We all like getting good value for our points, and it feels like to me that Marriott Bonvoy points seem to have an especially bad reputation for not being worth very much. I think that most sites that I have seen value Marriott Bonvoy points as worth between 0.7 and 0.8 cents per point. But of course, the true value for any type of miles or points depends on how you use them. I always say that the best way to use your miles and points is to get you where you want to go, when you want to go there, spending the least amount of cash out of your pocket.
The Problems With “Cents Per Point”
The way that many people choose to “value” their miles and points redemptions is “cents per point” (cpp). You take the cash cost of a redemption, and divide it by how many miles or points it takes to make that same redemption. That gives you a cents per point value for your redemption.
There are quite a few problems with this way of valuing redemptions. Probably the biggest is that it overvalues redemptions like first or business class flights that have huge cash prices that most normal people would not actually pay. I mean, maybe you’re different than me, but while I have enjoyed all of my business class flights, I would never pay over $5,000 for one of them.
The other problem with cents per point is that it assumes that you would choose the same hotel if you were paying cash. The reality for most people is that if you were paying cash instead of using points, you might choose a cheaper hotel, which would make for a lower cpp value. But instead, most people like to choose the most expensive cash price possible when calculating their return. That tends to give an artificially high cpp value, making people feel good about themselves 🙂
Getting 2 Cents Per Marriott Bonvoy Point
Anyway, with all those caveats out of the way, I wanted to share a recent redemption I had at the Residence Inn Cleveland Avon. I’ll have a full review coming up shortly, but wanted to just quickly talk about my booking.
We are headed up to Cleveland for a weekend stay. We are going with “only” 5 of us, so we booked the Residence Inn and could make due with a 1 bedroom suite, which was available for only 17,000 Bonvoy points per night.
Looking at the cash cost, that 1 bedroom suite is advertised as $246 / night, but after taxes and fees, it’s $569.49 total.
That gives a value of 1.67 cents per point which is twice as much as I think a Marriott Bonvoy point is normally work.
But Wait! There’s More!
Now as I mentioned, it’s only 5 of us (my wife and I and 3 of our kids) that are going on this trip, so we could make a 1 bedroom suite work without much trouble. But a TWO bedroom suite would be ideal. It’s kind of annoying that you can’t book a two bedroom suite with points, but on the other hand, if you could, it would probably be like it is with Hilton, where it’s an insane number of points where it wouldn’t make sense to book it anyways.
So I did something I have done many times before – I emailed the hotel, explained our situation, and asked if they would be willing to upgrade our family to the 2 bedroom suite. I asked for the complimentary upgrade but also said that we would be willing to pay a cash copay as well. I got a response back the next day that they had upgraded us to the 2 bedroom suite.
I will say that I have a 75%+ success rate with this strategy. I don’t think it’s because I am a “famous” travel blogger (I didn’t even mention it in my email though I suppose it’s possible that I am “flagged” in the Marriott system). I did include my Bonvoy number in the email, but I’m only a lowly Silver with 4 stays this year.
Accounting for the upgrade, my 34,000 Bonvoy points saved me a cash price of about $680 after taxes, giving me just over 2 cents per Bonvoy point in value. Not too shabby!
The Bottom Line
As I mentioned in the intro, the best value of miles and points is to get you where you want to go when you want to go there, saving the most cash out of your pocket. While many folks in the miles and points world tend to focus on first class flights and five-star hotels, it’s still possible to get a ton of value from stays at a suburban hotel that you might not think of. Having a stash of Marriott Bonvoy points (less than half of what I might have gotten from a signup from a credit card) just saved me nearly $700!
What’s been your best or most favorite redemption? Leave it in the comments below
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Dan Miller travels with his wife and 6 (SIX!) children. He loves to help families travel for free / cheap, especially larger families. If you are looking for help, drop him an email at 
I did that once with the Residence Inn El Paso. I was moving so had about a 3 week stay. Booked the one bed room suite on a combination of points and cash and called about two months out to ask if I can pay cash to upgrade. The price difference was about $50 per night. But the front desk upgraded me without a cost. I was so surprised!