Award category changes for hotels are part of the way the programs work. Each hotel program has their own measurements for which hotels will go up and down and sometimes the changes can work out good for some travelers and other times bad. Tomorrow, 50 Hyatt hotels will go up in categories and become more expensive with points or with the popular Points + Cash redemptions. Here is the list and what you need to know.
Book These 50 Hyatt Hotels Now Before They Go Up
Hyatt Award Category Changes
Here is the breakdown on the Hyatt award category changes that will go into affect tomorrow, August 1, 2016. The same list can be found here.
Category 1 -> Category 2
Category 1 hotels cost 5,000 points per night or 2,500 points + $50 while Category 2 hotels cost 8,000 points per night or 4,000 points + $55.
- Hyatt House Dallas/Frisco
- Hyatt House Dallas/Lincoln Park
- Hyatt House Dallas/Uptown
- Hyatt House Denver/Lakwood at Belmar
- Hyatt Place Augusta
- Hyatt Place Buffalo/Amherst
- Hyatt Place Champaign
- Hyatt Place Corpus Christi
- Hyatt Place Dallas/Grapevine
- Hyatt Place Nashville/Franklin/Cool Springs
- Hyatt Place Nashville/Hendersonville
- Hyatt Place North Charleston
- Hyatt Place Sacramento/Roseville
- Hyatt Place Salt Lake City Airport
- Hyatt Place Santiago/Vitacura
- Hyatt Place Savannah Airport
- Hyatt Regency Suites Atlanta Northwest
Category 1 -> Category 3
Category 1 hotels cost 5,000 points per night or 2,500 points + $50 while Category 3 hotels cost 12,000 points per night or 6,000 points + $75
- Hyatt Place Asheville Downtown
Category 2 -> Category 3
Category 2 hotels cost 8,000 points per night or 4,000 points + $55 per night while Category 3 hotels cost 12,000 points per night or 6,000 points + $75
- Grand Hyatt Amman
- Grand Hyatt Chengdu
- Grand Hyatt Incheon
- Grant Hyatt Santiago (review here)
- Hyatt House Atlanta/Downtown
- Hyatt House Belmont/Redwood Shores
- Hyatt House Boston/Waltham
- Hyatt House Emeryville/San Francisco Bay Area
- Hyatt House Falls Church/Merrifield
- Hyatt House Naples/5th Avenue
- Hyatt House Pleasanton
- Hyatt House San Diego/Sorrento Mesa
- Hyatt House San Juan
- Hyatt House Santa Clara
- Hyatt Place Chicago South University
- Hyatt Place Fort Worth Historic Stockyards
- Hyatt Place Garden City
- Hyatt Place Houston/The Woodlands
- Hyatt Place Mohegan Sun
- Hyatt Place Portland Airport
- Hyatt Place San Juan/City Center
- Hyatt Regency Dallas
- Hyatt Regency SF Airport
- Hyatt Valencia
Category 3 -> Category 4
Category 3 hotels cost 12,000 points per night or 6,000 points + $75 while Category 4 hotels cost 15,000 points per night or 7,500 points + $100
- Grand Hyatt DFW
- Hyatt Place Dewey Beach
- Hyatt Place Nashville Downtown
- Hyatt Regency McCormick Place
Category 4 -> Category 5
Category 4 hotels cost 15,000 points per night or 7,500 points + $100 while Category 5 hotels cost 20,000 points per night or 10,000 points + $125
- Hyatt Centric Park City
- Hyatt Centric The Loop Chicago
- Hyatt Regency Jersey City on the Hudson
- Hyatt Regency San Francisco
What You Need To Know
Always check the hotel’s cancellation policy, but with most hotels and points, you can always cancel up to the day before (or, in some cases, a few days before) and get all your points back. So, it would definitely be worth booking these hotels now, even if they are speculative bookings.
If you need to make a change after tomorrow at a hotel that has gone up, it will be repriced at the (then) current rates so you will pay more. You can book as far ahead as August 29, 2017 at the current rates.
If you have already booked a hotel at a property that will be dropping in price tomorrow, you can certainly change it to take advantage of getting your points back so some good news there!
4 Important Hotels to Note
Unfortunately, tomorrow, there are 4 Hyatt hotels that will move out of reach of the Hyatt credit card’s anniversary night. That certificate is only good for Category 1-4 and 4 hotels will be moving from Category 4 to 5 tomorrow. This is probably the biggest disappointment to me since that certificate is a great way to redeem and preserve points. If you redeem for a category 4, that is 15,000 points you can save for something else!
If you have one of these certificates, definitely consider if you want to redeem one for one of these 4 hotels since you will never be able to do it after tomorrow. Here are the 4 hotels that will be changing to category 5:
- Hyatt Centric Park City
- Hyatt Centric The Loop Chicago
- Hyatt Regency Jersey City on the Hudson
- Hyatt Regency San Francisco
I stayed at the Hyatt Centric The Loop Chicago (review here) earlier this year and had a really nice stay there. In fact, it was booked using the annual certificate so I will be sorry to see this one go away.
Summary
Remember, if you do not have enough points, you can always transfer from Chase Ultimate Rewards at 1,000:1,000. The time is now if you want to book these hotels! Of course, there are some hotels that will be dropping tomorrow and I am eagerly waiting for that. I will be booking up a storm tomorrow morning! 🙂
On a personal note, I am disappointed to see the relatively new Hyatt Place Buffalo/Amherst going up. This is a really nice hotel at a fantastic redemption rate (now) and very convenient for the Buffalo Airport. I do not blame them for kicking it up a category but still… Also, I “stayed” at the Grand Hyatt Santiago last year and found it to be an incredible property and an absolute steal for only 8,000 points per night (even better at the $5 I paid for the night!). Again, I do not blame them for raising it but it is still disappointing to see it go up by 50% in points.
