American Express Membership Rewards and Chase Ultimate Rewards points have been the creme de la creme of credit card points for years. Thanks to their extensive lists of transfer partners, TPG values their points at 2 and 2.05 cents apiece, respectively.
While there are many ways to get far more value when booking luxurious flights and hotel stays, the points and miles landscape has recently become increasingly competitive. Almost every credit card issuer has introduced a rewards program to incentivize spending within its ecosystem.
One of these newcomers is Bilt Rewards, and it's built (yes, pun intended) like no other. You can earn points for paying rent, which is great news since renting can amount to thousands of dollars spent annually. Despite being a new player in this competitive field, Bilt Rewards has an impressive lineup of transfer partners, including American Airlines AAdvantage (though this partnership will end in June) and World of Hyatt.
Plus, in May, Bilt Rewards added Hilton Honors as a transfer partner, with Bilt points transferring at a 1:1 ratio to Hilton. This partnership allows Bilt members to transfer their points to four of the most popular hotel loyalty programs in the U.S. since Bilt Points transfer to World of Hyatt, IHG One Rewards and Marriott Bonvoy at a 1:1 ratio.
We value Bilt Points at 2.05 cents each, though there are plenty of ways to get more value from them. Keep reading as we delve into all the details of the Bilt Rewards loyalty program, exploring how to earn and redeem points for maximum value.
What is Bilt Rewards?
Bilt Rewards is a loyalty program that lets you earn points to redeem in multiple ways. You can earn Bilt Rewards points by simply becoming a member, linking a qualifying card to your Bilt Rewards account and transacting with Bilt partners. Perhaps most notably, you can earn Bilt Rewards points by paying your rent.
Earning can be made easier and more lucrative when you hold the Bilt Mastercard® (see rates and fees), but you don't have to have the card to earn within the program.
There are many redemption opportunities within the Bilt Rewards program. You can transfer points to Bilt's loyalty partners; book travel with airlines and hotels through Bilt's travel portal; shop from Bilt's curated art, home decor and lifestyle collection; shop with Amazon; pay for fitness classes; and more.
How to earn Bilt Rewards points
Here's the first thing to know: You don't necessarily need to have the Bilt Mastercard or pay rent to earn Bilt points. There are seven primary ways to earn Bilt points.
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Earn Bilt points by paying rent
You can earn 250 points per on-time rent payment at Bilt Rewards Alliance properties when making an automated clearing house payment or using a non-Bilt card. That means you can earn up to 3,000 points per year, which we value at $61.50.
Alternatively, you can earn 1 point per dollar spent on rent at any home (up to 100,000 points per year) by paying your rent with the Bilt Mastercard. You can pay your rent with your Bilt Mastercard through the Bilt app. If your landlord only accepts physical checks, don't fret. You can still pay your rent with the Bilt Mastercard on the app, and then Bilt will directly mail your landlord a rent check each month, allowing you to earn points on rent without incurring any additional transaction fees.
Earn Bilt points with the Bilt Mastercard
Speaking of the Bilt Mastercard, it offers a simple earning structure:
- 3 points per dollar spent on dining
- 2 points per dollar spent on travel
- 1 point per dollar spent on rent payments (up to 100,000 points per year)
- 1 point per dollar spent on other purchases
You must use your card at least five times during each statement period to earn points (see rewards and benefits).
There's a whole suite of impressive perks for this no-annual-fee card (see rates and fees), including complimentary Cellular Telephone Protection, Trip Cancellation and Interruption Protection and No Foreign Currency Conversion Fees (see rates and fees). You do not need to pay rent to apply for the Bilt Mastercard.
Related: Should you use the Bilt Mastercard? Why it's a game changer for renters
Earn Bilt Points through Bilt Dining
Bilt also has its own dining rewards program, Bilt Dining. Currently, the program operates in more than 20 markets, including cities like Atlanta, Boston, Chicago, Dallas and New York City, and there are plans to add even more.
You can link any Visa, Mastercard or American Express credit card to the Bilt Dining program to earn 5 points per dollar spent at Bilt Dining restaurants when you pay with any eligible card in your Bilt Wallet.
These earnings come in addition to what you earn with your credit card. For example, if you pay with your Bilt Mastercard, you'll earn 3 additional points per dollar spent, making for a total of 8 Bilt points per dollar spent. Put differently, that's a 16.4% return on your dining purchases.
Bilt states you can earn up to 10 points per dollar spent on eating at a Bilt Dining restaurant and paying with any eligible card on file in your Bilt Wallet. Plus, there is no cap on how many points you can earn through Bilt Dining.
Earn Bilt Points on the Bilt travel portal
Expedia powers Bilt's travel portal, so you can earn points on flights, stays, car rentals and things to do. As a Bilt member, you earn 1 point per dollar spent on travel booked through the portal.
