Here is my proposal to the Bilt team.
This can’t be implemented right away for legal reasons, but longer term here are the three Bilt cards:
- Blue card – no annual fee, earn 1x everywhere, 3x at some partner merchants. For every $1 spent on the card you get $1 of fee-free mortgage payment, up to 30,000 points per year. (If this is too expensive, switch to to every $3 spent.) Automatic Bilt Silver status without any spend (for transfer promos or whatnot). 10,000 Bilt points signup bonus after $1,000 spend.
- Obsidian card – $95 annual fee, earns 1x everywhere, 2x on Travel unlimited, and 3x on both Dining and Grocery with a combined $25k limit per year, 3x at some partner merchants unlimited. For every $1 spent on the card you get $1 of fee-free mortgage payment, up to 60,000 points per year. Automatic Bilt Gold status without any spend (for transfer promos or whatnot). Two $50 hotel credits. 20,000 Bilt points signup bonus after $2,000 spend.
- Palladium card – $495 annual fee, earns 2x everywhere unlimited, 3x on both Dining and Grocery with a combined $25k limit per year, 4x at some partner merchants unlimited. For every $1 spent on the card you get $1 of fee-free mortgage payment, up to 120,000 points per year. Automatic Bilt Platinum status without any spend (for transfer promos or whatnot). Two $200 hotel credits. 50,000 Bilt points signup bonus after $4,000 spend.
Other Card Details:
- No two rewards options.
- No Bilt Cash earned on spend on any card.
- Bilt Cash runs in the background as a perks program, employed for various occasions. E.g. if you spend over $10k annual on the card you get $25 of Bilt Cash which can be used for some freebies or Collection items.
- No Bilt status (Platinum, Gold, Silver) earned from spend on any card – it comes automatic with the card tiers, as described.
- Rent/mortgage payments go on the card, not directly debited from the bank (that kinda defeats the whole definition of ‘the card’ paying your rent).
- No tax payment exclusion (I don’t see the issue on the Blue and Obsidian card; Palladium card should also be fine given my proposed 120k rent/mortgage limit), no gift card exclusion (just causes confusion; can send out warnings afterward if there’s some issue on a particular account), and definitely no eBay exclusion (WTH?!!).
- Rent Day – first of each month get 1x bonus point per dollar spent, up to 1,000 bonus points each month.
