I love the thought of elevating my travel experiences. My readers know that I love to plan a good vacation. Prior to parenthood, my husband and I Ioved to travel to Europe and visit beautiful beach destinations here in the United States or Bahamas. One thing I wish I would have known then was the benefit and power of having credit cards with travel benefits. Travel hacking is a hot topic these days but honestly, between holding down a full-time career, being a mom and wife I have to be realistic about how much time I can put aside for family travel. I plan out my potential vacation destinations as part of a vision board at the end of each year so that I have an active goal to work towards and spend my time researching wisely. Okay so what does this all have to do with a credit card? The Hilton Honors Aspire credit card by American Express is a card that I began looking at when I was considering my January travel to Waikiki Beach and knew I would be staying at a Hilton resort.
Consider the annual fee and the benefits it offers.
The annual fee is hefty at $450. I’m going to break down the value that it will bring to me and my family personally. Currently the credit card also comes with a bonus offer of 150K Hilton points after hitting a $4,000 spend in three months. This is doable for my family as I simply charge my bills and expenses to the card until I hit the spend. I personally wasn’t going to chase the spend limit for this credit card as I just wanted the travel benefits but after doing some research, I quickly realized that 150K Hilton points could easily translate into 2 free nights at a nice hotel. San Diego, Santa Barbara, Santa Monica, Coronado Island, and Phoenix all came to mind. Keep in mind these hotels will easily go for at least $250+ a night. And the nice thing is that when you book a reward stay, you don’t pay for parking or resort fees. This alone offset the annual fee for me. If the annual fee intimidates you, know that the Hilton Surpass only has a $95 annual fee, and there is also a Hilton Honors credit card that has no annual fee. I’m only going to focus on outlining the Aspire card because I want you guys to have something to reference as I’ll be providing you all with an update after our Hilton stay in January – which will really be the ultimate review as to whether or not the card benefits fared in our favor.
Hilton Honors Diamond Elite Status – Automatic
Upon getting approved for the card, which was literally less than 10 minutes for me I received my card in the mail via 2nd Day UPS. They also provided me with temporary credit card information so that I could begin using the card immediately via online shopping portals or to make monthly payments (think cable, phone bills, etc.)
Expedited Check-In
Diamond Elite Status – what value does this bring? Well for starters it grants you access to elite service check in meaning if you are travelling to a huge resort (like we will be in January), you get to bypass the standard check in line. You also have the opportunity to use digital check in days before your trip and they even grant you a digital key. Time is money for us so if I can save a little time and get straight to my vacation – I’m all in!
Daily Food and Beverage Credit
I will have access to a daily $18 food and beverage credit for myself and another registered person in my room. That translates to about $36 per day. We check in to the resort Wednesday and depart Sunday (4 night stay). When you immediately think of $18 it may not seem like much, however this can easily cover poolside drinks/snacks or breakfast bites at Starbucks (which our resort has). Or just apply it towards any meals you would be paying for out of pocket regardless. Travelling with a toddler will ensure that there will be some type of food consumed on the resort grounds. Value $144 dollars. Remember the value of the two free nights from the sign-up bonus I mentioned earlier? Yeah, we are now looking at travel benefits totaling $644. Annual fee has paid for itself with just these two perks.
$250 Airline Incidental Credit
You can select one airline per year to have an airline incidental credit valued up to $250. I don’t anticipate using it this trip since I don’t plan to check bags – more on that on a later post. But if I needed to check a bag with Alaska Airlines I could opt to have the credit cover the cost. My return flight is Southwest so I will likely select them as the airline carrier. We’ll see if I end up using any of the credit this trip or this year. Value $844.
Potential room upgrade at check-in (including suites).
The thought of this is really nice! I’m not going to bank on it but we’ll see what luck I have at check-in and I’ll have to report back on my experience. I’ve read in some places that this upgrade can be a hit or miss. But to think that I booked a standard accommodation, two double bed, resort view room and have the potential to get upgraded sounds really enticing!
At the time I’m writing this I can confirm that we had booked a Resort View room, with two double beds. The going rate for that right now is $317/night. These are the other rooms that I would be eligible to upgrade to based on availability. I also included their going rate so we can do a cross-comparison based on what happens with me at check in. It will help us pinpoint the value of the card even further.
- Partial Ocean View, 2 Double Beds $351/night
- Ocean View 2 Double Beds $368/night
- Tapa Collection Resort View 2 Queen Beds $370/night
- Rainbow Tower Marina/Ocean View 2 Double Beds $380/night
- Ali Resort View, 2 Double Beds $391
- Rainbow Tower Ocean Front 2 Double Beds $417/night
- Tapa Collection Partial Ocean 2 Queen Beds $433/night
- Alii Partial Oceanview 2 Double Beds $433/night
- Tapa Collection Ocean View 2 Queen Beds $433/night
- Rainbow Tower Deluxe Ocean Front 2 Double Beds $478/night
- Alii Oceanview 2 Double Beds $493/night
- Alii Ocean Front 2 Double Beds $556/night
- Tapa Family Room City View 3 Double Beds $591/night
- Tapa Corner Junior Suite 2 Double Beds $596/night
- Tapa Collection Family Room 1 Kings and 2 Queen Beds $609/night
- Tapa Collection Corner Ocean View Junior Suite 2 Queen Beds $670/night
$200 Resort Credit
As long as I charge expenses such as incidentals (including meals) or resort activities to my room and pay with my Hilton Honors Aspire card at check out – I will get a $200 credit applied towards my billing statement. $1044 is my running value on this card.
Free night/hotel stay 1x per year.
The last benefit that sold me was that I am eligible for a free one-night stay at any Hilton resort which also includes the luxe Conrad and Waldorf Astoria hotels. This can include a weekend night! I mean considering some of these room rates can go from $700-900 a night, this perk had me SOLD. And no resort fee or parking fee to pay on a reward stay? That means we can do a quick 2-hour drive on a weekend and have a little luxe getaway. Value $1744. Remember that this doesn’t include the potential room upgrade that we may be getting. But with these benefits
I read through so many blogs and searched for articles that covered people’s experiences with the Hilton Aspire. The big travel bloggers and points and miles people highlighted some of the benefits but I had to do lots of comparisons on my own to determine if the high-cost fee would be worth it. Because we are staying at a meaga Hilton resort in Hawaii for 4 nights I knew it would be a good fit. If we were going to do a local trip, I would have likely considered the Surpass card ($95 annual fee) that comes with complimentary Gold status (includes the food and beverage credit, upgrade eligibility to preferred rooms excluding suites, and a lower point sign up bonus 80K -120k).
As promised, I will post an update after our Hilton stay in Hawaii so you can expect to see that in the early weeks of February.
If you have any questions – you can fill out a contact form, drop a comment or email me at thesunqueendiaries@gmail.com.
If you choose to apply for a Hilton Honors card I would appreciate you using my referral code as American Express will compensate me with points at no cost to you!
Apply for an American Express Card with this link. With your new Card, you could earn a welcome bonus. Terms Apply. https://americanexpress.com/en-us/referral/VANESBsmBc?xl=cp15
xoxo,
The Sun Queen