Should You Transfer Points for Hotel Bookings?
Tl;dr: Some hotel redemptions look great on paper, but even the best programs like Hyatt can be sneaky value traps.
Most major credit card points—Chase, Amex, Bilt—can be transferred to hotel programs like Hilton, Marriott, or Hyatt. But is that actually a good idea? On paper, it can look like it. World of Hyatt points, for example, are considered among the most valuable points in the industry.
There are plenty of ways to get good value when redeeming points with hotels; I use my IHG and Hilton cards to collect hotel points and redeem them efficiently. I will even transfer points to a hotel program in a pinch (usually Hyatt). But, as a rule of thumb, I generally avoid transferring points to hotels. Why? I like to maximize the number of trips I take and the amount of time I can spend exploring my destination. More time=more meals. I don’t need a fancy hotel for that, so burning precious Bilt or Amex points on a hotel always seems like a waste.
Hotel values can be illusory
For me, an acceptable hotel or short-term rental on my travels must be clean, either walkable or convenient to transit, have good wifi, and score an 8 out of 10 or equivalent on reputable review sites. That’s it. Having modest requirements allows me to consistently stay for $50-75 per night (or less) when traveling abroad. It’s the quiet luxury of low expectations.
More expensive, higher-end hotels don’t actually add much to this picture. You might have a more central location, fancier design and furnishings, more robust service, more amenities like a pool, more square footage in the room, or in-hotel restaurants and room service. These can be nice splurges, but they only add value at the margin beyond a stay’s core purpose: a safe, clean, comfortable place to sleep. Our travel goal is to explore the destination, not sample the minibar.
With that dynamic in mind, even when you get a lot of superficial “value” from your points when redeeming them for otherwise-expensive hotel stays, the real or market value could be much lower, because there’s bound to be decent, affordable alternatives to your booking.
An example
I’m going to focus on Hyatt here, because they have genuinely excellent points–Nerdwallet estimates they are worth 1.8¢ each, the best value of any points currency they evaluated.
To see how strong Hyatt points can be, I searched for a night in Tokyo in March 2026. The Hyatt House Tokyo Shibuya priced at just 20,000 points (transferable from Bilt or Chase). The cash price on the same night was $516, so each point was worth nearly 2.6¢ (not factoring in Hyatt’s rewards discounts). That looks great–and is! But I would never pay $500 for a night in a hotel. (Ryokans are a different story.)
If I were staying in Tokyo, I would probably book a hotel like the Hotel Gracery Ginza for $142 or the Almont Inn Nihonbashi for $115 (roughly 9,000-14,000 Bilt or Chase points). So, even accounting for the higher square footage and more central location of the Hyatt, I might value a night there at $200 at most–a solid but unspectacular 1¢ per point in value for my Hyatt points.
More importantly, while the difference for a single night might not be huge, it adds up quickly. Five nights at the Hyatt could burn an entire once-in-blue-moon Sapphire Preferred welcome bonus. I’d rather spend more time in Tokyo.
How this compares to redeeming points with airlines
By contrast, although there is still competition for flights, it’s much harder to find a cheap flight that will get the job done. Many frequent flyer award tickets (especially from U.S. carriers) are fully refundable, main cabin tickets. On the one hand, this means that it may be possible to fly cheaper in basic economy, so your $2000 ticket might really be worth closer to $900. But the premium often represents real value: seat selection, refundability, status qualification, etc.
With my current job, I really need a refundable ticket—and I’ll gladly pay for seat selection if it means I don’t have to worry about spending 13 hours in a middle seat five rows away from my wife.
Lazy take 🦥
Given how valuable flight redemptions can be — and how easy it is to find a decent hotel — I usually skip transferring points for lodging. Still, there are exceptions: Bilt or Chase to Hyatt, Citi or Wells Fargo to Choice, Bilt and Mesa to Accor, and Amex to Hilton. These can make sense in the right moment.
That said, when you already have hotel points sitting around, it’s fine to be flexible. I’ve got plenty from my Hilton Aspire and IHG Premier. I’m so frugal that any redemption looks mediocre — which makes splurging a little easier to justify. Use your 4th- or 5th-night-free deals when you can, and if you’ve got points to burn? Use them. Save your cash and enjoy the trip.