Bilt Rewards: Worth it Without Their Credit Card?
Bilt Rewards has been shaking up the loyalty industry since it launched in 2021, making waves as the first program to reward members for paying rent. That alone generated plenty of buzz, press, and apparently, a whole lot of members. Their Bilt Mastercard launched around the same time, and if you follow Brian Kelly—aka The Points Guy—you’ve probably heard him singing Bilt’s praises (fine print: he’s an investor in Bilt. We’ll let that one slide and move on).
But not everyone can (or wants to) get another credit card. So, the real question is: Is Bilt Rewards worth it without the credit card? Well, the answer to that isn’t a clear yes or no. But we were surprised that the Rewards program tied to rent is the least rewarding around all aspects of rent. Read on to get the details…
Photo credit: Shutterstock
How bilt works:
Anyone can sign up to be a Bilt member—renter or not. While its core concept (supposedly) revolves around rewarding rent payments, it has extended perks for spending around your home and neighborhood, so it’s more of a Lifestyle Reward program. Here’s how to get started:
Link Your Cards – Connect your Amex, Visa, or Mastercard debit/credit cards to Bilt to track eligible spending and earn points.
Rent Payments:
If your home is INSIDE the Bilt Alliance network: Pay rent via Bilt’s app or website and earn points. Simple.
If your home is OUTSIDE the Bilt Alliance network: You can still earn points, but Bilt will process your rent payment via check or ACH for a fee: $9.95/month for debit or 3% (minimum $3) for credit. Ouch.
Once set up, here are ways to earn points (as of this writing):
Rent: 250 points per on-time payment, maxing out at a measly 3,000 points annually. For a program built around rewarding rent, calling this a disappointment is an understatement.
Rideshare: 2x points on Lyft when accounts are linked.
Dining: 2x or 3x points at participating restaurants when using linked cards.
Fitness: Points for classes at Barry’s Bootcamp, CorePower Yoga, SoulCycle, etc., if booked via Bilt. Sometimes you’ll get freebies like a smoothie or water bottle for being a member.
Pharmacy: 1x or 2x points at Walgreens, plus 100 points for prescription refills.
Travel: 1x points when booking through Bilt’s travel portal.
Home Decor: 1x points on Bilt’s curated “Home Collection.”
Home Purchase: 1 point per $2 spent if buying a home via Bilt’s partner agents.
Rent Day Bonuses: On the first of each month, Bilt offers special promotions, exclusive merch drops, and boosted redemptions
Tier Status-Worth the Grind?
Bilt has 3 elite tiers, which you can achieve by either earning a set number of points annually or by spending enough through Bilt’s platform (note: ironically rent payments don’t count toward fast-tracking status). Given the high spending or point thresholds required, the perks are underwhelming—unless discounted or free helicopter rides (yes, with BLADE) are your thing.
In the next section we’ll show how difficult it is to achieve these higher levels without the credit card.
earning potential
We ran some numbers for a hypothetical Bilt member who actively takes advantage of most earning opportunities. By our calculation, they would rake in just under 40,000 points a year, which isn’t even enough for Silver status.
Because the rent-earning rate is abysmal, you’d need to shift your behaviors to maximize points—like using Lyft over Uber, dining at partner restaurants a lot, and booking fitness classes through Bilt. Achievable? Yes. Effortless? No.
And we didn’t include home buying as a viable earning strategy because, let’s be real, adjusting behaviors to earn points when making one of the biggest financial decisions of your life is not something we can get behind.
redemption-What’s the Value?
Bilt offers plenty of ways to redeem points (great!), but value varies widely (not so great). Here’s how they stack up for a Blue (basic) member:
Best Value: Transferring to a plethora of airline and hotel partners at a 1:1 ratio, making it a solid way to top off your travel rewards for your favorite programs.
Worst Value: Paying rent. The rate? Half a cent per point. For a program that built its name on rewarding rent, we again are surprised how bad everything related to rent is!
Most convenient: Syncing your Bilt and Amazon accounts allows you to shop Amazon with Bilt points. The value is not great, but the process is easy and there is no minimum redemption.
Biggest hassles: Rent, again, unfortunately. And similar set up having to sync your student loan account for redemption which might not be worth the hassle depending upon how many points you have.
Rent Day promotions occasionally boost redemption values, so keep an eye out for those.
Pros & Cons of Bilt Rewards
(Without the Credit Card)
Pros of the program:
1. Earn on everyday spending: Other than switching from Uber to Lyft or CVS to Walgreens, you can easily earn for the things you were already doing.
2. Myriad of earning & redemption options: Bilt is adding new options all the time so this program will likely get even more robust than it already is.
3. User-friendly site: Easy to navigate to keep track of points, status, and earning and redemption opportunities.
4. Frequent promotions/deals: Rent day deals can be solid.
Cons of the program:
1. Rent earning & redemption value is terrible: To max out at 3,000 points annually on rent it’s literally not worth the effort. And the redemption value is so bad you’d be crazy to use your points to decrease your rent.
a. If your rental unit is outside the Bilt Alliance network we recommend forgoing the 3,000 points and not setting up payment via Bilt to avoid the fees that come along with it.
2. Mediocre redemption values: Most are just ok to poor. Transferring points to hotels and airlines offer the best option, but the rest are just ho-hum.
3. Elite status is hard to achieve: And even if you do the Perks aren’t exciting.
4. Earning requires a shift in habit: To maximize points, you need to actively book fitness classes, travel, and dining through Bilt’s partners via their site. Passively linking your cards won’t get you very far.
OUR VERDICT:
It’s not an enthusiastic yes, but it’s not a hard no either. Hence, we won’t be giving this our usual Rewarded or Robbed? treatment.
We should say we love the concept of what the Bilt team is trying to do here- give American’s a program that rewards their everyday lifestyle choices. And we love how they have made the program more robust in just a few years and months. That gives us hope for the future.
But if your plan was to sign up, pay your rent, and watch the points roll in—don’t bother. This is NOT the program for you as it’s not highly rewarding for rent. But if you’re willing to stay engaged with the site frequently, shift spending habits a bit, and use their site for more things, you can earn enough points to give you something of moderate but not great value.
Would Bilt be better with their credit card? Absolutely, as all loyalty program cobrand cards deliver way more value than the free programs. But if another card is not what you are after, you’ll need to put in the work to squeeze real value out of this program.
Leave us a comment! Do you agree or disagree? Any further tips about Bilt Rewards?
