Chase Ritz-Carlton 140,000 Point Offer Is Back, Annual Fee Of $395 Not Waived

The Offer

Direct link to offer

• Receive 140,000 Ritz-Carlton points (which can be used as Marriott points) when you spend $3,000 or more within three months. If the direct application link doesn’t work, then calling and using the code “FBBF”

Card Benefits

• Lounge club access for you and a guest at no cost
• Gold elite status for you first year and subsequent years if you spend at least $10,000 per year
• Platinum status if you spend $75,000 or more in one year
• J.P. Morgan Premier Concierge
• Primary rental coverage
• Free roadside assistance
• Visa signature benefits (requires you to be approved with a credit limit of $5,000 or above)
• 10% annual points premium on all points earned through card purchases during the year
• 3 upgrades to Ritz-Carlton Club® Level on paid stays of three nights or longer
• $300 annual travel credit
• $100 hotel credit on paid stays of two nights or longer

Our Verdict

Last time this was offered the spending requirement was $2,000 instead of $3,000. I procrastinated and couldn’t decide which version of the offer I preferred (there was a 70k version with no annual fee). This time I’m going to pull the trigger and here is why:

• The annual travel credit is given on a calendar basis, meaning I can get at least two of these and pay only one annual fee. I might actually be able to get a third depending on how lenient the customer service representatives are.
• The annual travel credit triggers on some gift card purchases, meaning I can just resell these giftcards and make a profit on the annual fee. Note: United gift cards don’t seem to trigger this bonus
• 140,000 points is a lot and whilst I generally don’t value Ritz-Carlton or Marriott points that highly they’ll come in handy when I can’t find anything else suitable, as long as I can get 0.35¢ value I am looking at a $500 sign up bonus on the points alone. Keep in mind I’ll also be turning a profit on the airline credit and the other benefits such as lounge club access might come in handy (although I have so much lounge club access already I don’t know how useful this will be).

This offer is definitely not for everybody, but it’s the highest this card goes so it’s definitely something that’s worth considering. It’ll be interesting to see if the no annual fee 70,000 point offer also becomes available, which will probably be a better option for most people unless you value the points at 0.564¢ per point or more.

One of the other uses of these points to consider is using them for Marriott Travel Packages. You’d need to get at least two of these cards to successfully do this, but you could score yourself several nights and airline miles as well. The sweet spots in the 280,000 point and under range are:

• 7 nights at category 7 and 77,000 airline miles: 260,000 Marriott Points
• 7 nights at category 6 and 110,000 Miles: 280,000 Marriott Points
• 7 Nights at category 1-5 and 132,000 Miles: 280,000 Marriott Points

The above is when you redeem for United miles. The other airline partners have different rate tables which you can view here. I’ve personally got way too many airline miles already, so I’m just going to keep them as hotel points for now instead.

I hope to have our full Chase Ritz-Carlton review up sometime this week with more information about this card and my thoughts on all of the benefits and uses of the sign up bonus. I’ll be sure to update this post when that goes live.

Useful posts:

• Chase cards are churnable every 24 months
• Chase will match sign up bonuses if you’ve applied for an inferior offer in the last 90 days
• Chase offers expedited shipping for free
• Chase will combine multiple inquiries
• Check to see if you have a higher pre-approved bonus from Chase first (incredibly doubtful for this offer)
• Asking for a credit limit increase with Chase will result in a hard pull

Hat tip to Lazy Travelers, who incidently also alerted us to  the last 140k offer