Earning and using Hyatt free night certificates

Jan 28, 2025

What I'm booking

This summer, I took an amazing trip to New Mexico, one of my favorite places! We stayed at the Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort and Spa, a category 4 property on the north end of Albuquerque on the way to Santa Fe. I met my dad and uncle there for a Mini Cooper car event and wanted to treat them to a nice weekend, since they normally don't book nice hotels for themselves! The resort was lovely and well positioned for exploring the region.

I used a Category 1-4 Free Night Certificate and 42,000 Hyatt points to book 5 nights (3 for us, 2 for them), a cash value of $2375. As a Globalist (highest elite status with Hyatt), we received free parking, waived resort fees, and free breakfast for 4. Since rooms routinely run $400-500, this represents an excellent value for your Hyatt free night certificates and points. Category 4 properties run 12,000-18,000 points per night, depending on the peak or off-peak rate.

Tip: How to book it

Hyatt points and free night certificates are easy to accrue. Hyatt is a transfer partner of both Chase and Bilt Rewards. Free night certificates can be earned in several ways, including as an annual benefit on the World of Hyatt personal card, by putting a certain amount of spend on the card each year, for staying 30 nights at Hyatt hotels, or through the Hyatt Brand Explorer (staying at 5 different Hyatt brands).

To find the category 1-4 hotels, you can use the Hyatt "explore" function on their webpage. Click on "Filters" and check off categories 1-4. You can then search all the properties eligible for the certificate! To use a certificate, there has to be award availability, so after finding a property, search for your individual dates and click the "points" box.

Credit Cards: What I opened

I opened the Chase Ink Business Preferred this past year, which has a current welcome offer of 90,000 Ultimate Rewards after $8000 in spend in the first three months (this can vary from time to time). This welcome offer could get you 7 nights at the Hyatt Regency Tamaya Resort for example, a value of nearly $4500. That's just one example, as Chase has multiple airline and hotel transfer partners to maximize your points' value. This card has a $95 annual fee and earns 3x points on travel, so I'll be putting our safari on the card to earn 3x points and meet the welcome offer.

 

Do you have student loans? Need to fund a 529?

If so, this short course is for you! The average student loan burden coming out of medical school is over $200,000 these days. In the past, there wasn't a safe and reliable way to earn points on loan payments, but now there is! Learn how to do this and see if the math makes sense for you. This course also applies to folks who need to fund a 529. It can be particularly useful if you have a welcome offer to meet!