How to Plan a Family Vacation Using Points & Miles

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If you have a family of four or more, planning a points and miles vacation can feel like an uphill battle, but it doesn’t need to be.

Redemption strategies and travel tips for families aren’t that different from those of anyone else. The principles of how to plan a family vacation on a budget are the same as for solo travelers and couples.

So if you’ve been pulling your hair out trying to plan your next rewards-funded family vacation, allow this guide to help ease that process and offer some proven budget travel strategies along the way.

Why Using Points and Miles Makes Sense for Family Travel

It’s no secret that traveling can be expensive. That’s all the more so if overwater Maldivian bungalows, first-class flight tickets or five-star hotel experiences are on your bucket list.

That’s why most of us got into this hobby in the first place—to fund our travel with points instead of an ever-dwindling bank balance.

The key idea of the points and miles hobby is to leverage your everyday expenses and fixed costs—in other words, money you’re spending anyway—to earn a return in the form of points. By doing so, you can fund your travels using points instead of additional cash outgoings, enabling you to travel bigger, better and more frequently for half the price (or less in most cases).

So when it comes to the question of how to plan a family vacation on a budget, points and miles can help ease the cost burden and allow for more luxurious, memorable experiences.

How to Earn Points and Miles Efficiently for Family Travel

Earning points and miles efficiently for family travel on a budget is no different from the strategies employed by solo travelers and couples.

Let’s run through the key pillars of your earning strategy.

Choose Cards Suited to Your Spending Profile

Without the right credit cards, you’ll limit your capacity to earn points and leverage your spending. Choosing credit cards that are best suited to your spending habits and travel goals is the key to maximizing your points and miles.

This begins with reflection. Take a look at your typical monthly expenditure and identify your key spending categories.

For instance, perhaps the bulk of your spending goes toward grocery shopping and dining—a highly probable situation for a large family. In this case, a card like the American Express® Gold Card (see rates and fees)—which offers 4X points at U.S. supermarkets (on up to $25,000 annually, then 1X points thereafter) and 4X points at restaurants worldwide (on up to $50,000 annually, then 1X points thereafter)—would be a perfect match.

Alternatively, perhaps a large portion of your spending goes toward miscellaneous costs, such as recurring bills and online shopping purchases. In this case, a card that offers a competitive baseline points multiplier—such as the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card—would be a great all-rounder card.

Of course, there’s nothing stopping you from holding both cards (and other ones) simultaneously. When you open cards that match your spending habits, you’ll be much better equipped to offset their annual fees through spending.

Focus on Flexible Points-Earning Credit Cards

Co-branded credit cards have their place. These are cards that are issued in partnership with a card issuer or bank and an airline or hotel. They typically include a range of complimentary perks with the respective airline or hotel, such as elite status and statement credits.

However, co-branded cards earn points (or miles) that can be redeemed with the respective airline or hotel only. In contrast, general travel rewards cards earn flexible points that can be redeemed either through the card issuer’s travel portal or by transferring them to a typically large list of partner airlines and hotels.

When planning a family vacation on a budget, your best bet is to focus on cards that earn flexible points. For instance, you can transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to 14 airline and hotel partners and American Express Membership Rewards points to 20 partners.

This gives you maximum flexibility when it comes to booking award fares and hotel stays, enabling you to prioritize the best rates rather than being stuck with the one airline or hotel. That way, you’ll have more points left over for future redemptions.

Leverage Welcome Offers, Everyday Spending and Bonus Categories

Lucrative welcome offers are often the reason for opening credit cards, and solid bonus spending categories justify holding onto them. Leveraging both aspects through your everyday spending is the key to maximizing credit card points.

Welcome offers come with minimum spending requirements that may sound steep at a first glance. However, if you break them down on a month by month basis, they’re often manageable to achieve.

For example, let’s say a welcome offer requires you to spend $6,000 within the first three months of card membership. That works out to $2,000 per month. For some households—particularly large families—your combined monthly expenditure on groceries, online shopping and dining may already exceed $2,000. If that’s the case, you simply have to ensure that you’re charging these expenses to your credit card, rather than cash or debit cards.

However, if your monthly outgoings are less than what you need to meet the spending requirements, there are still many ways to get creative to hit the minimum spend threshold without overextending your budget.

