Starting today, May 15th, Alaska Airlines Visa Signature cardholders can earn a whopping 3X Alaska Miles for every dollar spent on rent through Bilt Rewards. This new benefit allows cardholders to rack up miles faster while covering their biggest monthly expense.
How It Works:
This is the result of an exciting new partnership between Bilt and Alaska Airlines. Furthermore, this is the first time we've ever seen the ability to earn an enhanced number of points/miles by making rent payments.
To earn the 3x Alaska miles for making rental payments:
- Enroll in Bilt Rewards: If you're an Alaska Airlines Visa Signature cardholder, sign up for Bilt Rewards.
- Link Your Card: Connect your Alaska Airlines Visa Signature card to your Bilt account.
- Pay Your Rent: Use your linked card to pay rent through Bilt Rewards.
There is a 3% fee for using your Alaska Visa Signature card to pay rent, but you'll earn 3X miles on up to $50,000 of rent payments per year (calendar year). Any rent payments beyond this cap will earn 1X miles.
Important Details
There is one major catch to this: this benefit applies only to the Alaska Airlines personal Visa Signature card.
This means that Alaska Airlines business card holders will not be eligible to earn the 3x miles when making rent payments.
If you have your personal Alaska Airlines card linked already, you will receive the following notification:
How Do We Feel About This?
So, I think this method of paying rent will appear to some and be less enticing to others.
Notably, rent spend will count towards a few Alaska Airlines credit card spending qualifiers, including the Companion Pass and 4,000 EQM/$10,000 spent on the card. Here's our cost/benefit analysis on this for $6,000 of spend:
BRAND
Cost
Benefit
- Rent transaction fee: $180
- Alaska Miles: 18,000
- Companion Pass
If you decide to spend $10,000 in 2024, here's how the economics look:
BRAND
Cost
Benefit
- Rent transaction fee: $300
- Alaska Miles: 30,000
- Companion Pass
- 4,000 Alaska EQM (for status)
So, I think if you value the Companion Pass or EQM highly, this can be a fantastic way to spend rent. However, keep in mind that you will not earn any Bilt points, so there is an opportunity cost there for sure.
For me, I think I will spend either $6,000 or $10,000 of rent. Any higher and I feel like the opportunity cost is really high. However, earning the Companion Pass and 4,000 EQM seems pretty valuable to me.
Conclusions
The ability to pay rent and earn 3x miles using your Alaska Airlines card is now here. This exciting development is a consequence of Bilt and Alaska Airlines new partnership. We're excited to see where they take this in the near future, especially with other partners down the road.
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