We Bought A Million IHG Points
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- Опубліковано 12 вер 2024
- The title says it all. We talk about how to optimize purchasing and spending reward points with IHG Hotels.
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Thanks for the info. I suggest that when you're talking about numbers put up a visual slide. Nothing complex but numbers are better understood when you see them vs. when you just hear them.
Thanks for the tip!
Probably the biggest benefit of booking with points it that they are fully refundable. Most hotels now the best rate in dollars is non-refundable. You have to pay $20-30 more per night for a refundable rate but points books are fully refundable usually up to one day before checking in. The main downside for IHG is that they don’t publish rate tables to it is really hard to find when the deals/rates are best and most of US and EU if you can find below 20K points per night you are lucky or going to be having to travel the worst time of the year.
Absolutely. Plans change, so booking refundable is almost a necessity. It is tough to find low redemption rates in the US/EU, but the bargains are still to be had elsewhere! We recently booked in Malaysia and Japan for 10,000 points most nights. We also found 14k nights in Panama City.
Good video! I locked into IHG last year with a 185,000 SUB! Su-weet! Question for you - Are you planning your travels to only go where IHG has locations? We want to go to Vietnam but they have 2 hotels at the beach and that is it...which stinks.
Great job getting the 185k! We aren't locked onto any one brand... we will stay wherever we get the best deal overall, and that includes some amazing VRBO deals in South America. In parallel with IHG, we are working status using credit cards from Hilton, Wyndham, and Choice Hotels. Hyatt was being poopy and wouldn't give us a card, but we'll try again next year because their loyalty program is really good.
@@thepodojilsIt probably wasn’t Hyatt but Chase who thinks you’ve opened too many cards in the last 24 months.
Wow 1,000,000 ihg points! Thats crazy! What is your card set up and what kind of cards do you guys have?! Right now I carry Amex Plat, Amex Gold, Amex Delta Plat, Chase trifecta and just got IHG 5 night free nights!
We have cards for IHG (actually two), Wyndham, and Choice Hotels - all gave us Platinum status and sweet initial spend bonuses. Also a Hilton branded AMEX Platinum to get all those perks. Now, to spend all those points! Where's our globe...?
congrats. retiring next year in june. got the amex gold which you should get to redeem for airfare stuff and IHG (multiple card ) for the stays. will get the amex platinum for airport lounges etc... your plan is solid, looking forward to seeing your journey! subscribed and liked!
Pretty sure you pay resort fees on award stays at IHG (and Marriott) properties, but not at Hilton or Hyatt.
That's what I understand, too
That does indeed look to be the case at their Iberostar and Six Senses branded resorts. We don't have any experience with resorts, so we can't comment on how much those fees might be. But if we get hit with extra fees at any hotels, we will post an update!
It's very limited but can happen. The main thing is avoiding the tourist taxes which I generally do avoid.
@@Travelstrategist When you've run into these, could you see the fees at booking, or was it a gotcha at check-in? We've heard some rumblings about surprise VATs in some places...
@thepodojils the IHG hotels sometimes have a $5-10 "amenity fee" on points reservations which is manageable. You can see this on the search results page so its not a surprise. However, I recently stayed in Athens, GR at the Intercon where the VAT was 13% on paid nights. This is why I typically avoid the paid nights unless its a very low rate. The math almost always checks out to buy points and avoid that alltogether.
Hell ya, good work.
This whole credit card thing works if you pay the bill in full at the end of the month, because I don't see where the benefit is if you have 25 percent interest.
YES! We should have mentioned that. Actually, these cards are currently closer to 30% interest, so DO NOT CARRY BALANCES!!!
💯 And to add to your point. With Charge cards like American Express, you're expected to pay off the card at the end of the month. They have started allowing you to hold a small amount, but they set you up on a payment plan.
But the benefits are great IF you are going to travel a lot. Or wanted to and want to save money when you do. .
You just live your life through it They reimburse you for this and that. 30 off my insurance bill. Free Walmart plus. Pay 30 every month on Hulu.
Very interesting, and very different to anything I had ever known about credit until about 3 years ago . Anyway.. good point
Are you staying at IHG or in its counterpart hotel like Holiday Inn (HI) ? I checked IHG in Jakarta, Indonesia asked for 30k per night but yes HI asked for lower points around 10k but checking HI original price is below $50 so using points is more expensive.
We don't have any brand loyalty. We go with whoever is giving us the best deal in each location. And sometimes the cash rate is better. But if you get the credit card you'll get every fourth night free when you use points, so factor that in. Cheers and happy travels!
I just looked at Panama City, Panama over the next several months and didn't see any nights for 10,000 points. What am I missing? And even at the cost of points being $.005/point when.I calculate cash vs. points (I checked a few hotels in a few places), there seemed to be no savings or nominal savings. It would be great if you showed a specific example.
We try not to reveal our specific travel itinerary until after we have completed our travel (for safety reasons), but here goes: When we booked the Holiday Inn Panama Distrito Financiero six months out, the points rate was 14,000 per night with every fourth night free, bringing the average cost to 10,800 points or $54 with purchased points. (we actually used the free points from the credit card offer for this stay) The cash rate with taxes and fees was $82.24. It's a little bit higher to book now, at 15,166 pts/night.
One thing to be careful of is holding a bunch of points and then they announce a devaluation. Which they will at some point.
Try to book a reasonable amount of stays well in advance.
What is the math to determine how much you're paying for each point on the BOGO from IHG?
Pretty simple, actually. Points are one cent each, so BOGO is $0.005. It's a bit trickier for the less than BOGO offers throughout the year. Generally, since it's total cost divided by the number of points you get, it's (price per point * number of points)/(points paid for + bonus points). For example, a hundred thousand points at an 80% bonus would be ($0.01*100,000)/(100,000+80,000) = $0.0056
How do you start from zero if you want to accrue hotel rewards?
We started this spring with no hotel points! If you are in the USA, the fastest way is to spend the $100 or so to get a credit card for the hotel chain you prefer and do the initial spend (usually $3000 in the first 90 days) to get the reward offer. There's a link for IHG in the description. After that, just use it for everyday purchases and watch the points add up! You get a really good multiplier for using the card at that hotel chain. Depending on the hotel chain, you may also have opportunities to purchase points for future use.
Nice video
My head hurts! 😮
I can attest that it's all real!
You can’t purchase that many points. It even shows that in the rules. Not sure how this transaction even went through
It was a limited time offer where they increased the limit to 250k points max. Generally, the limit is 150k.
You purchase 250,000 and get 250,000. They each have an IHG account so they ended up with 1,000,000.