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Over the past couple of years, when someone would ask me for advice on hotel credit cards, I would almost unequivocally say that one shouldn’t get a hotel credit card to use it (for spend outside of the chain anyway), but rather just for its welcome bonus…with the addendum that some hotel cards are worth keeping long-term for ongoing benefits (like an annual free night, status, etc). Reflecting on that, I’ve personally gathered too many hotel credit cards for their ongoing benefits, and I need to thin the herd. I’ve decided that the Marriott and SPG cards have got to go. Here’s why.
Current portfolio needs thinning
I’ll admit that I have become a bit of a pack rat when it comes to hotel credit cards. As noted above, the time has come for a purge. At the moment, between my wife and I, we have the following hotel credit cards:
Marriott Rewards Premier Credit Card (x2)
Starwood Preferred Guest Business Card (x2)
Starwood Preferred Guest Credit Card (consumer version)
Ritz-Carlton Rewards Visa Infinite
Hilton Honors Aspire (x2)
Hilton Honors Ascend
Radisson Rewards Premier
Wyndham Rewards
IHG Rewards Club Select
As you can see, we need to do something about that situation as that represents far too much to pay out in annual fees. Maybe I could justify each card on a case-by-case basis, but I definitely can’t justify the collective whole by any stretch.
Why the Marriott-heavy collection?
The main reason for sitting so Marriott-heavy at the moment was in order to find out what would happen with all of these credit cards as the programs merged. Last March, long before we knew what the new program would look like, Greg wrote about the fact that there could be hidden opportunities in having a number of the cards (See: Investing in change: Marriott / SPG / Ritz new program opportunities). We held on to the collection above in order to see what might be in store.
At this point, we know a lot about how the credit card landscape is shaping up (See our Marriott SPG Ritz Transition guide for full details). Assuming we upgraded our Marriott Rewards Premier cards to the Premier Plus versions, we would end up with five annual free night certificates good at hotels that charge up to 35,000 points per night between our two Marriott cards and three SPG cards. That would come at a total cost of $475 in annual fees over those five cards (not including the Ritz card).
That doesn’t seem like an altogether bad price for 5 hotel nights. It started to sound even better when I started looking at some of the properties where those certificates will be valid as per the new award chart. As Greg noted in his analysis, there are 1,126 properties in the 35K category alone (out of 6,341 costing 35K or fewer points).
Many of the 35K properties are in destinations where I can imagine room rates eclipsing $95 per night. Further, there are enough hotels in locations closer to home — including New York City and other cities where I commonly travel — that I know I could come out ahead versus the cash cost of paying for a room. Heck, part of me is tempted to keep a couple of these for a free weekend in New York City every year. But I’m not going to keep my Marriott/SPG portfolio of cards for three reasons.
Reason #1 for axing my Marriott cards: Free isn’t free
Marriott charges resort and destination fees on award stays. Hilton and Hyatt do not. IHG charges those fees sometimes (and other times they do not). Resort / destination fees can vary from $25-$50 per night (or even reach higher in some locations). That’s before taxes are added to those fees. What’s more, while Hyatt waives parking fees for Globalist members, Marriott does not waive parking fees for elite members. That “free” weekend in New York City would become not-so-free pretty fast.
While free parking isn’t a common elite benefit with most chains, the tacky fee for choosing a Marriott hotel is something they could easily eliminate. I categorically hate these “resort” and “destination” fees and the fact that hotels are not required to include them in the price of the room. It bothers me all the more when they take away from the joy of free.
Reason #2 for axing my Marriott cards: Top tier elite status is harder with Marriott
I enjoy having hotel status. It’s definitely not something I need — my wife and I traveled for years without even knowing what hotel status was. But I’ve come to enjoy a nice hotel breakfast, occasional room upgrade, theoretically better service, etc. Top-tier elite status with Hilton is easy: pay $450 per year for the Hilton Honors Aspire card, get top-tier Diamond status as one of the many benefits of the card. Top-tier status with Hyatt is now easier to achieve as I previously laid out in our post about the new World of Hyatt Credit Card. Even if you don’t have top-tier elite status with Hyatt, it is easy enough to borrow it (See: How to get top-tier Hyatt elite benefits without status).
