When Buying Hyatt Points At 1.71 Cents Makes A Lot Of Sense

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Hyatt is currently offering to sell us points at around 1.71 cents each and, while most of the time I’m more than a little sceptical of points purchases, there is a specific instance where buying Hyatt points at this level could be a pretty nice money saver.

The Rules & The Math

• The “buy points offer is available for purchases made by 11:59 pm ET 9 August 2017.
• Purchase between 5,000 and 9,000 Bonus Points in a single transaction and receive 30% additional Bonus Points
• Purchase between 10,000 and 55,000 Bonus points in a single transaction and get 40% additional Bonus Points.
• Bonus Points will be awarded upon completion of individual transactions.
• Bonus Points can be purchased in increments of 1,000, up to 55,000 points per calendar year.
• Members can receive points in increments of 1,000, up to 55,000 points per calendar year.

Full offer terms can be found via this link

Put simply what this means is:

• Buy 5,000 – 9,000 Hyatt points for 1.85 cents each or
• Buy 10,000 – 55,000 Hyatt points for 1.71 cents each

If you were to buy the maximum number of points permitted (55,000) this is what the cost would look like:

77,000 points at a cost of $1,320 comes to 1.71 cents per point.

When 1.71 Cents Per Point Is A Good Deal

If you search diligently it isn’t all that difficult to find examples of where buying points at 1.71 cents and then using them to book award nights or points & cash awards could save you some money….but there’s a further example that doesn’t get as much publicity as it possibly should.

Properties That Charge Resort Fees

I really hate the proliferation of resort fees but it’s a sad reality in today’s world that more and more properties are charging extra for things that a lot of guests either don’t need, don’t want or should be getting as part of the room price anyway (Las Vegas properties are especially bad when it comes to gouging visitors for no reason other than to add to their bottom lines).

A number of popular Hyatt properties will charge guests resort fees on top of the room rate being paid and these can quickly add up.

Take the Hyatt Regency Coconut Point as an example:

Hyatt Regency Coconut Point – image courtesy of Hyatt

This property’s policy is to charge an extra $30 + tax per day per room for the following “benefits”:

• Welcome beverage for two
• Self-parking
• Two bottles of water each day in your guestroom
• Coffee maker with complimentary coffee and tea
• Local daily newspaper
• Unlimited local and 1-800 phone calls
• Incoming fax service
• 24-hour fitness center access
• Pool activities, lazy river, slides and lawn games
• Ferry transportation to the resort’s secluded island
• Beach chairs and umbrellas at the resort’s beach
• Rock climbing wall
• Bicycle rentals
• Resort trolley transportation to marina and Raptor Bay Golf Course
• DVD rentals,
• Golf bag storage
• Electric car charging stations

What?!

Most of those things are either things that most guests don’t necessarily want (unlimited local calls, pool activities, rock climbing wall DVD rentals etc…) or things that should come included in the room price anyway (golf bag storage, coffee maker with complimentary tea and coffee, local newspaper etc…)

Quite simply this is a rip-off…..but this is where Hyatt points can come to the rescue.

Picking a random night during high-season, as an example, the cheapest room rate comes to $450 + tax:

And, once you add in all the extras, that price rockets up to $531.81 per night:

This price includes resort fees of $33.30 but, an here’s the fantastic bit, Hyatt award nights no longer incur resort fees.

One of the few positive changes we’ve seen thanks to the introduction of the World of Hyatt is that, regardless of status, award nights will not incur resort fees…and this can sometimes make a big difference to the math when it comes to deciding if buying points is a good idea or not.

In this case, even if there were no resort fees to pay on a cash booking, buying points to book the room is a good idea….but the fact that the resort does add resort fees makes the math even better in favor of buying points.

Let’s assume for a moment that the Hyatt Regency Coconut Point didn’t charge resort fees in the first place.

The nightly rate (above) would now be $498.51 ($531.81 – $33.30) and, as the resort charges just 15,000 Hyatt points for a reward night on exactly the same date……

…..using points to book this room would see a guest getting a fantastic 3.3 cents in value from each point.

Already buying points to book this nights makes a lot of sense…but the resort fees you avoid by booking a reward night make the saving seven better.

The real nightly rate (as shown above) is $531.81 when you include the mandatory rip-off resort fees so, at 15,000 points for the same night, a guest booking with points will be getting an incredible 3.54 cents/point of value.

You could buy points in the current promotion for 1.71 cents each and immediately book a trip where you get over double that in value.

Now that’s how to use a “buy points” promotion! 🙂

What Makes This Example Even Better…..

You’ll find that in a lot of examples offered up to show how buying points is a good idea the most you can really book is one or two nights….because the properties in question require a lot of points to book.

But not in this instance.

At just 15,000 points per night for the Hyatt Regency Coconut Point you could by enough points for up to 5 nights at the property and you’d still have a little bit of change left over.

Bottom Line

In this particular instance the property was already a great example of how buying Hyatt points in a sale can save you quite a bit of money and the resort fee saving was just the icing on the top…..but it’s not always like that.

There will be times where the resort fees charged by a resort (like the Andaz Maui) will make the difference between buying points being a poor idea and a very good idea indeed.