Increased again: Preferred Hotels & Resorts now cost even more Choice points
If you want to redeem Choice points for your Preferred Hotels & Resorts stay, unfortunately, award rates are have increased again for many properties within the portfolio.
In May 2024, you could redeem 25,000 to 55,000 Choice points per night for participating Preferred Hotels & Resorts stays. In June, award rates at many properties increased to as high as 87,000 Choice points per night.
The bad news from Choice continues, with top properties now costing as much as 118,000 points per night, representing a more than 100% increase in the prices of some properties since May. Frequent Miler first reported this news.
Interestingly, award rates from May 2024 are still advertised for six hotels on the Preferred Hotels & Resorts landing page on the Choice Hotels website.
But when you click through to book on the Preferred Hotels & Resorts website, some of the best properties in the Choice Privileges program now require six-figure rates, per night.
In all fairness, only a handful of properties are now priced over 100,000 points per night. These include:
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- Eau Palm Beach Resort & Spa in Manalapan, Florida
- Half Moon in Montego Bay, Jamaica
- Hawks Cay Resort in Duck Key, Florida
- Edgewood Tahoe Resort in Stateline, Nevada
- Chatham Bars Inn in Chatham, Massachusetts
- Boston Harbor Hotel in Boston
- The Sherry-Netherland in New York
- Inn by the Sea in Cape Elizabeth, Maine
- Castelfalfi in Montaione, Italy
- Mykonos Blanc in Mykonos, Greece
- Rosa Grand Milano — Starhotels Collezione in Milan, Italy
- ModernHaus SoHo in New York
I had considered redeeming 55,000 Choice points per night for Noku Maldives, but this hotel is no longer bookable through the Preferred Hotels & Resorts partnership. So, given the current list of properties and their award pricing, I don’t expect to redeem Choice points for any Preferred Hotels & Resorts.
Instead, I’ll continue getting great value when redeeming Choice points for stays in Japan at a rate of 8,000 to 12,000 points per night and expensive destinations where award costs top out at 35,000 points per night. After all, award nights at Choice Hotels properties still cost between 6,000 and 35,000 points in most parts of the world (except Asia-Pacific, where award nights cost up to 75,000 points). I’ll also watch for Choice Hotels Sweet Spot Rewards properties and Choice Privileges Experiences, as both are good ways to get solid value when redeeming Choice points.
Bottom line
Many travelers are disappointed in this second award pricing increase in just three months. But the partnership was likely seeing far more redemptions once online bookings became available, and that could have forced — or at least encouraged — an increase in award rates.
