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Last chance to get up to an 80% bonus when buying Marriott, Hyatt, IHG points

JT Genter
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JT Genter is a digital nomad who travels full-time.
Oct. 18, 2019
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5 min read
King room Manchester Grand Hyatt
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Update: Some offers mentioned below are no longer available. View the current offers here.

Today, Oct. 18 is your last chance to take advantage of three different hotel buy-points promotions from Marriott, Hyatt and IHG. If you've been considering one or more of these promotions, consider this a final reminder to look into whether or not these make sense for you to utilize.

We're just going to provide a quick overview of these three promotions below. Click through to our full articles on each of these for tips about how you can generate these points for free through credit cards or transferable partners.

Marriott Bonvoy

This is just the second buy-points promotion that Marriott has offered since launching the Bonvoy program. So, it's worth considering this one closely as you may not have an opportunity to buy Marriott points with a bonus for a while.

This promotion offers the full 30% discount when buying as little as 2,000 points, making it great for topping off your account for an award. Members can buy up to 100,000 Marriott points per year — which you can do for $438 by purchasing two transactions of 50,000 Marriott points each.

Although the purchase price is more than TPG's valuation of Marriott Bonvoy points, there's still plenty of value to be had from redemptions if you know where to look or can book a fifth-night-free award.

Verdict: Good deal for the right redemption.

World of Hyatt

While a 40% bonus doesn't sound noteworthy, this bonus effectively drops the purchase rate to almost match TPG's valuation of Hyatt points. That means this promotion is definitely worth considering. Here are some of the ways to get great value out of your Hyatt points:

You'll need to buy at least 10,000 Hyatt points to get the bonus. The standard limit for buying Hyatt points is 55,000 points per year, but Hyatt is doubling that to a 110,000-point maximum for those buying points through this promotion.

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Verdict: Great offer that's worth digging into how you can maximize it.

IHG Rewards

IHG has often offers a 100% bonus on buying points, but this promotion is only offering an 80% bonus. While it's not the best-ever offer, there's no telling when the next 100% bonus promotion will be offered. So, if you have an immediate-use high-value redemption, it makes sense to take advantage of this offer.

Although the 80% bonus is offered when you buy as few as 7,000 points, you'll want to buy at least 26,000 points in order to get the lowest purchase rate. When maxed out, you can buy 180,000 IHG points for $1,000.

Remember that IHG Rewards Premier Credit Card cardholders can stretch their IHG Rewards points further by booking fourth-night-free awards. There are no blackout dates on this perk and IHG Rewards charges the same amount of points throughout the year. So, you can book a fourth-night-free award in Times Square for New Years Eve for a cost of 210,000 points for four nights.

Verdict: Good deal if you have an immediate use. Otherwise, wait for 100% bonus.

Which credit card to use

Each of these buy-points purchases are processed by Points.com, so the purchase won’t code as travel. That means that you won’t earn bonus points from cards such as the Chase Sapphire Reserve or the Ink Business Preferred Credit Card (which previously earned bonus points).

So you should put the purchase on the best card for your situation — whether that's a card that you're trying to hit a minimum spend on, a spending threshold or the card with the biggest return on non-bonus spending.

Three of those to consider are the The Blue Business®️ Plus Credit Card from American Express (2x Membership Rewards points on the first $50,000 per calendar year — a 4% return — then 1x after), Chase Freedom Unlimited (1.5% cash back on purchases/1.5 Ultimate Rewards points, 3% return), Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card (2x miles on all purchases, which can be redeemed for 2% cash back or 2.8 cents of value toward transfer partners).

If you have the Bank of America® Customized Cash Rewards credit card and have chosen online purchases as your category, you can get at least 3% cash back on these purchases (on the first $2,500 in combined choice/category purchases each quarter; then 1%). If you have significant assets with Bank of America and affiliates, you can get up to 5.25% cash back on these purchases.

Editorial disclaimer: Opinions expressed here are the author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, airline or hotel chain, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities.