How To Use American Airlines AAdvantage Miles And Elite Status For Hotel Rooms

 

A few days ago, I taught you how to use American Airlines AAdvantage miles and elite status for car rentals. Now, I will show you how to use American Airlines AAdvantage miles and elite status for hotel rooms. Even though I am a Starwood Platinum member and stay mostly in Starwood hotels, I still look at useaamiles.com for price comparisons. You should only redeem your miles if you have American Airlines Platinum or Executive Platinum status because you get a HUGE discount when logged in.

vegas3

I value 1 American Airlines AAdvantage mile at a minimum of 2 cents each. In my book, anything over 2 cents is considered a great redemption since I am overflowing with American Airlines miles. At #FTUDC last weekend, we were taught to Learn, Earn, and Burn. I fly over 100,000 miles on American Airlines a year to maintain Executive Platinum status. Ever since the new Elite Awards chart came out, I am leaning towards flying over 150,000 miles on American Airlines this year. With 150,000 miles flown and a 100% bonus on all flights taken due to being an EXP, I will earn 300,000 American Airlines miles this year. With the new Elite Awards, I will gain an additional 100,000 miles on top of that if I choose all the “Miles” within all the milestones. With 400,000 redeemable miles in the bank this year, I value that at a minimum of $8,000. Now you can see why I always use these valuable American miles for hotels and car rental redemptions.

For example, I’m looking for a SPG hotel in Las Vegas for the night of October 11, 2013. I plug in my search dates on SPG.com and it returned a rate of $159.00 for the Westin Las Vegas Hotel, Casino and Spa.

vegas

 

A close look at the $159 with taxes turns out to be $200.42.

vegas1

I searched on useaamiles.com and turned out the hotel is offering a redemption of 8,300 American AAdvantage miles. When you redeem with miles on AA, you don’t pay the additional taxes you see on spg.com.

vegas2

It’s a great redemption at 2.4 cent per mile which is above my minimum valuation of 2 cents per mile. I would never redeem 16,000 Starpoints at the Westin Las Vegas! 8,300 AAdvantage miles is a bargain.

For my second example, I’m looking for a SPG hotel in the Big Island of Hawaii for the night of June 14, 2013. I plug in my search dates on SPG.com and it returned a rate of $179.00 for the Sheraton Kona Resort & Spa at Keauhou Bay.

kona

A close look at the $179 with taxes turns out to be $234.25.

kona1

I searched on useaamiles.com and turned out the hotel is offering a redemption of 12,500 American AAdvantage miles. When you redeem with miles on AA, you don’t pay the additional taxes you see on spg.com.

kona2

It’s a 1.9 cents per mile redemption which is close to my bare minimum valuation of 2.0 cents per mile, but when you’re swimming in AA miles, it’s still a great value to use the miles. If you have elite status with Starwood, I wrote a guide on how to receive elite benefits on a Starwood third party reservation.

I would highly advise you to play around with the useaamiles.com website to leverage your AAdvantage elite status and make your AAdvantage miles go further with hotel redemptions.

 

About the Author

Points Summary
My name is and I write the Points Summary travel blog.

10 Comments on "How To Use American Airlines AAdvantage Miles And Elite Status For Hotel Rooms"

  1. I did the same for the Cosmopolitan Las Vegas which retailed anywhere between $1300-$1500 for memorial day weekend. Only cost me 59k miles plus i received 10% back for having the citi aa card which made it an even better value.

    • that’s great! You might also be able to add your Marriott rewards number & Identity card (cosmopolitan loyalty program) and earn rewards for your 3rd party booking. I would call Cosmopolitan to add your Marriott Rewards # and have the hotel add your Identity membership at check-in. Best of luck

      • Yep did that also. But marriot is no longer a partner with american so I have to credit the airline miles to united.

  2. For those who only get miles/points via credit cards etc. and normally don’t care about status (since redemption is mostly for business/first), this is a helpful post.

  3. Question.
    lets say I book a hotel (Hilton) through the AA website. Can I also redeem my HHonors point on check in? Same would be Hyatt, SPG etc..
    Appreciate your trip reviews and tips.

    Congratulations on your achievements.

    • After booking the Hilton hotel through the AA website, call up the hotel and ask them to add your Hiltons HHonors number to your profile. I would advise you call the hotel a few days after booking.

  4. Hi
    I had hoped to book a room in Birmingham, AL., for 1 night.
    Is this possible?

  5. Nice post. I learn something more challenging on different blogs everyday. It will always be stimulating to read content from other writers and practice a little something from their store. I?d prefer to use some with the content on my blog whether you don?t mind. Natually I?ll give you a link on your web blog. Thanks for sharing.

Leave a comment

Your email address will not be published.


*