If You Buy Hilton HHonors Points Before July 15, You will Enjoy a 25% Discount - But Does it Make Sense?
Expiration Date – July 15, 2015
On June 17th, the offer to buy Hilton HHonors points with a 100% bonus expired. The latest offer only provides a 25% discount through July 15, 2015. You will need to click on “Buy Points” and log into your account to view the bonus offer. You can purchase points in 1,000 point increments up to 80,000 points.
With this discount, the cost per point equates to 0.75 cents. The normal price without a bonus is 1 cent per point. And purchased points do not count towards elite tier qualification.
As you know from prior TRVLVIP Perks and Tips, we believe the value of a HHonors point is 0.50 cents per point, which is the value we would be willing to pay for HHonors points if we could buy them for cash. It is also the minimum value we feel you should expect before redeeming your points. To see how TRVLVIP determines the value of a rewards point or mile, see our great Tip: What in The World are my Points and Miles Worth?
With this offer you would be purchasing points for quite a bit more than we believe they are worth.
So does a purchase make sense?
Maybe – we don’t suggest buying points speculatively, but rather advise you to purchase only with a specific award stay in mind.
Here is a quick calculation to help you decide:
Find an award stay
Determine the full price of that stay if you were to pay cash including all taxes and fees
Divide that amount by the number of HHonors points required for the award stay (for Points & Money award stays subtract the cash outlay for the stay from the total in #2 before dividing by the points required)
If the value per point exceeds 0.75 cents per point you’ve found a good deal and, if not, we suggest you don’t buy the points
The Wrap-Up:
It rarely makes sense to buy points until you’ve chosen a location, picked your dates and have taken the steps to ensure award availability. Make the small effort to crunch the numbers to ensure the point purchase makes good economic sense. If you know you can get a value for an award stay higher than 0.75 cents per point, the purchase may make sense but because we’ve seen much better offers it may be worth the wait for a better offer.
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