topic Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points? in Credit Cards

What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Time2letgo — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 16:12:48 GMT

I am relatively new to the HH program. What are the points worth and what is the best way to maximize them? In a recent stay at a Hilton, there was an incident that resulted in them offering me 200K points posted to my account.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

K-in-Boston — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 16:18:01 GMT

According to TPG, 0.6 cents each, so $1200 for 200k points. That's not a bad haul; I'm afraid to ask how bad that experience was. Transfer to airline partners is usually horrible value with Hilton, though, since the last time I checked it was still a 10:1 transfer ratio (meaning your 200k points would become 20k miles).

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 16:19:18 GMT

Not sure that I can give a $/pt value, but I stay at Hilton’s a few times a year. Decent room for four normally costs me between 40-45,000 pts. The 200k points for me would be worth at least $600 maybe?!
I’d LOVE to be offered 200k; sorry you had some trouble, but looks like they tried real hard to make up for it

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Peteyglad — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 16:20:30 GMT

I would say .6 cents each is a pretty good approximation. I have had a few stays were they have been worth more than 1 cent, but not many.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

adelphi_sky — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 16:21:04 GMT

@Time2letgo wrote:
I am relatively new to the HH program. What are the points worth and what is the best way to maximize them? In a recent stay at a Hilton, there was an incident that resulted in them offering me 200K points posted to my account.

That must have been some incident. That's like 2 free nights at a lot of hotels.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

K-in-Boston — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 16:28:14 GMT

Somewhat of a tangent, but I don't understand why the common valuation of 0.6 for Hilton and 0.9 for Marriott if 200k is only getting a couple of free nights. As of today, 200k Marriott points is enough for 12 nights at a Tier 1 Ritz-Carlton with a PointsSaver, or 40+ nights in a Category 1.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

wasCB14 — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 16:29:12 GMT

I paid $145 (tax included) nearly three years ago (no status from Amex Platinum then) for a basic room at a 70k HH property. As an award room, it would have worked out to 0.207 cpp. So that's an example of a low-ish value.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Time2letgo — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 17:39:36 GMT

Thanks all for your responses

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 17:49:58 GMT

I would just keep them where they are for when you need them. No need to transfer them anywhere.

200k is for sure a nice gift!!

I'm still waiting for my Ameriprise to post 5k MRs they owe me for a bad experience as well

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 19:28:22 GMT

There's a simple explaination for this. HH points are worthless unless you have 100,000 or more at a time.

They aren't worthwhile like Hyatt points where you can get a quality room for 12,000 points/night. You'd be lucky to find a decent property at 45,000 a night with Hilton.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

SouthJamaica — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 20:41:43 GMT

@Time2letgo wrote:
I am relatively new to the HH program. What are the points worth and what is the best way to maximize them? In a recent stay at a Hilton, there was an incident that resulted in them offering me 200K points posted to my account.

I think I figured they were worth less than half a cent each

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Fri, 27 Apr 2018 22:04:03 GMT

It really depends on you. If you don't have any Hilton Honors properties that you want to stay at then they aren't really worth anything short of a transfer or some gift cards, though I would peg the bottom end at $400 which is the conversion of 500 points to $1 on Amazon. Conversely, if you have status they can be worth 5 nights at a 50k point hotel or even 10 nights at a 25k hotel using the fifth night free perk. I just took a look through my account with what is nearby and there is a Hampton that normally books at $130 a night for 25k. That's over $1300 worth of out of pocket cost and kind of a middle-ground. If you can find a place that you're interested in and use the Points & Money Rewards then there's the possibility that you can get upwards of around/over a 1 cpp return depending on the property.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

NRB525 — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 02:22:12 GMT

@Time2letgo wrote:
I am relatively new to the HH program. What are the points worth and what is the best way to maximize them? In a recent stay at a Hilton, there was an incident that resulted in them offering me 200K points posted to my account.

Hilton points are not worth much, but a volume of them is worth something. Same with Delta miles.

The most important factor should be, are you using them to help pay for an experience you really want, or are you shopping places to stay to maximize point value? I would emphasize somewhere you do want to go first. If the point redemption turns out to be $0.002 per point, maybe consider paying with cash and continue to accumulate until you find a place you really want to stay for $0.004 or $0.005. Then just realize you accumulated a lot of low value points, etc them go, and enjoy the stay because you really want to be there.

If you are using credit card spend to accumulate points, then take the time to understand where your best return for that spend is, which could be a 2% Card, could be a travel card, and gather value to contribute toward your goal.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 02:33:54 GMT

The math teacher in me was really dying to say that scientific notation is involved, but I won’t. 🤐

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 04:30:55 GMT

Example Hilton hotels in Manhattan range from 70-159k a night. Yes1 night. So go figure So the 200k points seem worthless in NYC.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

wasCB14 — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 03:03:27 GMT

The Hilton point price isn't constant for a basic room at a given property. For example, the above HGINY/TSC is only 56k tonight for 1 Queen and 59k for 1 King.

During times of peak demand, point prices rise. It makes it harder to find occasions where using points is really appealing.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 12:51:45 GMT

I think it depends on where you are. I stayed at a Hilton Garden Inn in March in Ft. Myers, Fl and for a larger king room with sofa, it was 30000 pts. per nights. That was during Spring Training so I thought it was an ok rate (cash rate was $279 plus tax).

On the other hand, I'm staying in Portsmouth, NH in July at a Hilton Garden Inn. Same size room at 60000 pts per night (and they charge $28 for valet parking). Not much difference between the two hotels and cash rate here is $300/night. I've stayed here many times in the past and it's always about the same rate.

So, figure out where you want to go and check the different hotels in the area for rates.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Sat, 28 Apr 2018 15:25:15 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
Example Hilton hotels in Manhattan range from 70-159k a night. Yes1 night. So go figure So the 200k points seem worthless in NYC.

Unless you choose another night for the basis of the discussion. Here's tomorrow:

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

SouthJamaica — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 17:11:41 GMT

@Anonymous wrote:
@Anonymous wrote:
Example Hilton hotels in Manhattan range from 70-159k a night. Yes1 night. So go figure So the 200k points seem worthless in NYC.
Unless you choose another night for the basis of the discussion. Here's tomorrow:

I'm learning from this thread that the value of Hilton points varies from situation to situation. When I figured .46 cents a point, I was basing it on a particular night for a particular hotel. I was assuming that there was a more or less constant point to dollar ratio. I've learned here that there are times and places where a Hilton point can be worth almost a full penny, while there are other instances when it's almost worthless.

So I guess I have to treat them as being basically worthless, and then -- when I've accumulated a massive number of them -- I can look to see whether there's any point in using them towards a particular stay.

Re: What's the $$ Value of Hilton Honors Points?

Anonymous — Mon, 30 Apr 2018 19:01:35 GMT

K-in-Boston beat me to it, but here is a link to The Points Guy website for the April 2018 Monthly Valuations for most, if not all, of the hotels and airlines.

https://thepointsguy.com/guide/monthly-valuations/

Hilton is .6 cents and Marriott is 0.9 cents per point