The new Marriott program will have three “Platinum” levels: Platinum Elite (50 nights), Platinum Premier Elite 75 (75 nights), and Platinum Premier Elite 100 (100 nights + $20K spend). Even considering the 15 shortcuts to Marriott Platinum Elite status, I’m never going to reach Platinum Premier Elite 100 because I’ll never spend $20K with Marriott hotels. The highest I can hope for is Marriott Platinum Premier 75. Subtracting the 15 nights of elite credit I would get next year with one of the credit cards (since that’s the max you’ll get no matter how many of the credit cards you hold starting next year), I’d need 60 nights to reach Platinum 75K. That’s not going to happen for me, either.
And so the highest I can hope for is 50-night Platinum status. After 15 nights of elite credit from any of the credit cards, I’ll need another 35 nights to get that status. This isn’t an unreasonable number for me if I dedicated all of my stays to Marriott.
However, I’m unlikely to do that because of….
Reason #3 for axing my Marriott cards: It will be harder to collect additional free nights
After the programs merge in August, it will be harder to collect Marriott points from credit card spend. This is because the SPG cards will go from earning an effective 3x Marriott points everywhere to just 2x everywhere. That means it will require $17,500 in spend on one of those cards in order to earn one additional 35K night (to go with my certificates above). If I instead spent that $17,500 on a no-fee 2% cash back card, I’d earn $350 cash back. Trading $350 cash back for 1 free night at a 35K property isn’t a good value proposition in most instances.
Since Marriott is also transfer partners with Chase Ultimate Rewards, I could alternatively use cards like the Chase Ink Cash or Ink Business Preferred or the CSR to generate points in bonus categories that are greater than 2x. But here’s the thing: Greg did a comprehensive analysis of the amount of spend required to earn free nights with Marriott, Hyatt, and Hilton (based on the new Marriott chart) — see: Manufacturing free nights (Hyatt, Hilton, Marriott). Under almost every condition Greg considered — from unbonused spend to grocery store spend to office supply store spend and more — Marriott required more spend to generate low category free nights, “average” free nights, and top-tier free nights when compared against either Hyatt or Hilton. And that’s without considering Marriott’s resort and destination fees tacked on.
In fact, if you look at that post on manufacturing free nights and do some math considering the options for MS in the various categories, it will likely become apparent that one could MS free nights in “average” Hyatt and Hilton properties for less than the $95 annual fee on the Marriott cards.
The bottom line is that it won’t make much sense to manufacture free Marriott nights as compared to free Hyatt or Hilton nights — which makes that chase for elite status all the more elusive as I definitely won’t pay for 35 nights out of pocket.
But I’m still going to spend my way to new Marriott Platinum status
All that said, I am going to qualify for the “new” Marriott Platinum (50-night status) for 2019 via the Ritz-Carlton credit card. I recently realized that I had done about $4,600 in spend on the card earlier this calendar year and I had about $3,000 in upcoming legitimate expenses that could easily be paid with my Ritz card (before August). That leaves me somewhere around $2400 short of reaching the $10K annual spend for Ritz Gold status, which will convert to new Marriott Platinum status in August. I’ve decided that since I can be that close without much effort or huge opportunity cost, I’ll meet that additional spend this year in order to get 1 year of new Platinum status (i.e. free breakfast / lounge access at many — though certainly not all — Marriott properties). My Ritz card will then follow the other SPG and Marriott cards out the door when its fee posts later this year unless there is some incredible unexpected new benefit announced on that card next month.
With the potential huge win in Marriott Travel Packages and the incredible opportunities with the SPG off-the-charts properties come August, I do intend to make a couple of stays at Marriott properties next year. Particularly considering a 7-night stay certificate, having Platinum status and therefore scoring free breakfast / lounge access for a week could certainly come in handy.
That said, I don’t see myself continuing on with Marriott beyond 2019 since Hilton and Hyatt make elite status much simpler and I can manufacture free nights with those chains more cheaply.