For example, by booking this one-way United Airlines ticket from San Francisco International Airport (SFO) to Newark Liberty International Airport (EWR), you'd earn 318 Bilt Points.
As a Bilt Mastercard holder, you earn 2 points per dollar spent on travel booked through the portal and 2 points per dollar by charging your purchase to the card. That is a total of 4 Bilt Points per dollar spent.
Earn Bilt Points with referrals
You'll earn 2,500 points each time you refer a friend to the Bilt Mastercard. For every five referrals, you earn 10,000 bonus points, up to 50 total referrals. You can refer friends to the card through the website or app.
Earn Bilt Points with Lyft
You can earn 2 Bilt Points per dollar spent on Lyft rides when you link your accounts. When you pay for your ride with the Bilt Mastercard, you'll also receive an additional 3 Bilt Points per dollar spent. For most, Bilt Rewards is the best Lyft reward partner.
Earn Bilt Points with SoulCycle
You can earn up to 10 points per dollar spent on SoulCycle classes booked through the Bilt app.
See rewards and benefits.
Earn Bilt Points by playing Rent Free and Point Quest games
Bilt offers two game show-style opportunities for members to earn extra points on Rent Day — the first of the month: Rent Free and Point Quest.
Rent Free is set up like "Family Feud," with a new creator or personality (in April 2024, the guest was singer/songwriter Tinashe) playing the game each month. As a Bilt member, you can earn points with Rent Free when you pick a top three answer, when you correctly rank that answer (double points) and when the celebrity guest picks the same answer as you (triple points).
On top of earning points, Rent Free comes with the chance to earn free rent for a month (up to $2,500). The top 10 scoring players each month will win free rent; the next 600 top-scoring members will get Bilt points. If you tie, the tie will be broken based on who played the game first.
Additionally, Point Quest is a monthly trivia game that automatically awards you Bilt points for every correct answer. You can win up to 150 points for answering five questions; if you answer all five questions correctly, you'll get a bonus sixth question worth 100 points. This means you can get 250 Bilt points through Point Quest every month on Rent Day.
Elite status through Bilt Rewards
Bilt offers four status tiers. You can reach Bilt elite status in two ways: earning Bilt Points and receiving fast-track status with spending on the Bilt Mastercard and within the Bilt ecosystem.
While you won't earn fast-track status on rent spending, you can earn it through SoulCycle classes booked in the Bilt app, Bilt Dining restaurant purchases made with any card linked in your Bilt Wallet, Lyft rides when Bilt is set as your rewards partner and bookings made via Bilt's travel portal.
Here's a quick overview:
| Blue | Silver | Gold | Platinum | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Option 1: Bilt Points qualification | All Bilt Rewards members | 50,000 points | 125,000 points | 200,000 points |
| Option 2: Fast track with spending | All Bilt Rewards members | $10,000 spent | $25,000 spent | $50,000 spent |
| Earn interest on your points (at the FDIC-published national savings rate) | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | |
| Access to complimentary homeownership concierge | ✓ | ✓ | ||
| Bonus points on new leases or lease renewals | 10% | 25% | 50% | |
| Complimentary Bilt collection gift | ✓ |
Your member status is based on the total points earned in a calendar year. You'll receive the higher of the two statuses through qualifying points or via spending on the fast-track status path.
No matter when you earn status each calendar year, it's good for the rest of the year and the following year.
Bilt Platinum members can apply for an Air France-KLM Flying Blue status match
Bilt Platinum members can receive 12 months of Flying Blue Gold status. To activate this status match, members must go to the Bilt app and select "Elite Status Match." Then, members must transfer 10,000 Bilt Points to Flying Blue to officially activate their Gold status. Luckily, the 10,000 points can be used toward a future Air France-KLM award flight.
After requesting status, it may take up to three business days until your Flying Blue Gold status is officially active.
Flying Blue Gold status will give Bilt members additional airline perks as well as qualify members for SkyTeam Elite Plus.
Learn more about specific Flying Blue Gold status perks on Flying Blue's tier benefits page and the added benefits of having SkyTeam Elite Plus status on SkyTeam's FAQ.
Related: How to earn 'interest' on your points balance with Bilt Rewards
Redeeming Bilt Rewards points: Poor-value options
The Bilt Rewards loyalty program gives you many ways to use your points, though not all carry equal value.
If you want to extract the maximum value from your Bilt Rewards points, you'll likely want to avoid some of these less valuable redemption options.
Use points for Amazon purchases
You can select your Bilt Mastercard on Amazon as a payment method and redeem your points to cover all or a portion of your purchase at checkout. However, Bilt Points are worth 0.7 cents each when used this way. For example, you'll need approximately 14,300 Bilt Points to cover a $100 Amazon purchase. Compare that to TPG's potential estimated value of 2.05 cents apiece, and it's not necessarily the best deal.
