NEW Bilt Benefit, THIS Sapphire Lounge to CLOSE, US Bank RUINS Altitude Card

In this video, we are going to cover three things. First up, we have a new way that you can pay rent through the built system and earn points. These aren't built points. It is a totally different points currency. Then yesterday, we reported on the opening of a new Chase Sapphire Lounge at Las Vegas airport. But today, we have news that one of Chase's existing Sapphire Lounges is actually going to close down. And lastly, US Bank just confirmed rumors that it is severely nerfing or should we say ruining the Altitude Reserve card. Hey credit warriors, welcome to the show. My name is Ben Hedges aka the credit shu and on this channel I cover US credit cards, personal finance and luxury travel. If you like the sound of that do subscribe but let's get into the video. All right, so the first story of the day is that Built, the very popular platform for paying rent with a credit card, has just announced a new partnership and that is with the United cards from Chase where they let you earn extra points if you use one of those particular cards. This is the second such partnership that Built has done. The first one was with the Alaska Airlines credit card where you earn three Alaska miles per dollar on rent payments through Built. Now, this latest partnership was just announced for the following cards. The United Gateway card, the United Explorer card, the United Quest Card, the United Club card, and the United Presidential Plus card. That last one is no longer available to new customers, but many people still have it. And you will earn two United miles per dollar on up to $50,000 in rent spend per year. Just FYI, the usual limit for rent spending is $100,000 per year that you can earn points on with Built. So, it's half of that. So, this is obviously better than earning one point per dollar on a United card, but you don't earn the built points that you would otherwise earn, it seems. Okay, now that isn't as bad as you think because Built changed the program mid2025 so that when you use third party credit cards, you only earn one built point every $2 in spend anyway. So, if you look at an example of a $1,000 rent payment, I know that might seem low in 2025, but it's a nice round number. All right, so let's use it. You would previously earn 500 built points plus 1,000 of whatever credit card points for a total of 1,500. But now you can earn 2,000 United points. In both cases though, you have a 3% transaction fee. Now the points guy values built points at 2.2 cents per point and the value he gives United miles is 1.3 cents per mile. So here is the value of the points that you would earn in the above two examples. So in example one, this is the old way. You'd get 500 built points, which is $11 in value. And then you'd get 1,000 United Miles, which is $13 in value for a total of $24 value minus a 3% fee. That's equivalent to $30 on a $1,000 payment. And that gives you a grand total of minus6. Then example two. Okay. Earning 2,000 United miles and no built points. Well, the value of that 2,000 United miles is $26 minus a 3% fee of $30. The grand total is $4. So, there's a $2 difference with the United Way uh being better. That's if we use the average valuations of the points guy. Of course, you may be really good at redeeming points and get way more value, so don't treat that as 100% fact. And you also may view it as advantageous to have more of one type of point, too. And yes, I know United is a transfer partner of Built, but you know, you'd only be getting 500 built points to transfer over to United. In this case, you'd be getting uh a,000 extra uh United points where you'd only get one uh 500 uh build points. Okay, so you know, it might be advantageous to have more in one, you know, one loyalty program. I'm looking for positives here, guys. Help me out here. Okay, this promotion runs all the way from now until June 2028. So, you do have a lot of time to take advantage of it. It will be more lucrative if you're getting a welcome bonus on one of these cards because that 2x United miles basically covers most of the transaction fee. and then your welcome bonus is going to be pure profit. But it also may be a good way to top up a balance if you are a few thousand miles short for a redemption that you want to do. It certainly beats buying United Miles anywhere. Okay, United charges $35 for 1,000 mi. So, this is way cheaper. It would be $30 for 2,000. But the best way, in my opinion, to earn points on rent is with the Built Credit card. Now, that card currently isn't open to new members, but in February next year, they're coming out with a trifecta of three new Built cards, and you'll be able to pay mortgages with them, too, if you want to sign up for Built in preparation for that. Check it out in the links below. You can also sign up for the Built dining program and link any card from your wallet, and that will give you an extra three Built points per dollar on top of your credit cards rewards at restaurants in their program, which are many. Link for that is down below. All right, let's now move on to our second story of the day. One of Chase's Sapphire Lounges is closing down. So, the Chase Sapphire Lounge at Hong Kong airport is going to close down. You can see that Chase has now added a little note saying that it's closing January 5th on their Sapphire Lounge website. Now, in my opinion, this is to be