50% off Rio hotel: How buying Hilton points saved me over $600 during Carnival

Attending Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, has been on my bucket list since I first visited the country more than a decade ago. So, while planning a three-month trip through South America earlier this year, I wondered if this would finally be the year I could make it happen.

I expected it would be very expensive to attend official events and book a hotel stay in the city during Carnival. However, I was optimistic that I could leverage my credit card rewards to help cut costs. Luckily, I'm happy to report I made my dream trip happen for a reasonable price — here's how I did it.

Related: United award sale: Fly to Latin America for as low as 9,000 miles

How I secured a discounted Carnival ticket

Carnival has both official and unofficial events. You can attend "blocos" (street parties) for free. But I wanted to go to the Sambadrome, as I'd been wowed by the images and videos of the processions.

I missed out on the first round of tickets that went on sale in August, but secured one in November at a higher price of $148, including fees, through a third-party reseller during a 30% off Black Friday sale. That seemed like a reasonable amount to pay for this experience.

Then came the step of figuring out where to stay and comparing my booking options.

Award hotel options in Brazil

As you may imagine, cash prices for hotels and vacation rentals were quite high during these dates, especially in the popular neighborhoods of Copacabana, Ipanema and Leblon.

I wanted to leverage my hotel elite status for free breakfast and potentially snag a room upgrade. However, I was unable to find any high-value redemptions or affordable cash options with Hyatt, IHG or Marriott.

But I did find hotel award availability with a property that had been part of the Hilton portfolio for a year. The Tapestry Collection's Yoo2 Rio de Janeiro is conveniently located in Botafogo (between Copacabana and downtown, where the Sambadrome is). And it was priced at a reasonable 40,000 Hilton points per night.

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With complimentary Hilton Diamond elite status that comes with the Hilton Honors American Express Aspire Card, I would get free breakfast for two (covering my friend and me) as well as the chance at a room upgrade (which we didn't get because the hotel was full).

However, my Hilton Honors balance was zero, given that I adopt the approach of earning points and using them as soon as possible, since loyalty programs are prone to devaluations. Besides, life is short.

Though I had some American Express Membership Rewards points in my account, which transfer to Hilton Honors at a 1:2 rate — even when they run a transfer bonus — the conversion rate is so low that it almost never makes sense. So, I decided to look into buying points instead.

Should I pay cash or redeem Hilton points?

Using cash:

A five-night stay at this hotel was retailing for about $1,778 (or 10,325 Brazilian reais).

I would've used my Hilton Aspire card to pay the cash rate, earning me a total of 60,452 Hilton Honors points. To break it down, I receive 10 base points per dollar spent when booking a hotel within the Hilton portfolio, plus 10 bonus points for every dollar spent because of my Diamond elite status, plus an additional 14 points per dollar spent for purchasing a room at a Hilton hotel on my Aspire card. Therefore, I'd earn 34 points per dollar spent on this hotel stay.

According to TPG's April 2025 valuations, these points would be worth $363, giving me an effective 20% return on my purchase. So the effective cost of a cash stay would drop from $1,778 to $1,415, taking into account the points earned.

Related: Which credit card should you use for Hilton stays?

Buying Hilton points:

Alternatively, I could buy points for this Hilton redemption. I had a hunch this would work out advantageously for me, but I needed to do the math to make sure it made sense.

The hotel was priced at 40,000 Hilton points per night, which would make the cost of a five-night stay 200,000 points.

However, if you have at least Silver elite status with the hotel loyalty program — which Hilton Amex cobranded cardmembers do — you get your fifth night free on award redemptions. So, that means I'd only have to pay for four nights for my five-night stay, paying 160,000 points instead of 200,000 points.

Hilton Honors frequently offers buy points promotions, during which they offer a bonus or discount when purchasing points. Luckily, Hilton was running a promotion at the time I had purchased my Carnival ticket, offering points at the ideal cost of 0.5 cents per point.

Buying 160,000 points at 0.5 cents each would cost me $800, less than half of the $1,778 cash rate.

I decided to go this route and used my Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card — my go-to card for everyday spending — to purchase the points. This would earn me 1,600 Capital One miles, worth $30, according to our April 2025 valuations. That reduced the effective cost of buying the points required for this redemption to $770.

Related: When does it make sense to buy points and miles?

Bottom line

By leveraging the power of buying points, I was able to save over $600 on the cost of a five-night hotel stay in Rio during Carnival.

While my first calculations showed 55% in savings, it was important for me to calculate the value of the points I'd earn if I had booked with cash. When I factored the earnings through both methods, the savings went down to 46%, which is still a great deal.

And I decided to put half of those savings ($320) toward another thing I had on my bucket list — going skydiving for the first time, on my last day in Rio.

These two experiences — Carnival and skydiving — made my week in Rio one of the best travel experiences I've ever had — and it was all thanks to buying Hilton points.