Account · Doctrine

Point Strategy

“Hold enough in reserve to guarantee the trips that matter, spend the rest freely on the trips that don’t need to be perfect, and never let a point settle for its floor value when its ceiling is 3–5x higher.”

Your strategy at a glance

We start with the recommended defaults. Tune them to how you actually travel — the wallet and planner use these numbers.

Trips per year3 trips

How many real trips you'll actually take.

Years of runway in Flight Reserve4 years

How far out you want premium-cabin trips guaranteed.

Flight Reserve CPP floor
$300.00/10k pts

Only burn Reserve points when a redemption clears this bar.

Hotel Bucket CPP floor
$120.00/10k pts

Fine to spend Hotel points at or above this rate.

Per-program bucket split

Route each program to what it’s actually strong at. Amex airline bench is deeper; Chase is the Hyatt king.

Amex Membership Rewards

Balance 85,000 · 71% reserved

Fixed until you change it.
60,000 Reserve 25,000 Hotel

Chase Ultimate Rewards

Balance 120,000 · 33% reserved

Fixed until you change it.
40,000 Reserve 80,000 Hotel

Points value tiers

Edits here update the Trip Planner too.

Points value tiers

Your global bars. Edit anywhere — individual trips can override on top.

TierMin CPPRange10k pts =Guidance
¢
2.5¢+ / pt$2500+ / 10k
¢
1.7 – 2.5¢$1700–2500 / 10k
¢
1.2 – 1.7¢$1200–1700 / 10k
¢
0.9 – 1.2¢$900–1200 / 10k
¢
< 0.9¢< $900 / 10k

The Two-Bucket System

Every point balance splits into two buckets, not one undifferentiated pile:

Flight Reserve

Purpose
Transfer to airline partners for lie-flat / premium cabin redemptions.
Bar for use
Only deploy when a redemption clears $300.00/10k pts or better.
Mindset
Patient, opportunistic, hunts the release. Not ‘use it or lose it.’

Hotel Bucket

Purpose
Hotels, domestic travel, near-term trips, portal bookings.
Bar for use
$120.00/10k pts is fine — the value is time and ease now, not maximum extraction.
Mindset
Spend it, don’t hoard it. Utility now beats a theoretical better redemption later.

The split isn’t 50/50 by default — it’s weighted by what each program is actually good at, and sized to roughly 4 years of your 3 trips/year cadence.

Program strengths aren't interchangeable

Amex Membership Rewards

Deepest airline partner bench — Delta, Flying Blue, ANA, Virgin Atlantic, Aeroplan, Singapore.

Lean: Weight toward the Flight Reserve. This is your sweet-spot-hunting currency.

Chase Ultimate Rewards

Fewer airline partners, but Hyatt transfers are consistently one of the best redemptions in the game.

Lean: Weight toward the Hotel Bucket — Hyatt hotels do the heavy lifting.

The Devaluation Clock is always running

Holding points isn’t free. Two risks run in the background at all times:

  • Program devaluation — banks rarely devalue their own points, but the airline sweet spots you’re transferring into can vanish overnight (award chart changes, dynamic pricing, partner agreement shifts).
  • Time value — a great trip now beats a theoretically-optimal trip you never book. Chasing perfection indefinitely is its own kind of loss.

Rule of thumb: if a transfer bonus (20%+) hits a program you’re planning to use anyway, move on it — even before you’ve picked the trip. Transfers are one-way, but sitting in the partner account costs nothing extra.

Cash-back, reframed

Points aren’t competing with a 2% cash-back card on redemption value — they compete on earn rate × redemption value.

Effective return = (points earned per $) × (value per point at redemption)
  • Well-hunted premium redemption (~3–5¢/pt) at 1x earn already beats most cash-back.
  • 2x–3x earn categories make it decisive — 6–15% effective return vs. 2% flat.
  • The only way points lose is neglect: sitting unredeemed, or cashed out at the 1¢ floor.