Bottom line
Hotel credit cards can certainly be worth keeping for ongoing benefits like an annual free night if you know you’ll put that free night to good use and for outsized value. That said, I just don’t see myself continuing on with Marriott after 2019 considering how easy it is to procure status with Hyatt and Hilton. Further, Marriott’s free nights aren’t really free if you end up at one of the many properties where they now charge a resort or destination fee, further reducing my interest in the program versus the alternatives. I’ll enjoy a year of Platinum status and burn a 7-night certificate and (hopefully) some nights at top-tier former SPG properties next year, but as the fees post on my Marriott and SPG cards, they will drop out of my wallet in favor of cheaper free nights and easier elite status. Glancing back at my stable of hotel credit cards, they probably won’t be the only ones riding off into the sunset this year.
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[…] with an $85 annual fee that now comes with a free night worth up to 25K points. Ironically, after talking about cancelling all of our Marriott and SPG cards, I’m second-guessing the decision. With both of us having Platinum status post-merger (mine […]
[…] week, I wrote about plans to dump all of my Marriot and SPG credit cards (See: Sending the Marriott and SPG cards off into the sunset). This morning, in my post about why I think there is no hurry to sign up for the Marriott Premier […]
Nick, is it still the case with Chase that you can’t PC among hotel cards? Thx
“Among”? To my knowledge, you’ve always been abloe to PC among hotel cards (assuming they issue more than one in the brand you’re trying to change, which has historically only been Marriott). You can’t PC from one hotel brand to another or from any co-brand to Ultimate Rewards or vice versa.
So, in a nutshell: you can PC from Marriott to Ritz or vice-versa or to some other Marriott cards. See:
https://frequentmiler.com/2018/01/08/secret-marriott-cards-get/
So should be possible, then, to PC from the Marriott card to the RC card before August for the sole purpose of Plat status thru 2.20?
Theoretically, yes….and no. Complicated answer.
First, I should have mentioned that your PC options aren’t guaranteed. I believe with Chase the PC options can vary a bit from one customer to another. In other words, you might have upgrade/downgrade options available on your account that aren’t on mine. But yes, it should theoretically be possible to upgrade.
However, if you are in the first year of your Marriott card, I think they will not allow you to upgrade it — something to do with the way they interpret the CARD Act and not increasing your annual fee in the first year (you’d run into the same trying to upgrade a CSP to a CSR during year 1).
And then the “no” that’s a “not exactly” but “sorta yes” 🙂 — I don’t expect you’ll get status automatically that way. I imagine Chase views the 1st year Gold status as a new application benefit. I’d expect that you would have to spend $10K before August to get current (50-night) Gold status to pick up Platinum through 2.20. Otherwise, you’ll only get new Gold with the Ritz card.
I should note that Marriott has been coy on the exact start date of the combined program. They were saying August 1st for a long time, but then they shifted to “in August” – implying that it won’t be August 1st exactly. However, the announcement on the Ritz card leads me to strongly assume that the program merger will happen before August 26th. So you need to pick up current Gold status before then — but since we don’t know if it’ll be August 1st or August 3rd or August 12th or August 25th, you should do your spend this month.
Hmmm,…thinking am gonna try to PC with a sock-drawer-Marriott card I have had over a year but not complete the 10k spend & see what happens. When folks PC’d from the CSP to the CSR, they kept all the benefits of the new card app other than the extra 50k URs, of course. Same with PC’ing from AMEX HH Ascend to Aspire. still gave Diamond status. Even the new Chase Hyatt card keeps all the benefits (although a 2k point bonus is actually also added on that).
Worth a try for me, at least, compared to spending $75k or stacking multiple elite credits from new AF cards! Thank you for the info & your clear thinking as always. You offer real value to your readers.
Totally different situations. None of the other benefits you are citing are first year benefits — those are ongoing benefits.
You’ll for sure get all of the ongoing benefits of the Ritz card right away with a product change (three club upgrade certificates, $300 travel credit, $100 Visa Infinite Discount Air discount when booking 2 or more tickets, etc) just like a product change to the Aspire gets the ongoing benefit of Diamond status or a product change to the CSR gets the ongoing benefit of the $300 travel credit. A product change is a product change — you get all of the built-in card benefits of the new card you changed to (including spending bonus categories, Priority Pass membership, etc).