For instance, you can prepay bills such as utilities, cell phone bills, insurance premiums and homeowners association fees. You can also prepay upcoming vacations. That way, you can schedule upcoming annual expenses to occur earlier in the year, enabling them to count toward your welcome offer minimum spend.

With the welcome offer secured, your next step is to use the card’s bonus spending categories to the max.

Depending which credit cards you have, you’ll want to prioritize certain cards for specific situations. For instance, the average household spent $9,985 on food (both at home and away from home) in 2023, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Charged to the Amex Gold Card, $9,985 on dining and groceries would earn you 39,940 Membership Rewards points. If you charged this same spending to a card that didn’t have groceries or dining as a bonus spending category, you’d end up with a mere 9,985 points.

Likewise, you’ll find credit cards that earn elevated points on streaming services, gas, utilities, rental payments, travel and more, enabling you to boost your return in most instances. For example, the Chase Sapphire Preferred® Card’s bonus categories offer a wide variety of earning opportunities for an annual fee of $95.

And even for obscure or miscellaneous spending, a card with a solid baseline rewards rate will ensure you’re getting between 1.5X and 2X points per dollar spent.

Finding the best credit card bonus spending categories suited to your habits is key to your success in leveraging your everyday spending.

The key is to make your everyday spending do the work for you. Once you start charging everyday expenses to your credit card, the last step is to ensure you always pay your balance off before its due date. That way, you’ll avoid exorbitant interest charges and help protect—and even boost—your credit score.

Hotel Redemption Strategies for Large Families

Many hotel rooms have only two double beds in a single room. While this may fit your family of four, such accommodations can feel cramped for larger families. In such cases, there are a few properties with multi-room or additional bed layouts that you can book using points.

Choosing Family-Friendly Hotel Chains with Suites

Embassy Suites is a Hilton brand hotel that’s perfect for large families. At most of their properties, each room comes with an amazing feature for traveling families—a door, affording adults privacy and kids independence.

Embassy Suites’ rooms divide the sleeping area and the living area with a door, allowing families to close off the bedroom so a little one (or a grown-up) can take a nap. This creates natural barriers for some much-needed privacy when traveling as a large party. Embassy Suites’ standard room configuration can sleep up to four people, making it perfect for large families.

Similarly, Residence Inn and Fairfield Inn hotels are both Marriott properties that have two-bedroom suite layouts. However, because these rooms are not considered standard rooms at most properties, you typically won’t be able to book them directly with points.

That said, if you have elite status with the Marriot Bonvoy program, you may be able to get an upgrade from a base room (without a door) to one of the larger suites. However, this isn’t a guarantee, and you won’t find out until check-in. If you plan on attempting to score an upgrade, you’ll need a backup plan. Think about booking two rooms under different names in case you aren’t able to get the upgrade.

If you end up paying cash for a suite at the Residence Inn or Fairfield Inn, at least do so using a card that either earns you points through its travel portal or that offers a travel statement credit. For instance, both the Chase Sapphire Reserve® and the Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card offer generous annual travel statement credits that can help you reduce the cash cost of your hotel stay.

Some other chains to consider for large families include Hyatt House, Homewood Suites by Hilton and Springhill Suites by Marriott. There are also hotels out there that charge the standard room rate for family-style suites. Some examples include the Sheraton Lakeside Terrace Villas at Mountain Vista Avon, Vail Valley in Colorado and Conrad Fort Lauderdale Beach in Florida.

Check out the best Hyatt family resorts for more inspiration.

Booking Multiple Rooms or Adjoining Rooms

As you’re paying with points, you may be able to afford to book two rooms instead of one.

After booking your reservation, call the hotel front desk and ask for adjoined rooms. Keep in mind that not all hotel properties offer adjoining rooms. Depending on the age of your kids, it may be just as practical to split the family between two rooms.

If you request adjoined rooms, be sure to confirm at check-in that the hotel is able to honor your request.

Take Advantage of Free Nights

You can turn an already cost-effective family stay on points into an even cheaper experience by taking advantage of free night promotions.

While general travel rewards cards are excellent when it comes to redeeming points with maximum flexibility, co-branded cards play a key role in providing hotel- and airline-specific perks.