Core principle

Points are not currency. They’re an arbitrage instrument. A point redeemed poorly is worth ~1¢. A point redeemed well is worth 3–8¢. The entire game is closing that gap — and the entire mistake is treating all points as interchangeable with cash. Never cash out points reflexively. Always ask: what’s the ceiling on this point’s value, and am I capturing it?

Reference & tuning

The underlying valuations, partner map, and devaluation log. Rarely touched, but everything above is derived from these.

Baseline valuations

Your editable estimate of what each channel is worth per 10,000 points.

Amex Membership Rewards

Chase Ultimate Rewards

Transfer partners & map

Per-partner overrides used when estimating transfer redemptions.

Transfer partner map

Amex Membership Rewards

  • Air Canada Aeroplan1:1 · Instant
  • ANA Mileage Club1:1 · 1–2 days
  • Air France/KLM Flying Blue1:1 · Instant
  • British Airways Executive Club1:1 · Instant
  • Virgin Atlantic Flying Club1:1 · Instant
  • Singapore KrisFlyer1:1 · 1–2 days
  • Delta SkyMiles1:1 · Instant
  • Emirates Skywards1:1 · Instant
  • Avianca LifeMiles1:1 · Instant
  • Iberia Plus1:1 · Instant
  • Aer Lingus AerClub1:1 · Instant
  • Qantas Frequent Flyer1:1 · 1–2 days
  • Qatar Privilege Club1:1 · Instant
  • Etihad Guest1:1 · Instant
  • Cathay (Asia Miles)1:1 · 1–2 days
  • HawaiianMiles1:1 · Instant
  • Aeromexico Rewards1:1.6 · Instant
  • JetBlue TrueBlue1:0.8 · Instant
  • Hilton Honors1:2 · Instant
  • Marriott Bonvoy1:1 · 1–2 days
  • Choice Privileges1:1 · Instant

Chase Ultimate Rewards

  • Air Canada Aeroplan1:1 · Instant
  • Air France/KLM Flying Blue1:1 · Instant
  • British Airways Executive Club1:1 · Instant
  • Virgin Atlantic Flying Club1:1 · Instant
  • Singapore KrisFlyer1:1 · 1–2 days
  • United MileagePlus1:1 · Instant
  • Southwest Rapid Rewards1:1 · Instant
  • JetBlue TrueBlue1:1 · Instant
  • Emirates Skywards1:1 · Instant
  • Iberia Plus1:1 · Instant
  • Aer Lingus AerClub1:1 · Instant
  • World of Hyatt1:1 · Instant
  • IHG One Rewards1:1 · ~1 day
  • Marriott Bonvoy1:1 · 1–2 days
Devaluation history

A manual log of program devaluations — used to compute each program's burn-vs-hold trend. No live data.

Air Canada Aeroplan

~4% / 3 yrs

Air Canada Aeroplan has devalued ~4% over the last 3 years — points held lose value; burn good redemptions when you find them.

  • 2024-10-01Long-haul partner award rates increased-4%
  • 2023-03-15Dynamic pricing expanded on partner awards-6%

Delta SkyMiles

~12% / 3 yrs

Delta SkyMiles has devalued ~12% over the last 3 years — points held lose value; burn good redemptions when you find them.

  • 2023-09-01SkyMiles award pricing inflation-12%

Virgin Atlantic Flying Club

~8% / 3 yrs

Virgin Atlantic Flying Club has devalued ~8% over the last 3 years — points held lose value; burn good redemptions when you find them.

  • 2024-01-10Peak pricing introduced on reward seats-8%

World of Hyatt

~5% / 3 yrs

World of Hyatt has devalued ~5% over the last 3 years — points held lose value; burn good redemptions when you find them.

  • 2025-03-01Annual category shifts moved ~15% of hotels up-5%

Marriott Bonvoy

stable

No recorded devaluations for Marriott Bonvoy in the last 3 years — points are relatively stable.

  • 2022-03-28Moved fully to dynamic award pricing-15%