But the first-year Gold status is not an ongoing benefit — it’s a new cardholder benefit. The ongoing benefit is (I believe) Silver status, which is what I suspect you’ll get. (On August 26th, that’ll become “new” Gold — so I expect you’ll get Gold then, but that’ll be too late for the Platinum status transition).
I would put the odds at 98% that you would not get a 1st-year-only benefit through a product change. The CSR, Aspire, and Hyatt card don’t even have any first-year-only benefits that I can think of — the benefits you’re talking about are ongoing benefits you get every year. Essentially, they are part of the product in the same way that the steering wheel is part of your car — if you buy a Subaru, whether you buy it new or used, you get a steering wheel. And because it’s a Subaru and all-wheel drive is (I think) a standard feature on all Subarus, you get all-wheel drive — it’s just part of the way that product is built. By contrast, free Sirius XM service for the first year on a new car is just a first-year benefit used to attract you to buy the car — you won’t get a free year when you buy it used in the future (OK, OK — I know that certified used cars might come with an XM trial and I have no idea if Subarus come with this benefit — hopefully, you see my analogy in the difference between Sirius XM and your steering wheel). Gold status is like Sirius XM — you get a trial for free in year 1, but then you have to “pay” for it in future years (through $10K spend on the card before the transition). I don’t think you’ll get the new car deal through a product change. Starting August 26th, Gold status will become a standard feature like the steering wheel — but at that point, Gold status will be 25-night status, so it won’t matter. Think of Gold today as being Sirius XM and new Gold being AM radio. It’ll be a standard feature on August 26th, but it’s a paid upgrade when you don’t buy the vehicle new. In this case, buying the vehicle new is like applying for the card as a new member rather than PC-ing.
For your sake, I hope that I’m wrong — and I haven’t done it myself, so it’s not impossible — but if I were a bettin’ man….and I’ve been known to lay a wager….I wouldn’t bet on getting Gold status from a PC. I’m fairly confident that you’ll either need to apply new OR PC and do $10K spend.
However, if you try it out, I’d love to hear what happens — win, lose, or draw.
Ok, will do. Just seems to me that since Gold status in the first year has always been a feature of this card that Chase can’t come back 8.1 after the status transition & tell me they really meant Silver, not Gold, after they just charged me a huge AF!
Regardless, I appreciate the explanation & iit certainly makes sense, too. Since Chase doesn’t allow PCs by SM anymore I have to wait til after work to try Step 1! Thx again
Well, by that logic, 2 free nights have always been a feature of this card in year 1…..with a new card application and meeting the minimum spend. You don’t get new signup bonus features without applying for the card anew.
It’ll come down to whether or not they view free Gold status as part of the signup bonus. Since Gold status *without spend* is a temporary feature, I’ll be surprised if that’s not considered a new account benefit just for new signups like the signup bonus. The ongoing benefit (as of 7/11/18) is Gold with $10K spend (though that of course changes 8/26/18). Here’s a better example: if you product change to a card that has historically waived the annual fee in year 1, you won’t get your annual fee waived after product changing to it. That’s a benefit when you open a new account, not when you product change (regardless of the fact that it’s always been waived for accounts the first year).
That said, I’d love to be wrong and I’m now extra curious about how this works out for you — because if it does in fact work, that would be a huge way to easily get status without a new account. Do you currently have Gold status with Marriott? I’m hoping you don’t so you can tell us whether or not your account changes to Gold status after your upgrade. I’ve heard it takes about a week for Gold status to be reflected after opening the card. That will leave people with just enough time to follow in your footsteps if it works….and your name would become the stuff of legend. I truly am rooting for you.
Chase will not upgrade my old Marriott card to the RC card. My hubs then tried on his (same) old card but also nuthin’ doin.
We both have 800+ credit scores with long-term banking & cc relationships with them (& otherr banks) so i feel this has less to do with our borrowing practices and rather more about their lending ones. Then again who knows these days with ever-evolving policies. I tried extracting more info as to whattttt? But you know how that goes some, no most, times with phone reps.
Anyways still think it’s an idea worth pursuing by others & why not? Nothing to lose. And if they actually do for somebody, like I wish they’d done for us, I would raise bloody he#* in August if I wasn’t then Plat.