One of the standout perks of co-branded hotel cards is free night awards. These can either be tied to minimum spends or included as complimentary annual benefits.

Here’s a summary of every co-branded credit card that offers free night awards.

If you’re not interested in opening a co-branded hotel credit card, there are still other ways to score free nights for your family vacation.

Through Hyatt’s Brand Explorer Award promotion, you’ll enjoy a free night award at a Category 1 to 4 property each time you stay with five different Hyatt brands. Likewise, if you happen to hold Marriott Titanium elite status, you can choose a free night award worth up to 40,000 Bonvoy points after earning 75 elite night credits as part of the annual choice benefit.

Similarly, keep in mind that Marriott, Hilton and IHG all offer free nights when redeeming points for longer award stays.

For stays at Marriott properties, you’ll automatically receive the fifth night free on consecutive award stays of five or more nights. The discount applies to the night with the lowest point redemption value rather than the actual fifth night.

For those with Hilton Honors elite status—which you can get by simply holding the $0 annual fee Hilton Honors American Express Card (see rates and fees)—you’ll also enjoy the fifth night free on consecutive award stays of five nights or longer.

And for holders of any IHG One Rewards credit card, you’ll receive the fourth night free on award stays with no limit on the number of nights stayed consecutively.

These benefits can go a long way in making your family vacation on points affordable.

Consider Vacation Rentals for More Space

In certain cases, cramping your family into a hotel room just isn’t feasible. Instead, a vacation rental can offer the much-needed space and privacy that a large family requires. Thankfully, there are alternatives to Airbnb where you can use your points to help reduce the cost of vacation rentals.

You can search for vacation rentals through Chase Travel℠ enabling you to redeem your Ultimate Rewards points toward accommodation costs. If you hold the Chase Sapphire Reserve®, you’ll be able to redeem your points for 1.5 cents apiece when booking a vacation rental.

Likewise, holders of The Platinum Card® from American Express or The Business Platinum Card® from American Express can access luxury vacation homes through the American Express Select Homes + Retreats program. The only drawback to Amex’s program is that you’ll be redeeming your points for 0.7 cent apiece—a suboptimal rate compared to other redemption opportunities.

Capital One also offers its own “Premier” and “Lifestyle” collection of vacation rentals. If you hold the Capital One Venture Rewards Credit Card or the Capital One Spark Miles for Business, you’ll have access to the Lifestyle collection only. However, if you hold either the Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card or the Capital One Venture X Business, you’ll be able to access both the Lifestyle and Premier collections, giving you a wider choice of luxury properties.

You can redeem your Capital One miles for 1 cent apiece when paying for Premier and Lifestyle collection properties.

Likewise, you can take advantage of your Marriott and Hyatt points—or any flexible points currencies that transfer to these travel rewards programs—to book Marriott Homes & Villas and Hyatt Homes & Hideaways. These programs offer luxury properties that could provide the perfect place for your family getaway, all while being paid for with points. While the Hyatt program offers only a few thousand properties nationwide, Marriott offers more than 140,000 rental properties across 132 countries.

Similarly, Wyndham Vacasa rentals offers more than 15,000 properties across the U.S., Canada, Mexico, Belize and Costa Rica where you can redeem your Wyndham points to pay for your stay.

For Wyndham Vacasa rentals with an average cost equal to $250 or less, it’ll cost you 15,000 points per bedroom per night. If the cost is between $250.01 and $500, you’ll be charged 30,000 points per bedroom per night. Properties costing $500.01 or higher are ineligible for payment with points.

If you focus on redeeming your points for properties priced at just under $250 or just under $500, you’ll get the best value for your points. And if you hold the Wyndham Earner Credit Card, you’ll enjoy a 10% discount off award stays.

While the volume and international reach of vacation rentals bookable with points is less than that of hotels or Airbnb, it’s still worthwhile to explore your options. And even if your per-point redemption rate is suboptimal compared to other redemption alternatives, it will still save you from paying cash.

Flight Redemption Strategies for Families

Air travel doesn’t need to be luxury to be successful. By using your points wisely, taking advantage of airline promotions and traveling on off-peak dates, you can score yourself flight tickets for the entire family at an affordable price.

