Traveling on Points and Cash, June '24 Edition

[canyonwalker]

I'm checking in how I'm using— and not using— my frequent flyer/hotel points for travel in June 2024. As usual, our trips use a mix of points and cash. That's because while points rates are almost always available for bookings in modern airline/hotel programs, they are often poor values for the high number of points required relative to the cash price. Thus I check both rates and do a bit of arbitrage in choosing which currency to pay with, cash or points. (Of course you've got to know what the points are worth to make this arbitrage.)

On our trip to Wisconsin earlier this week:

• I booked our hotel room with Marriott points. Cash prices weren't that high, as there was a discount for a 5 night stay. But there's also a points discount for a 5 night stay: pay points for 4 nights, get the 5th night free. It's a standard Marriott policy. That helped the points rate beat out the cash price.


• For our flights on Southwest Airlines, the cash-vs-points tradeoff was also close to being equal. The numbers tipping slightly in favor of cash on the way out and points on the way home, so I booked it as a split itinerary.


• The Avis rental car I paid cash for. I wish there were a decent way to use points on rental cars since they've gotten so pricey— even with the worst of the post-pandemic price surge past us, rental cars are still routinely double what they cost in early 2020— but the rental car loyalty programs have all gone to shit so it's not worth chasing the points.

On our trip to Alaska this weekend and into next week:

• I booked tonight's hotel in Anchorage with Hilton points. Cash and points rates were all absurdly high, so as a matter of arbitrage I decided I'd rather get gouged for points than hard cash.


• For the remainder of the trip there are no chain hotels in the small town where we're staying, so there's no choice but to pay cash there.


• For our flights on United, I found a great points rate on the way home, so I booked those tickets with points. On the way out tonight, cash prices were high and points prices were absurd so (arbitrage again) I picked cash. But paying cash made us eligible for an upgrade— and we've already been upgraded for our flight tonight. We're looking forward to relaxing in first class on tonight's flight from San Francisco to Anchorage.


• Rental cars in Alaska are even stupid-er expensive than elsewhere, but there continued to be no reasonable points alternative that I see, so stupid-er amounts of cash it is. Alaska's too big to uber around.