Shop the Bilt Collection
The Bilt Collection is a curated list of items, including art, home decor and apparel. The value per point will vary, but since it rarely exceeds more than 1 cent per point, you should likely pass on this option.
Redeem your points for fitness classes
Fitness enthusiasts can redeem their Bilt Points to attend name-brand classes like SoulCycle, Solidcore and Y7 Studio. The value will depend on the class you select but hovers around 1 cent per point.
Pay your rent with points
A potentially enticing option with your points is to save them to help cover your next rent payment. However, this is only available if you live in a Bilt Rewards Alliance property or opt for check payments. Even worse, the redemption value is just 0.55 cents per point.
Related: 5 common purchases you should never redeem miles for
Redeeming your Bilt Rewards points: Medium-value options
The following redemption options will get you a decent value with a redemption rate of at least 1 cent per point.
Use your points to save up for a down payment on a home
Bilt offers the unique ability for users to save up their points toward a down payment on a home. If you opt for this route, your Bilt points are valued at 1.5 cents each toward a down payment.
Redeem for travel on the Bilt travel portal
You can use the Bilt travel portal to offset the cost of flights, stays, rental cars or activities — at a rate of 1.25 cents per point.
Transferring to airline and hotel partners: Best value
Nothing beats the outsize value of transferring your points to Bilt's 18 airline and hotel partners.
In May, Bilt Rewards added its fourth hotel transfer partner, allowing Bilt points to transfer to Hilton Honors at a 1:1 ratio. However, TPG only values Hilton points at 0.6 cents per point, so when transferring your Bilt points to Hilton Honors, you lose 1.45 cents per point of value.
Bilt has also recently added the ability to transfer points to Alaska Airlines at a 1:1 ratio. This adds another solid transfer option to Bilt's portfolio since the only other major transferable currency that also transfers to Alaska Mileage Plan is Marriott Bonvoy points.
It's worth noting that while Bilt Rewards is the only transferable points program to offer American Airlines AAdvantage as a transfer partner, this partnership is slated to end in June. Still, the program has multiple valuable transfer partners to maximize your Bilt Points.
It's free to join these loyalty programs, even if you've never flown the airline or stayed with the hotel brand. Plus, Bilt gives cardholders 100 bonus points (up to a total of 500 points) for each loyalty program you link to your account.
You can easily get 2.05 cents per point in value — and perhaps much more — and score a lie-flat airplane seat or a luxurious hotel stay by transferring your Bilt Points to the right programs, all at a simple 1:1 transfer ratio.
| Program | Ratio | Transfer time |
|---|---|---|
| Aer Lingus AerClub | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Air Canada Aeroplan | 1:1 | Within 24 hours |
| Air France-KLM Flying Blue | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan | 1:1 | ** |
| American Airlines AAdvantage | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Avianca LifeMiles | 1:1 | Up to 72 hours |
| British Airways Executive Club | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Cathay Pacific Asia Miles | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Emirates Skywards | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Hawaiian Airlines HawaiianMiles | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Hilton Honors | 1:1 | ** |
| Iberia Plus | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| IHG One Rewards | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Marriott Bonvoy | 1:1, with 5,000 bonus points for every 20,000 points you transfer in a single transfer | Within 48 hours |
| Turkish Airlines Miles&Smiles | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| United Airlines MileagePlus | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| Virgin Atlantic Flying Club | 1:1 | Within minutes |
| World of Hyatt | 1:1 | Within minutes |
**TPG has not yet tested transferring Bilt Points to Alaska Airlines or Hilton Honors.
Bilt Rewards has historically offered some of the best transfer bonuses we've seen during Rent Day (the first of every month). This has included 150% transfer bonuses to some carriers, such as Emirates Skywards.
For example, Bilt was recently offering 100% transfer bonuses to Flying Blue and HawaiianMiles.
Simply put, the options are endless. Because so many of Bilt's transfer partners overlap with existing transferable points programs, you can refer to our guides as inspiration to maximize programs like Air Canada Aeroplan, Flying Blue, Virgin Atlantic Flying Club and so many more.
Related: 7 of the best airline award chart sweet spots
Bottom line
Bilt Rewards presents an exceptional value proposition for both renters and non-renters. Bilt has established partnerships with some of the more lucrative airline and hotel loyalty programs, enabling you to extract extraordinary value from your points. Your points transfer seamlessly at a straightforward 1:1 ratio, and most programs process the transfers instantly.
Even if you aren't renting or don't want to apply for the Bilt Mastercard, you can earn lots of points by linking your Lyft account, enrolling in Bilt Dining and booking travel through the Bilt portal.
See Bilt Mastercard rates and fees here.
See Bilt Mastercard rewards and benefits here.
Editorial disclaimer: Opinions expressed here are the author’s alone, not those of any bank, credit card issuer, airline or hotel chain, and have not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities.