Utilize Airline Miles and Transferable Points

You can reduce the cash cost of air travel significantly by redeeming airline miles for your airfare. However, transferable points are going to give you the widest choice when it comes to booking flights because you’ll be able to book with any of your credit card issuer’s airline partners.

To put things into perspective, Amex Membership Rewards points transfer to 18 airline partners; Capital One miles transfer to 15 airlines; Citi ThankYou Points transfer to 14; and Chase Ultimate Rewards points transfer to 11 airline loyalty programs.

That way, when it comes to booking, you’ll be able to transfer your points to any of these airline partners—typically at 1:1 ratios—giving you the widest choice of routes and prices.

Transferable points come with a second major benefit. Depending on which airline you fly with, you can leverage distance-based partner award charts to book cheaper flights on partner airlines.

Most airlines have switched to dynamic award pricing, tying the number of miles required for an award seat to its cash price. This makes it difficult to get outsized value for your miles when redeeming them. However, in some cases, certain airlines use distance- or zone-based award charts to price their partner award flights—even if they themselves use dynamic pricing.

In short, that means you could redeem the same number of miles in peak season as you would on off-peak dates, significantly increasing the value of your miles.

To learn more about how to leverage partner award bookings, check out this article: Partner Awards Bookings: Everything You Need to Know.

Southwest Companion Pass for Family Travel

While redeeming your points and miles strategically can help with saving money on travel, there’s nothing like free flights to do the job. Enter, the Southwest Companion Pass.

Equipped with the Southwest Companion Pass, you can nominate a companion to fly with you an unlimited number of times for just $5.60 in taxes and fees each way. The Southwest Companion Pass is valid for the remainder of the calendar year in which you earn it plus the following calendar year. That means if you manage to earn your Companion Pass right at the beginning of the calendar year, it’ll be valid for almost two years.

To earn the Southwest Companion Pass, you need to either fly 100 flights with Southwest within a calendar year or earn 135,000 Rapid Rewards points within a calendar year. In most cases, earning Rapid Rewards will be the easiest option for scoring yourself a Companion Pass.

If one parent earns the Companion Pass, that’ll enable one kid (or the other parent) to fly for (almost) free. However, if you’re pursuing a two-player strategy and both parents manage to earn the Southwest Companion Pass, that means both children could fly for (almost) free. Meanwhile, both parents can use their Southwest Rapid Rewards points or transfer Chase Ultimate Rewards points to Southwest to travel purely on points, further saving money on family travel.

Check out our in-depth guide to earning the Southwest Companion Pass so you can save money on your next family vacation.

Fly During Off-Peak Times for Better Redemption Rates

Another solid strategy for how to plan a family vacation on a budget is to focus on off-peak seasons. Traveling off peak doesn’t just mean cheaper flights. It also means cheaper hotels, fewer crowds and discounted rates on activities.

For instance, if you’re planning a family vacation on a budget to Walt Disney World, traveling during the low season will afford you the cheapest rate on park tickets.

For airlines that use dynamic pricing, off-peak travel seasons will also require the fewest miles for award tickets.

Admittedly, traveling off peak is not always easy for families tied to school holidays, but if you can manage to find a way around this, you’ll be guaranteed budget-friendly family travel.

Cost-Efficient Strategies for Dining

It’s easy to focus on major expenses like flights and hotels when planning family vacations on a budget. Yet, feeding four or more mouths three times per day can easily exceed the cost of your flights and hotels—especially with teenagers.

Luckily, there are ways you can reduce the cost of dining and earn a return on your restaurant expenditure, so you can enjoy every bite without worrying about breaking the bank.

Some of the best credit cards for dining come with rewards and statement credits on dining expenditure. The all-time favorite is the American Express® Gold Card. The Amex Gold Card offers three dining statement credits, for an annual fee of $325 (see rates and fees), including:

• $120 statement credit, issued in $10 monthly credits, with Grubhub (including Seamless), The Cheesecake Factory, Goldbelly, Wine.com and Five Guys
• $100 Resy statement credit, issued in semi-annual $50 credits
• $84 Dunkin’ statement credit, issued in $7 monthly credits

Even if you can’t take advantage of these restaurants while on holiday, the card earns 4X points at restaurants worldwide on up to $50,000 in spending per year (1X points thereafter). That means you can earn a competitive return on your cash spending, helping you to fund your next vacation with points.

