Tag Archives for bilt.
There are some situations where getting one card precludes you from getting something else, whether it’s the best deal on a mortgage (usually not an issue, but always best to be safe before applying) or another credit card. When there’s a tradeoff you have to consider which choice delivers more value to you.
Bilt Rewards, the program that lets you earn transferable points paying rent, turns two. And each month they offer rich promotions the first of the month for ‘Rent Day’. This month you can instant win 100,000 Bilt points or points for Virgin or Emirates business class roundtrips for two, on top of points for trivia and double points on card spend.
Bilt Rewards May 1st ‘Rent Day’ promotions includes a 100% bonus on points transfers to Air France KLM Flying Blue. Before Bilt ran a 100% bonus to Hawaiian Airlines there had never been a double points transfer bonus to an airline where points already transferred one-to-one. And now they’ve done it again.
And they’ve coordinated with Flying Blue to make May’s discounted ‘promo awards’ especially lucrative from North America. I haven’t seen such a great set of award discounts from Flying Blue in years.
Bilt Rewards has introduced Bilt Dining where you’ll automatically earn 5 points per dollar spent at participating restaurants when you pay using any credit card that you’ve added to your Bilt Wallet in the Bilt Rewards mobile app.
You may be familiar with the dining programs of airlines and hotel programs, run through third party Rewards Network. This is a different program, being built from the ground up with restaurants that in many cases are quite good – that you’ll actually want to eat at – rather than just being financially-strapped restaurants that need Rewards Network funding.
If you want Hyatt status, you normally have to earn it from scratch. They don’t offer the same kinds of shortcuts that Hilton and Marriott do. Except for the next 5 days. Hyatt is offering 90 days of free mid-tier Explorist status and a fast track to achieve Globalist through February 2025.
Banks are spending billions of dollars to gain access to customers, and to convince those customers to run their spend through the bank’s products. However this strategy is difficult.
It can be a more fruitful strategy to fish for customers in new ponds. And we’ve seen a lot of that. Chase used to see small portfolios and feel they wouldn’t move the needle enough. Now they’re doing DoorDash, Instacart, and Air Canada Aeroplan’s U.S. co-brand.
Bilt Rewards has introduced a new partnership with Lyft. All Bilt members can now earn 2 points per dollar spent with Lyft by linking their account. Bilt credit card members separately earn 5 points per dollar on Lyft spend. So you can earn 7 Bilt points per dollar spent with Lyft.
This is highly valuable to me personally. It makes the Bilt Mastercard the most lucrative card for Amazon spend (more valuable than the 5% back Amazon Visa because I value Bilt points at a minimum of 1.7 cents apiece) and the most lucrative for food delivery as well.
But I’m most interested in the strategy because of what these spending categories have in common.
For February 1 Bilt is offering their staple double points, up to 6 points per dollar spent, on their Bilt Mastercard. They’re also giving away free points and free tickets to Hawaii (plus paying rent for some program members). And they’re offering an unprecedented 100% transfer bonus to Hawaiian Airlines HawaiianMiles, putting free tickets, upgrades, and partner awards within reach.
Bilt Rewards now has free Point.me award searches right inside its app. That way you can see where your Bilt points can take you – either ‘paying with points’ at 1.25 cents apiece, or transferring their points to an airline partner.
Gary Leff is one of the foremost experts in the field of miles, points, and frequent business travel -- a topic he has covered since 2002.
Co-founder of frequent flyer community InsideFlyer.com, emcee of the Freddie Awards, and named one of the "World's Top Travel Experts" by Conde' Nast Traveler (2010-Present) Gary has been a guest on most major news media, profiled in several top print publications, and published broadly on the topic of consumer loyalty. More About Gary »
