Now you can earn 3x Avios on rent with Bilt

1️⃣ Citi increases annual fee on the AAdvantage Executive card ($595 to $695)

The Citi AAdvantage Executive World Elite Mastercard will increase its annual fee from $595 to $695 starting August 23, 2026. This annual fee increase comes, as expected, with new benefits. 

• New credits: $500 per year at American Airlines Vacations, split into $250 each semester, and $100 for in-flight purchases on American Airlines and spending at the Admirals Club.

• More rewards: hotel and rental car bookings through the AAdvantage portal will go from earning 10x miles to 12x miles per dollar, and new Loyalty Points bonuses will be added.

• Other benefits: the monthly Lyft credit will increase from $10 to $15, and status at Avis and Omni Hotels will be included, plus the possibility of obtaining an annual free night at Omni after a qualifying stay.

This card includes an Admiral's Club membership, which on its own is quite expensive. Until now, the price of the membership was $850 a year, but once this card update takes effect, the price will become $1,400 a year. 

Personally, I can't imagine a person in their right mind paying that amount of money for this membership, but as they say, to each their own. 

The most prudent thing if someone is interested in an Admiral's Club membership, is to opt directly for the card and pay $695 a year instead of $1,400 direct. It's pretty obvious that is what AA and Citi expect to be done. 😬

Previously, this card seemed quite mediocre to me and we never personally considered it. Now I can say with certainty that it seems even worse to me. 

Yes, it has new credits and benefits… But they are not easy to use at all and are not useful for the vast majority of people. 

The only way I see this making sense is if we fly with AA enough that the Admirals Club membership is worth it. Other than that… Hard pass. 😬 

2️⃣ Now you can earn 3x Avios on rent with Bilt

Bilt and Qatar Airways Privilege Club launched a new option where you can earn Avios through rent payments if you are a Bilt member.  

Since August 5, 2026, Bilt members who pay their rent with an eligible Qatar Airways card can earn 3 Avios per dollar spent in this category. 

The benefit is available for the Qatar Airways Privilege Club Visa Signature and Visa Infinite cards, both issued by Cardless (same issuer as Bilt). 

The bonus applies to a maximum of $50,000 in rent per year, meaning the maximum possible to accumulate this way would be 150,000 Avios annually.  

The catch? Rent payments made this way incur a 3% fee. This means a $2,000 rent payment would charge $60 in fees and earn 6,000 Avios.

Honestly, we are not very excited about this new “benefit” simply because there is a 3% fee, since paying directly through Bilt we earn 1x Bilt Points, which can then be transferred to Avios at a 1:1 rate. It's not 3x, but we don't spend anything extra out of our pocket. 

On the other hand, let's remember that earning and accumulating Avios is extremely easy since it is a transfer partner of all major issuers, and many times there are transfer bonuses that end up being much more profitable than paying 3% to receive 3x.

3️⃣ Hyatt is offering up to 5 free nights (without involving a credit card!)

World of Hyatt launched a new promotion for stays in Latin America and the Caribbean, where it is possible to get up to 5 free night certificates in category 1 to 4 hotels.

The mechanism is simple: for every 3 nights completed at participating hotels between January 1 and March 31, 2027, you get a free night certificate for category 1 to 4 hotels. It is possible to get a maximum of five certificates, so 15 nights would be necessary to reach the maximum of the promotion.

To participate, you must register before September 30, 2026 (you can do so through this link). Only nights completed after registering and at one of the more than 100 participating hotels and resorts in the region count. To see the participating hotels, you can do so here. 

Nights booked using points or free night certificates count as eligible nights, in addition to paid bookings. 

An important detail is the expiration of the certificates: all must be used before June 30, 2027, regardless of when they were earned. This means that those who complete their stays towards the end of March will only have a maximum period of 3 months to use them. 

4️⃣ Bilt sends 1,850 people to collections by mistake

Around 1,850 cardholders of the old version of the Bilt card mistakenly received debt collection notices already in collections for balances that did not belong to them. And in some cases, they also appeared on the credit reports of those affected and caused drops in their credit scores. 

The problem affected customers of a previous beta version of the card, which stopped accepting new users in 2022. According to Bilt, the origin was an error by an external agency and not balances actually owed by customers.

Some users reported drops of 50 or 60 points in their score, in addition to notifications of a debt they supposedly owed, but did not recognize. 

Bilt indicated that it detected the problem on July 31 and contacted the agency to correct the records. The company expects the corrections to be reflected in credit reports within three business days.

As compensation, Bilt announced that it will give 2,500 Bilt Points to affected customers and will offer direct assistance to those who need to resolve issues arising from the incident.

Just in case, we recommend keeping an eye on your credit periodically to ensure everything is in order. These errors can be chaotic if they are not fixed. 😮‍💨