Holders of the Marriott Bonvoy Brilliant® American Express® Card can also enjoy a $300 annual statement credit toward dining purchases, issued in $25 monthly credits.

Similarly, joining airline and hotel dining programs is another way to earn a return on family dining expenditure. These programs enable you to link a card to your account to then earn miles every time you dine with a partner restaurant. They also offer first-dine welcome bonuses upon signing up.

Some examples include:

• American Airlines AAdvantage Dining
• Alaska Airlines Mileage Plan Dining
• Delta SkyMiles Dining
• JetBlue TrueBlue Dining
• Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards Dining
• Spirit Airlines Free Spirit Dining
• United Airlines MileagePlus Dining

Depending on your status, you could earn up to 5X miles per dollar spent at restaurants through these programs. Not to mention, you’ll also double-dip on points by spending with a credit card that earns separate points on dining expenditure.

That way, you’ll be able to offset some of your holiday dining costs through accumulating points and miles.

Tips for Maximizing Rewards and Redemptions for Larger Families

Using points and miles to fund budget family travel is a great way to save money. And to make your points go even further, you can take advantage of a few other family-friendly travel tips and tricks. Let’s check them out.

Use Flexible Points to Top Off Redemptions

Redemptions for families of four or more typically require a significant number of total points, particularly on international award tickets. For this reason, you might find yourself short of the required number of miles when booking your tickets. That’s where flexible points come into play.

If four award tickets cost a total of 150,000 miles but you have only 120,000 miles, you can transfer flexible points from your credit card loyalty program to top off your account.

Be it Amex Membership Rewards points, Chase Ultimate Rewards points, Capital One Miles or Citi ThankYou Points, flexible points can always save the day.

Plan Redemptions Early to Secure Availability

Planning your points and miles redemptions early is key to securing affordable award rates. On top of this, award seat availability can often be limited. That’s all the more so when you’re trying to find award seats on the same flight for a family of four or more.

In most cases, the earlier you can begin to plan and book, the greater the chances are of securing affordable award tickets. As spaces fill up, prices begin to skyrocket.

For some tips and tricks to securing award seats, check out this guide on finding award seat availability for a family of four or more.

Combine Points, Miles and Cash to Save on Family Trips

Just because you don’t have enough points to cover the entirety of your award fares, it doesn’t mean you should lose hope. Most airlines allow you to combine your points with cash, enabling you to significantly reduce the total cash cost of your vacation.

You also can take advantage of travel statement credit perks conferred by credit cards to reduce the cost of flight and hotel bookings.

For example, the Chase Sapphire Reserve card offers a $300 annual travel statement credit which you can put toward flights and hotels, among other travel purchases.

Likewise, The Platinum Card from American Express (see rates and fees) offers up to $200 in statement credits annually on prepaid bookings with Fine Hotels + Resorts® or The Hotel Collection (minimum stay of two nights required), when made through American Express Travel. The Amex Platinum also offers a statement credit of up to $200 annually toward airline incidental fees, such as seat assignment and checked baggage fees, with one eligible airline of your choice.

The Capital One Venture X Rewards Credit Card also offers a competitive $300 annual travel statement credit for bookings made through Capital One Travel.

Not to mention, booking with flights or hotels through any of the above card issuers’ travel portals will earn you an elevated rate of points—between 5X and 10X points per dollar spent—enabling you to make your next vacation points-funded.

Transform Family Vacations with Smart Points Strategy

Planning a family trip is intimidating. That’s all the more so when trying to work out how to plan a family vacation on a budget. However, by opening credit cards suited to your spending habits, charging them for everyday expenses and earning their welcome bonuses, you can leverage thousands—if not hundreds of thousands—of points and miles to reduce the out-of-pocket cost of your trip.

Keep in mind that you don’t always need to seek the optimum redemption value for your points and miles. Rather, you just need to find a value that you’re happy with. If that’s 1.5 cents per point, great, and if it’s 1 cent per point, that’s also fine.

If your redemption can significantly reduce the cash cost of your trip and make for a memorable family vacation, then you’ve used your points and miles successfully.