5 Tips for Starwood SPG Points

Starwood is one of the most versatile programs in terms of redemptions and yet there’s only one credit card that does earning for SPG. The large options for redemptions from airlines to 2,000 point a night hotels, vs the limited and slow earning options makes SPG points some of the most valuable points in the game.

Earlier I did kind of a joke post on “best use of SPG points” where I just show people how to transfer from SPG points to miles. Not a very helpful post, and usually I’m the only one who finds my humor funny… But it’s also half a good point.

In reality you’re going to get way more “value” out of 20,000 points going to a roundtrip flight, or a flight to Europe than you will from one stinking night at a hotel. At least in terms of cash saved, you can surely find a hotel in whatever town it is that would be cheaper than the flight in whatever route you’ll be flying.

Yet, I would be lying if I said I haven’t enjoyed great category 1 & 2 redemptions all over the world. The thing is that SPG has great low category redemptions that rival the value of transferring to miles.

1) Wait for the 30k bonus

The SPG card has consistently come around for short periods of time offering 30k, instead of the normal 25k bonus. It may not sound like a lot of points, but when you consider how hard earning is with SPG and that Amex only gives out a bonus once per card, it makes a difference.

Luckily there is a business card as well, and luckily the annual fee is relatively inexpensive at $65 a year. I hate paying annual fees, but given the limited ways of earning SPG points, it is tempting to keep this card around.

2) Check out the Category 1 & 2 hotels

As I said, any time you redeem points for a hotel that costs 30,000 points, you’re forfeiting 35,000 miles with your favorite airline, like AA. 20,000 AA miles can get you a oneway to Europe 6 months out of the year. That’s nearly a roundtrip to Europe for the price of 1 night at a higher end hotel.

But on the bottom end, category 1 and 2 hotels range from 2,000 points to 4,000 points. Actually it works like this. Incredibly, these hotels can be a fraction of the cost of higher end hotels. And there are hotels above the top categories of 35,000 points a night. Many premium hotels like in Bora Bora or Santorini can be close to 100,000 points a night.

Check out the map of category 1 & 2 SPG hotels:

Or read Best Category 1 & 2 Starwood SPG hotels. In this post I list many of the stand out hotels and resorts that can be had for 2,000 – 4,000 points a night.

3) Redeem on Weekends if you can

So let me explain the prices of category 1 and 2 hotels.

During the week days:

• Category 1 hotels = 3,000 points
• Category 2 hotels = 4,000 points

During the weekend:

• Category 1 hotels = 2,000 points
• Category 2 hotels = 3,000 points

Obviously, much of the time you can’t really help when you need a hotel. Other times, it couldn’t possibly make a difference. Let’s say for example you have a week in Bali and for a couple of those days you wanted to take the ferry over to Lombok and stay at the Sheraton. If it doesn’t make any difference, might as well go over the weekend.

Now this may sound cheap, as you’ll only save 1,000 points a night. But you have to understand that I’m pretty skimpy on SPG points compared to almost any other hotel chain. So consider that the earnings are low, and when you’re talking about saving 1,000 points at the hotel in Lombok, that’s saving 1/3 of your points by staying on a weekend. If you were saving 1/3 of your points on a hotel chain playing with larger numbers, it would be way more obvious. Using 20,000 Marriott points instead of 30,000 Marriott points would totally be worth taking the ferry on a Saturday instead of a Wednesday.

4) Only MS if you have specific redemptions

The SPG card only earns 1 point per dollar, but when consider the value of the redemptions talked about above, it could be worth it for an uncategorized spend, like Simon Mall gift cards.

And again, considering that the lower category hotels are much cheaper than lower category redemptions at other chains, it’s actually not a bad deal.

Consider a 3,000 point redemption. This could be a cat 1 on a weekday, or a cat 2 on a weekend. 3,000 points would be 6 $500 gift cards that cost a little less than $3 a card (at Simon). In this very basic example that’s about $18 a night. But consider that we stayed at many ITC hotels in India for 3,000 points a night that would otherwise be over $100 a night.

However, if you don’t have plans of visiting a hotel that are a good value redemption, this could be an expensive way of earning points. If you’ll end up using points for a transfer to an airline, it may actually be a lot cheaper to use another card. And it may be cheaper to use another hotel chain, depending on the redemption. I don’t use the SPG card unless I have a plan.

5) Know that SPG has some of the ONLY transfers to some airlines

If you’ve seen my post on Using JAL miles with 7 Stopovers, then you’ve seen my disclaimers about JAL miles being hard to earn as SPG is the only credit card transfer. Seriously, SPG is the only transfer option to JAL, which probably has the most stopovers allowed, and some actually decent prices on certain routes.

Similarly, if you remember my Best Use of Air Berlin Miles, you might know 2 things. 1) 60,000 points could get you two roundtrips to Europe! This is because of the Airline Companion Tickets offered just from using JAL miles. And 2) SPG is the only transfer partner to Air Berlin.

I can go on and on, but basically all I’m saying is don’t use your SPG points lightly. Very rarely do I say “have a plan before earning”, but with SPG you could be passing up a one time opportunity that’s incredible.

Conclusion

I think you get the point: SPG points are awesome and yet hard to earn. If you see a redemption that is calling your name, plan ahead. Maybe you’re dying to go to Lombok, or maybe you’re wanting to use JAL miles or Air Berlin miles. Whatever it is that you would like to do with SPG points, know that your options are limited.

Of course, there are people who earn SPG the really hard way, via paid stays. These people perhaps have to be less picky, but for the rest of us, I recommend sticking to the advice above.