The Offer
Direct link to offer (you’ll need to log in to your Marriott account). Note that a URL ending in “credit-card-rewards.mi” takes you to the current 80,000 offers while dropping the “-rewards” takes you here. (Marriott redirected to this offer when logging in to try to pull up the $150 statement credit + 40,000 point offer from this companion post).
- Apply & be approved for a Marriott Rewards Premier Credit Card (which is under 5/24), AND
- Earn 1 free night at a Category 1–4 Marriott property, AND
- Earn 50,000 bonus points after spending $1,000 on purchases within the first 3 months of account opening.
- (Some people are seeing a 70,000 bonus point offer after spending $2,000 on purchases within the first 3 months of account opening, so the [very old & expired] offer must still be targeted to your Marriott loyalty account somehow).
Card Details
- $85 annual fee, waived the first year.
- Annual free night certificate, valid at a Category 1–5 Marriott property, after each account anniversary.
- Unknown bonus for adding an authorized user—possibly none.
- Earn 5 points per $1 spent when you stay at Marriott and SPG hotels.
- Earn 2 points per $1 spent on purchases directly from airlines, car rental agencies, & restaurants.
- Earn 1 point for every $1 spent on all other purchases.
- No foreign transaction fees.
Our Verdict
As with the companion post to this one, I discovered this accidentally and only wrote it up because it seems like a delightful old curiosity piece. This has all the hallmarks of a very old offer that never got taken down. (For example, the 5x category lists “over 3,700 Marriott locations” whereas the current Marriott Premier lists “5,700 participating Marriott Rewards and SPG hotels”). I’m pretty surprised that it didn’t get scrubbed considering how similar the URL is for this offer and the standard offers, but the application landing page is well and truly dead.
Of course, the standard offer is 87,500 points for $3,000 in spend, with no annual fee waiver. Were this offer actually available, you’d be getting the equivalent of 70,000 points (counting the Category 1–4 free night as 20,000 points) and $85, so you’d only consider this offer if you value Marriott points at around 0.485 ¢ / point, or less. (And, again, in that case it would make little sense to fill a 5/24 slot with the Marriott Premier Rewards card at all). The 70,000 point offer would actually be pretty attractive since you’d be getting the equivalent of 90,000 points and $85, which exceeds the current 87,5000 point offer—if you were using points for hotel rooms.
Still, I think it’s a nice museum piece, and an interestingly structured offer. Obviously, the points are more valuable at this moment (due to the SW Companion Pass & SPG transfer), and the free night is intended to introduce more breakage into the signup bonus (from those who don’t redeem it, or those who redeem it for less than a Category 4). But I’d find it pretty cool if some current signup bonuses provided some constrained variety similar to this offer (a current example would be Alaska’s Companion Fare). It’d certainly make things a little more interesting!
If you have any thoughts, please drop them in the comments below!
If you’re considering applying for the standard offer on this card, you’ll definitely want to review the things everybody should know about Chase credit cards first.