BTW I am currently lifetime M Gold thru my SPG timeshare. But like my 2 SPG cc, also only maps in Aug as Gold. Back to Hilton Diamond for me I guess…
[…] I wrote about getting rid of my Marriott and SPG cards despite the annual free night award (See: Sending the Marriott and SPG cards off into the sunset). A couple of reasons why the annual free night award doesn’t appeal to me are that the free […]
I’d love a post on FM regarding the evaluation of actual spend on the AMEX SPG cards. I’ve been spending about $300k/year on my SPG Biz card, and have been loving all the SPG points. But with the 33% earning reduction in August, I’m unsure how to best earn SPG/Marriott points moving forward. It would be great to have Nick or Greg do an evaluation of where/if to move AMEX SPG spend to.
As fate would have it, Greg did just such a post back in April:
https://frequentmiler.com/2018/04/20/spending-for-miles-best-spg-alternatives/
Note that post won’t tell you about how to earn Marriott points, but rather your best alternatives in place of the SPG card for earning miles. If you want to earn Marriott points, it would at first seem that a Chase Ultimate Rewards strategy is probably your best bet — but since Marriott points are only worth about 0.78 cents each, I can’t even recommend that. You’re better off either collecting Ultimate Rewards (in 5x / 3x / 2x categories) and using them through the Chase portal for 1.5c in value per point to book your hotels OR just collecting cash back. The best bonus categories on the vvrious Marriott cards (apart from Marriott hotel spend) earn less than 3% in value towards hotels based on the valuation of Marriott points. You’d be better offf getting a Discover IT Miles (effective 3% the first year) or Alliant Cashback Visa (3% back the first year, then 2.5%) and using your cash back to pay for your hotel rooms…and earn points while you’re doing it.
Of course you guys did 🙂 Love it. And thanks also for the follow up regarding hotel points. I loved earning SPG points both for miles (via travel packages) and for aspirational SPG hotel stays, and it sounds like both of those will not be worth it anymore. So sad.
I was already splitting my spend between Chase UR cards (Ink+FU+Reserve) and Amex SPG, but will now probably just have to go all-in on UR.
Looks like if one has/gets the two existing SPG Amex cards (personal and biz), the new premium SPG card, and the two new Chase cards (personal and biz), one would get certs good for 5 free nights for a net total of $530 in annual fees. Four of the certs would be worth 35,000 points each; the fifth 50,000 points – total 190,000 points – equivalent to $95,000 in un-bonused credit card spend. (Admittedly the certs are not as flexible as points, and one would need to have the anniversary dates on the 5 cards line up fairly closely to be able to – for example – use them once a year for 5 nights in Manhattan.)
I received an email from the Marriott credit card saying that the annual night was only good for points up to 25,000. 🙁
“Beginning August 1, 2018, the Free Night Award you receive every year after account anniversary, will be valid for a one-night hotel stay at a property with a redemption level up to 25,000 points. This replaces the category 1-5 certificate you previously earned each account anniversary.”
I thought it was 35,000.
The Premier Plus gets a night up to 35,000. You would have to upgrade to the new version of the card.
OK. Thanks! What about the SPG AMEX cards?
Those get 35K certs. If you click the link in the post to the Marriott SPG Ritz Transition Guide, I linked directly to the section of the guide about the credit cards.
Actually, looks like maybe the free night cert info isn’t in there……it should be……anyway, 35K on the SPG personal and SPG biz.
Which will probably reset anniversary date to get the night if Chase follows their normal pattern.
Well, don’t I feel silly?!
We have 7 Marriott/SPG cards, 2 IHG, 4 Radisson, and still have 5 Hilton’s (we had 9 at conversion). We got rid of our Wyndham cards after the first year and our Hyatt cards a couple of years ago (although I just applied for the new hyatt card again!).
We will likely continue cancelling Hilton cards (other than at least one aspire) as fees come due because we can’t justify spending $15K for a free night, but might keep the marriotts. We travel as a family of 6 most of the time so we need at least two and sometimes three rooms, so the marriotts actually give us a critical mass of free nights to use for the whole family. Still haven’t decided though.
Thanks, Nick, for the unique perspective, which I quite agree.
