Today is Daily Getaways Day 2 for Choice Privileges points on sale at 1pm Eastern time. This is the day to buy Choice Privileges points at the lowest rate in 2018. This post includes a tip on how to see seasonal reward rates at any specific hotel to help you decide if Choice Privileges points might be useful to you for your travels.
My parents asked me if Choice Privileges are points they should buy? Like I would tell anyone, only buy points if you have a specific redemption in mind where you know points will save you money on hotels.
Choice Privileges Buy Points rate is normally $11.00 per 1,000 points with a 50,000 points calendar-year annual purchase limit.
Choice Privileges Daily Getaways offers
$265 = 55,000 Choice Privileges Points = $4.82 per 1,000 points; QTY: 800
$205 = 42,000 Choice Privileges Points = $4.88 per 1,000 points; QTY: 1048
$144 = 28,000 Choice Privileges Points = $5.14 per 1,000 points; QTY: 1571
$80 = 14,000 Choice Privileges Points = $5.72 per 1,000 points; QTY: 3143
Personally, I am definitely a buyer of Choice Privileges points. I typically burn through 100,000+ Choice Privileges points per year. Last year, I stayed 16 nights at Choice Hotels with 14 reward nights in Prague, Stockholm, Malmo and Copenhagen and 2 paid nights in Colorado Springs to earn 8,000 Choice Privileges points after 2 stays. The hotels in Colorado Springs were substandard compared to the upscale and upper upscale hotels I stayed at in Europe using Choice Privileges points.
Choice Privileges points give me the highest return on investment of any hotel points I redeem. Scandinavia offers fantastic value for hotel reward nights with a choice of 180 Nordic Choice Hotels. There is no doubt that you will find great value from Choice Privileges points if Norway and Sweden are in your travel plans. Hotels are expensive there and buying Choice Privileges points for reward nights will almost always be lower cost than paying the prevailing room rate.
But you need to make a comparison and check out the reward rates for hotels in other places to see if buying points will potentially cost less than paying published rates.
And keep in mind that Choice Privileges can change its redemption rates and rules at any time. The past 15 months have seen many programs eliminate and change some of their best redemption values and low booking rates:
Choice Privileges (Eliminated Points Plus Cash rates),
Club Carlson (eliminated 2-for-1 and 4-for-2 rates),
Hilton Honors (changed Points & Money rates),
IHG Rewards Club (changed PointBreaks rates) and
Wyndham Rewards (changed GoFast rates).
Tool to check Choice Privileges seasonal reward rates.
Update April 13: Since writing this article I noticed ChoiceHotels.com now shows seasonal reward rates at the bottom of an individual hotel’s web page. This was not the case for much of 2016-17 when I regularly used choicehotels.ca Canada website to find this infoormation. This is a good consumer-friendly change for Choice Privileges members.
An important tool for Choice Privileges members is the Canada Choice Hotels website. Choice Hotels change reward rates seasonally. You can find the seasonal reward rates for the next six months or so for any specific hotel when you look up a specific hotel on https://www.choicehotels.ca/. This reward night cost feature is not shown on the ChoiceHotels.com website.
Comfort Hotel, Star Inn Wien Schoenbrunn (Canada website)
Points required for Choice Privileges reward night redemption:
- April 8, 2018 – April 15, 2018:
- Sun – Thu 10,000/room
- Fri – Sat 16,000/room
- April 16, 2018 – June 30, 2018:
- Sun – Thu 12,000/room
- Fri – Sat 10,000/room
- July 1, 2018 – September 15, 2018:
- Sun – Thu 10,000/room
- Fri – Sat 8,000/room
I might be in Vienna in July and this is one city where I see good value between Choice Privileges room rates and reward rates. Five nights for 46,000 to 50,000 points shows me I can pay $265 for 55,000 Choice Privileges today and redeem for a room that is currently priced at 403.75 EUR ($499 USD) in July 16-21.
$50 per night for a stay in Vienna is probably one of the best deals available in this city in July.
Reward stay booking window
Keep in mind that US members of Choice Privileges without elite status can only book hotels in North America within 30 days of stay and international hotels outside of North America within 60 days of hotel stay. This means waiting until May 17 to even see if reward space is available for Vienna. On the plus side for US members, European members in Choice Privileges without elite status can only book reward nights in Vienna within 30 days of stay.
Another tool for Europe is finding which countries Choice Hotels are located.
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