue. To me, that’s the key question to answer before investing in earning the points
Clearly, losing out on 1 point per dollar on rent after 5 transactions (the end of 1.0) is the real loss here, then the earlier 10,000 down to 1,000 cap on 2x Rent Day, and loss of AA transfers, etc., but, I just wanna say… RIP ‘Rent Day Trivia’… (I miss my free 250 points each month.)
I disagree – the reduced transfer ratio with no elite status was announced when Bilt added Rakuten as a partner. So Bilt effectively announced you could transfer 2:1 from Rakuten unless you had elite status or it were the first 6 months of the partnership. You could think of the no-status 1:1 transfers as a temporary transfer bonus.
A devaluation would have been Rakuten transferring 1:1 to Bilt for years before Bilt announced a drop in the transfer ratio.
Same story with Capital One adding transfers to Japan Airlines at a 2:1.5 ratio, with a temporary transfer bonus.
Those terms were on place at the time that Rakuten began allowing Bilt transfers — the was never a time where permanent 1:1 transfers were devalued. If a card offers 100,000 points for $10,000 initial spend. And then becomes a 2x earner, that’s not a devaluation from 10x to 2x.
In any event I think Greg is discussing whether points ALREADY in Bilt will be devalued by Bilt (they’ll definitely devalue on the post-transfer side) and his argument is not (mine would be that, if they start losing partners, that’s the time to worry). On the earning points side we know that Bilt had repeatedly added restrictions to eliminate any possibility of truly large earnings — expect that to continue.
Bilt 1.0 was clearly unsustainable from the start. Would Bilt 2.0 be sustainable as it’s currently structured? Highly doubtful. There will be devaluation, and significant devaluation, sooner than later.
I would have a lot more faith in Bilt, despite these issues with the new card roll-out, if they were using a more reputable card issuer. I am not at all surprised that there were issues with the Cardless roll-out. This had to be 10X the biggest rollout Cardless ever dealt with.
And, David, why do you think it is that they couldn’t convince a more reputable entity to be their new sugar daddy, I mean, ‘issuer’? Funny how Ankur’s sycophants kept reminding me on here and elsewhere that the great Ken Chenault (former Amex CEO) is on BILT’s board, yet, interestingly Amex isn’t their new issuer… Meanwhile, Amex be like… ‘new phone, who dis?’ And, why not a better bank, too? Had anyone really heard of ‘Column Bank’ before this? Fine, the Plaid guy (William Hockey) is behind it, so maybe he’s the new sugar daddy. More FinTech. AI. Hype. Not to mention, Fidem feels a bit too much like Synapse… beware.
During the FiTech hey-day and the X1 Card came out with 4X, did we take advantage of it while it lasted? After everything that US Bank had pulled and it came out with the Smartly Card, did we take advantage of it while it lasted? We knew they were not sustainable yet many took advantage of them. Yes, they would consume a 5/24 slot but we took them.
What Mesa taught us was to eliminate risk by regularly transferring points out. Sure, with Bilt, you might forego a juicy transfer bonus. But, that’s a chance you’ll have to take. That’s the price of safety. And, as reader wrote, if your target is Alaska or Hyatt or JAL, don’t expect a juicy transfer bonus. Like the AA Rent Day Bonus that everyone was saving up for but never came.
Earn the potential 3X and regularly transfer out and you’re good while it lasts.
Exactly! The Rent Day bonuses are for relatively unpopular transfer partner options. Think of it like a clearance sale—people tend to transfer to Alaska, Hyatt, and JAL, so those “run low on stock.” They have to create incentives to clear their inventory.
Another important point is that, unless you already have a need for those particular points or mileage programs, you shouldn’t transfer preemptively just because there is a promotion. You should only transfer if you actually have a use case for the points. Points and miles tend to devalue over the long term, so most Rent Day bonuses, in my opinion, are just a gimmick.
Yup, you nailed it. While transferable points are usually the most valuable when you leave them as transferable points until you pick a redemption option, I agree that the risk of a shut down or significant devaluation out of nowhere is too great to keep a large amount of Bilt points sitting in your account.
If Bilt sticks around for a few years and shows strong financials after this transition, I’ll change my tune, but I think there have been too many other rewards companies that have gone under or gotten significantly nerf’d.
Churn and burn these. They will be great until they won’t be. Don’t get left holding the bag
What is in the bag? *shit*
Bilt points are still the most valuable points ever created so how are that shit?
For a guy that claims he’s being “hunted” in FM’s content section, he does a lot of “replying on every non-negative post.” You can see his irritation plainly. He must have gotten burned somewhere on this.
Ah, so, now the hunter becomes the hunted… enjoy the chase! (I mean, Chase? No. Wait…)
I’ll never understand this ‘this guy comments a lot, therefore, he bad’ comment-section strategy. More is more. Say whatever you wanna say.
Tommy Boy, we all love them BILT pointies… we’d just’ve preferred to keep earning on rent them without paying fees. Alas, 1.0 is dead. Don’t worry, friend, we’re going to earn that 50K Palladium SUB and get them to Hyatt/Alaska ASAP.