February 28, 2016

Picking the Right Credit Card for Hotel Stays

When you have 20+ credit cards, you want to use them like a swiss army knife.  Co-branded hotel credit cards can often provide lucrative spending bonuses so it makes sense to pay attention to which card you're using to pay for hotel stays and incidentals.  Throw in an international stay and you've got an even more complicated situation due to foreign transaction fees (you'll want to avoid these at all costs).

If I'm working on minimum spend towards a credit card sign-up bonuses, I'll use the card for a hotel stay regardless of the return.  Assume you're working towards a 50,000 point bonus (average these days) for $3,000 in spent.  You're effectively receding a bonus of nearly 20 points per dollar so unless you have massive spending ability, it makes sense to knock the minimum spend out first.

Beyond that, I'll look to the co-branded card (assuming I have one) of the hotel chain I'm staying with.  If it's an international stay, the card must also have no foreign transaction fees.



If I don't have the co-brand card or it's a card that doesn't offer no foreign transaction fees (I think the only holdouts at this point are some Hilton cards) then I'm looking to my Citi Prestige Card which offers 3x Citi Thank You points on hotel stays.

For my upcoming trip to London, Abu Dhabi, and NYC, I'll be staying at two Hyatt properties and one Marriott property.  I happen to hold both co-branded cards issues by Chase.  Both cards offer bonuses for hotel stays.

The Chase Hyatt Credit Card offers no foreign transaction fees as well as 3x bonus points on Hyatt hotel spend.

3x earnings on Hyatt spend

Beyond that, the card provides a bump to Hyatt Gold Passport Platinum status which provides another 15% bonus on the 5x points HGP offers for Hyatt stays.

15% bonus for Hyatt Platinum's

So all in, I'm earning 8.75 Hyatt Gold Passport points per dollar including 3.75 points from the credit card.

The Chase Marriott Visa card offers no foreign transaction fees and 5x points per dollar spent at Marriott properties around the world.  I'm a Marriott Silver member meaning I earn 10x base points, a 20% bonus for being Silver, and 5x points for spend on the co-branded credit card.  Meaning I'm earning a total of 17x points per dollar spent with 5 points coming from the credit card.

Chase Marriott Rewards Credit Card

5 of our 7 nights are paid for on points.  1 night is a cash and points reservation and the final night is a cash rate.  I'm looking at about $350 in Hyatt spend plus incidentals at all three properties.  Let's assume we spend $250 at the New York Edition and $400 in incidentals at the Hyatt properties in London and Abu Dhabi.  This is an extreme example but makes the math easy (total of $1,000 in spend).

For the Hyatt spend, I would earn roughly (depending on taxes) 6,500 Hyatt Gold Passport points which I value around $130.  For the Marriott spend, I would earn 4,250 Marriott Rewards points which I value around $40.  All in, that's a nearly 17% return on the $1,000 in spend.

It pays to think about which card to use for a hotel stay especially when traveling internationally.

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