SPG and Marriott are essentially interchangeable brand names at this point. On Thursday, you can PC to SPG Luxury. Otherwise, there are no other product change possibilities. As for benefits, your card still earns 6 Marriott points when staying at Starriott-Carlton properties (2 points for other purchases), and also now comes with an annual free night certificate up to 35,000 points. The certificate alone should easily outweigh the annual fee.
Retention offer: You call stating that you would like to close your account. They transfer you to retention, who gives you one or more options of a one-time bonus or statement credit to keep your account open, often with a spend X within Y days requirement. This can also backfire and they could just say, "OK, I've closed your account for you." As the annual certificate should be worth an easy $250+ at your choice of Starriott-Carlton properties, that possibility is something to consider.
Whatever you do dont PC to the new luxury card as you wont get the one time signup bonus anticpated to be 125k pts. I still believe the Hilton Aspire card is a better long term keeper than the new Marriott SPG luxury card. The luxury card is good for the first year to get the bonus but then I will most likely close and continue to use the Aspire card. However once again it depends where you stay more Hilton properties or Marriott properties.
@morgacj2004 wrote:Whatever you do dont PC to the new luxury card as you wont get the one time signup bonus anticpated to be 125k pts. I still believe the Hilton Aspire card is a better long term keeper than the new Marriott SPG luxury card. The luxury card is good for the first year to get the bonus but then I will most likely close and continue to use the Aspire card. However once again it depends where you stay more Hilton properties or Marriott properties.
I would agree about not missing the SUB, although I personally will be upgrading since there's no way on earth that I can do $75,000 in spend between Thursday and December 31st. For me, it's worth keeping my YTD spending to maintain Marriott Platinum status through 2020 since I'll be just short of nights this year but not close enough that a mattress run makes financial sense. (I don't exactly live in an area where I can get $75-100/night rooms without driving nearly halfway across the country.)
I still think it's a keeper; I'll likely have little trouble covering most or all of the $450 AF on the free night certificate alone and that $300 back will just be gravy. I wanted to like Aspire, but I just can't get my head around Hilton redemptions, very bad airline transfer ratios, and limited properties in many locations.