Even axing Marriott/SPG cards, you still have many other hotel cards. Which one would you keep for long term compared to the rest? I currently have Amex HIlton Ascend, Chase IHG and Club Carlson (called Radisson rewards now) card, and have been debating which one to cancel. Many cards have been changing their benefits, I would like to get your updated opinion.
Also, for those who don’t need or can’t easily get the top-tier status, which card gives you the easiest path to get/earn middle level elite? For me, I define “middle leve” as “free breakfast” and hopefully lounge access. From your wording, it looks like Amex Ascend? Have few chances to try Hyatt (due to limited locations).
Great points, Nick! Has Marriott stated if they will continue to let us upgrade certificates (esp. from credit cards or travel package) by paying 5k points per category per night? This might be the deciding point for me since I see good value in point upgrades. Booking a 2BR villa at a cat. 8 MVC resort for 7 nights during next ski season by paying an extra 160k points plus a 7-nt cat. 5 cert. got us $3k in value.
recently stayed at a Kimpton with the free cert. They charged me the RESORT FEE – which I thought was only valid if one took advantage of their valet parking – which I did not… as I thought it was a PARKING FEE. I chose to park across the street (Not difficult). I called to complain after I had already left and they removed it and refunded my CC. It was like $35….
Their booking page did / does not mention the fee. I only learned about it from calling earlier, but again I thought it was just a PARKING FEE.
These fees are ridiculous. Personally…I would pay extra to have a room with NO Wi-FI RADIATION though. But…none of the rooms are like that as far as I know.
These resort fees are so ridiculous…
I’m definitely canceling my Chase Marriott Biz card – $99 annual fee for Cat 5 anniversary night (up to 25k). It’s not worth it unless they refund the annual fee difference and somehow up the anniversary night for us who have already paid the annual fee or who will pay it before the release of the Chase Biz card that only has $95 annual fee. Come August 1, there will be one hotel in Hawaii that this free night can be used.
As for our SPG cards, I’m not sure yet since we won’t get our anniversary until next year and who knows what Marriott will do with their categories by then. If they go by what they’ve done in the past, then the anniversary night could end up useless in a lot of major cities in the US. We might just cancel anyway to free up more slots for other Amex cards. I know there will be a lot of hotels in Hawaii I can use this for, but a lot of them also are Courtyards and charge resort fees. Paying $95 annual fee for a hotel plus ~$30 in resort fees is just not worth it sometimes. for these hotels.
Hey Nick–Can you please tell me what Marriott status level my Amex Platinum will get me after August 1st?
Gold.
I’ve got 3–SPG Biz, Chase Personal and Biz–mainly to stock up points on the transition and to help get to 50 nights for Plat in 2019. Since their anniversary dates are in December, January, and May I’ll turn off two of the three after I get the certs and keep Marriott Biz for some MS on the 4x gas category.
Turning off the SPG Biz also means a free Amex slot, which is not insignificant.
Nick (and Bob) , can you verify or refute what Bob is proposing? The 5 nite category 7 for 270K? Is this the 5 nite packages that were only given to vacation club members?
Bob is right. People have been reporting success booking them over the past week. That’s not to say that you’ll definitely be successful, but it might be worth a shot. Here’s the pricing info:
https://frequentmiler.com/2016/01/14/marriott-5-night-travel-packages-exist-but-theyre-secret/
I can alo verify this with posts on this and other blogs. Sometimes it is taking up to 5 calls, but I got my 2 cat 7 5-nite packages on the first call by calling at 8 am yesterday (holidays and weekend calls seem to have had greater success).
Did you call the same number as the regular TP redemption? Or a different number for the vacation club?
I did not know they opened on July 4th holiday.
TIA
I called the regular number. Greg has a recent article out on how to navigate the phone tree. Others have used the Vacation Club number successfully, but they are not open on holidays or weekends, apparently. I tried calling the Vacation Club number first yesterday and got a “we are closed” automated message. I then called the regular number and got immediate success. Call was over in less than 10 minutes.
Here is the guide Bob mentioned below:
https://frequentmiler.com/2018/06/26/navigating-marriotts-phone-prompts-to-book-a-travel-package/