Airbnb

As of late, people are becoming more and more comfortable, preferring in some cases, with the idea of using lodging that is not your typical hotel when on vacation as witnessed by the growing popularity of sites like Airbnb and Homeaway. I myself have been attune to award travel that used hotels, but is there a way to use award travel for non-traditional lodging? The answer is yes!

If you are unfamiliar with the term award travel, it's simply strategically acquiring credit cards that have large signup bonuses or earn points desired to achieve near free travel and accommodations. That was a mouth-full. In other words amass reward points on credit cards that you can match to your travel plan.

What is Airbnb

Now that you have that nugget, I was speaking of non-traditional lodging and how we can get it using award travel. American Express has affiliation with Airbnb where you can use membership rewards (MR) points towards accommodations.  Airbnb, is an online site where everyday people can list lodging, all around the world, for rent either an entire house, private room, or shared room.  The prices are often comparable to what you would pay at a typical hotel, but prices do vary.  If you were trying to rent a house on Airbnb, you could use MR points to do so instead of cash.

Redeeming MR on Airbnb

That said there are two different ways to redeem those points one of which is not as efficient as the other in terms of getting the maximum value for those points. You can either use MR to get an Airbnb eGift card or you transfer points directly from your American Express Membership Rewards account. If you do the latter, you will not get maximum benefit for your points and American Express now seems to have made the transfer option the only option because the Airbnb eGift card is not available on it's site right now as of writing this.  Instead of MR being worth $.01 per point, which they typically are, they are being slightly devalued and are worth less when transferred from Membership Rewards to Airbnb. 

You can do this simple calculation to see what your redemption rate is:

• price charged per night for accommodations/#MR required = redemption value

Example, to redeem for $150 per night/21,000 MR = $0.007

This is slightly less than $.01, but what the heck, use the points you earned with signup bonuses below if it meets with achieving your travel plan.

What Credit Cards Can Be Used

If I had upcoming travel, and a little time to get a big credit card signup bonus for points towards award travel, I would be targeting credit cards from American Express (that earn Membership Rewards (MR)), Barclaycard, and Capital One with large signup bonuses.  If you get American Express, just know it takes a lot longer for their points to post as apposed to a Barclaycard or Capital One card that typically post once you have crossed the threshold of required minimum spend within the time-frame allotted.

I want to make it easy for you, so I have laid out 3 cards (2 personal credit cards and 1 charge card) which I would get right now to accomplish using the points to pay for the Airbnb accommodations.  This is not a one or the other only selection either.  If you have good or great credit, and can meet the required minimum spend on all of them in the 3 months, apply for all 3; otherwise, do what you can manage.  Also, you can close these cards if you don't want to keep to avoid the annual fee.

• How to Meet the Minimum Spend on Chase Sapphire Preferred Credit Card

• Techniques I Use to Meet Required Spend for Credit Card Bonuses

Links to these cards can be found on my Affiliate and Referral page here, but here is a brief synopsis of each.

• Barclaycard Arrival Plus World Elite Mastercard - this card currently has a signup bonus of 50K points after $3,000 spend in 3 months.  The annual fee is waived the first year, then $89.  It earns 2X points on all purchases.  You get 5% points back when redeeming for travel, free FICO score, and chip with PIN capability.  Points are redeemed at $.01 per point, so the bonus is worth about $500 (50,000 x $.01).  The difference between this card and an American Express cards is points are eligible to be redeemed on travel related items when purchased with the card and you get a statement credit on those travel purchases.  Travel is considered to be (rental cars, Airbnb, Homeaway, hotels, airfare, theme parks, even travel excursions).
  
  
• Capital One Venture Rewards - this card currently has a signup bonus of 40K points after $3,000 spend in 3 months.  The annual fee is waived the first year, then $59.  It earns 2X points on all purchases.  Points are redeemed at $.01 per point, so the bonus is worth about $400 (40,000 x $.01).  The card is similar to Barclaycard in that you are eligible to receive statement credit for travel related purchases.

• American Express Premier Rewards Gold - this card currently has a signup bonus of 25K MR points after $2,000 spend in 3 months.  The annual fee is waived the first year, then $195.  It earns 3X points for flights booked with airlines, 2X points at US gas stations, US supermarkets and US restaurants, 1X points on other purchases. $100 a year in statement credits for airline incidental fees. Get a $75 hotel credit on qualifying charges, plus a room upgrade upon arrival, if available with The Hotel Collection at americanexpress.com/hc. Their is a difference between this card and the other two as this is card is a charge card meaning the entire balance needs to be paid in full each month (you should be doing that anyway).  Points are typically redeemed at $.01.   

You next award travel stay at Airbnb awaits you!  Get started.

PS:  Any readers who are currently using Airbnb, please share your experience by leaving a comment on this post.  Also please be sure share this content to your friends and family if you find it useful.  I thank you in advance.