This is something that The Points Guy circulated, but I thought it was worth sharing because we immediately made use of this. I already posted about the trip we booked to South Africa next year, during which our last stop is in Cape Town. As it turns out, you can actually book the Hyatt Regency Cape Town for peanuts if you use points, compared to the actual cash price.

1. Details of the Hyatt Regency Cape Town
2. Pay with money, and the Hyatt Regency is as expensive as you’d expect it to be…
3. …but pay with points and you can stay at the Hyatt Regency Cape Town for peanuts
4. How to book
5. Summary

Details of the Hyatt Regency Cape Town

The Hyatt Regency Cape Town is located on the edge of where the central business district of Cape Town and the historic Muslim (Cape Malay) neighborhood Bo Kaap meet. Right beyond Bo Kaap is Cape Town’s famous Signal Hill, which is really more than just a hill, and more of a small range that also includes the imposing Lion’s Head. While Signal Hill can be driven onto to enjoy the views, Lion’s Head requires a hike that is only for that that don’t have fear of heights. And further to the south west is of course the beautiful Table Mountain, which is Cape Town’s instantly recognizable geological formation. So, you can say that the Hyatt Regency Cape town is in a good location, close to myriad shops and restaurants in downtown, while also on the edge of historic districts and natural beauty. If you’re more of a beach person though, the Hyatt is not particularly close to the beach, as Cape Town’s beaches are all along the western coast of the city.

Known for its colorful houses on the slopes of Signal Hill, Bo Kaap is a neighborhood that is quickly becoming a tourist hotspot. For it’s beauty and its calm streets that allow for a leisurly walk, but also for the food! What seems to be a mix of Malaysian dishes cna be had here, including rotis and curries.

This hotel has a number of standard rooms as well as larger, luxury suits. The normal rooms start at a generous 38 square meters, with the suites being even larger. Given the height of the hotel, if you’re towards the back you’ll have beautiful views of Signal Hill and Lion’s Head. All rooms appear to have a king-size bed and the usual amenities, such as an ensuite bathroom, desk, comfortable seating and such. Interiors are modern and despite the blue color pattern appear warm and welcoming.

The hotel also has a club lounge, though it seems to only serve snacks and appetizers later in the day, and not breakfast as is the case at some other Hyatt Clubs. There’s also a pool, a fitness center, and overnight self parking is also available for a rather cheap 100 South African Rand (about $6) per night (compared to e.g. Hawaii, where you will easily pay $40 per night).

Pay with money, and the Hyatt Regency is as expensive as you’d expect it to be…

To get a sense of the rates around the time we will be visiting, I looked at both Expedia (where I often like to book my hotel stays) as well as directly with the hotel on the Hyatt website. Look at these outlandish prices: Expedia is more expensive than Hyatt at ~$700 per night, with Hyatt at ~$650. Though this does include breakfast, and represents the lowest per-night rates for our dates, about 9 months from now.

…but pay with points and you can stay at the Hyatt Regency Cape Town for peanuts

Now have a look at the price with points, below: You can book this same room for 3500 Hyatt points per night! By my book, that is $35 per night at a 1 cent/point ratio, or a discount of 95%. At a more conservative rate, I usually tend to think of hotel points being worth 0.5 cents/point, meaning that we’d be talking of an even lower price of $17.50 per night.

I do believe some things are not included, such as breakfast, and it’s possible you’ll get a room without a view, on a lower floor or something. But for this price, that seems like a small sacrifice….

The lesson: it’s very much worthwhile, like with flights, to check the point requirement with the hotel (not credit card travel portal) for some of these upper tier chains, as sometimes you may bump into some great deals!

How to book

Log in, and search for availabiltiy for your dates using Hyatt’s search tool. Put in the ‘Hyatt Regency Cape Town’, select your dates, and check the ‘Use Points’ box, as below:

You will then be presented with options for rooms, as displayed in the previous section of this post. You’ll see that throughout May the rate is 3500 points per night. Other months may be different, so be sure to check before transferring any points. For example, in April the rate was 5000 points per night.

Select the room you wish to book, but note that to continue with the booking you will need to be logged in. If you don’t have enough points, this is when you transfer points. Chase and Bilt points are the only credit points currencies that transfer to Hyatt, and they do so 1:1. But personally I’d recommend using Chase points, as I’d prefer to use Bilt to book business class flights with Japan Airlines… Either way, the transfer to Hyatt should be instant. Once the points arrive with Hyatt, you can finalize your booking as you’d always do it.

One note: you do have an option to pay with points and cash, but I really don’t recommend doing that since the cash price at this hotel is far higher than the points price. Simply pay in full with points for the best deal.

That’s it! Pretty easy, huh?

Summary

I was alerted to cheap rates at the Hyatt Regency Cape Town, so I jumped on it to book us a 3-night stay at this nice hotel for the tail-end of our trip to South Africa, next year. I was able to procure a stay at this $650+ property for only 3500 points per night, which seems like a total steal. With these guideline, I hope you will not only make use of this for yourself, but perhaps inspire you to try and look at other Hyatt properties in other locations to see what options you may have! It can certainly be lucrative to book such properties with points, now and again…