expected. The Hong Kong location was actually the first ever Chase Sapphire Lounge. I'm not really sure why Chase opened a lounge in Hong Kong before opening any US locations. Maybe since they were partnering with the club. Uh perhaps there was a vacant location in Hong Kong that the club had signed a lease on and the club was like, "Hey, uh pay us to put your branding on our newest lounge that we want to open in Hong Kong and we'll sign a contract to partner with you on all of your US lounges." And maybe that was advantageous to Chase, so they accepted the club's terms. I don't know. But from Chase's perspective, um it was always the Sapphire Lounge that made the least sense. All right, Chase does not issue cards in Hong Kong or other Asian countries. Um or at least, you know, maybe they have a debit card. I don't know, they do in the UK, but you know, whatever. They don't issue credit cards that offer lounge access in Asia. Okay, so the number of Sapphire Reserve card holders or any Chase card that actually would have lounge access traveling through the region would undoubtedly be small. And thus, this lounge was the only Sapphire lounge that you got unlimited access to through Priority Pass. And that was probably the only way that they could fill it with people. Now, if you are a Priority Pass holder, including Chase Sapphire members, okay, cuz Sapphire Reserve card holders get Priority Pass, don't worry since there are loads of good lounges at HKG. You have the Kira Lounge, which was actually lounge of the year in the Asia-Pacific region, so it's probably better than the Sapphire Lounge anyway. All right. And then we have these three plaza premium lounges. I visited those back in 2017 and they were all really cool. I especially loved the shower suites. Now, we still don't know what is going to happen with the Hong Kong Sapphire Lounge location. Maybe it's just that Chase's deal with the club has ended and they will take the Sapphire Browning off, do some refurbishment with like their own color scheme and stuff and reopen it as a normal the club location. But if you want to check it out, go before January 5th because that's when it's closing. Otherwise, just go to the Kira Lounge. It was lounge of the year anyway. All right, let's now look at our last story. US Bank ruining the Altitude Reserve, one of their best credit cards. So, the US Bank Altitude Reserve is US Bank's premium travel credit card. But US Bank has this problem where they make their cards a little too amazing and then they have to intentionally ruin them a while later. We saw this with the Smartly Visa card that let you earn 4% cash back on all your spending if you had $100,000 either in a savings account or invested with US Bank. But now they have switched it to having you keep $100,000 in a checking account to access that 4% cash back on the credit card. the money you would lose out on in interest versus just $100,000 in a US bank savings account totally negates any rewards that you would earn. So, the card is basically ruined. And the Altitude Reserve has the same problem. It was just too generous. Three points per dollar on mobile wallet, a super flexible $325 credit for travel and dining that almost totally offset the $400 annual fee, and then 1.5 cents per point in value when redeeming through the travel portal. Because of this, US Bank already closed the card to new applicants at the end of 2024, and now they are nerfing the benefits, too. Rumors swirled around about this earlier this year with leaked photos like this one. But now we have a document on US Bank's website and apparently emails being sent out that 100% confirm the following changes. So, they start off with how your card is going to get even better. I love that they have negative changes, but they say good news. All right, you're going to get this one good change, but otherwise you're totally screwed. All right, it reminds me when I used to work for Uber as an Uber driver, they would say, "Good news. Rates are going down in your area. This means more demand." As if, okay, mental gymnastics going on. Anyway, we'll say the good news first. They are increasing point earning on the travel portal. Okay, 10x points on hotels and car rentals, 5x on flights. Uh they're bringing in transfer partners uh which you know that actually could be good but they haven't said which partners that they are choosing yet. Uh you'll find that out soon. And they're also going to give you a 5% discount or up to 5% discount on certain gift cards. But then we have the negative changes. 3x on mobile wallet is now limited to $5,000 in spend per month. That's not a super low limit actually, so it probably won't affect most people, but if that was like the one thing that really made this card profitable for you, then I'm sorry. Then we have the $325 travel and dining credit. This is switching to a US bank travel portal credit. Okay, so it's only on travel now through the portal. No dining. So it's getting a lot more restrictive. Okay, it used to be the most flexible in the industry, but that is no more. Probably Chase Sapphire Reserves travel credit is now the most flexible. And finally, the change that really ruins the card for me if I had it. I don't even have this card, but it would ruin it for me if I had it. You will no longer get 1.5 cents per point on travel portal redemptions. It's going down to 1 cent per point. And this all goes into effect on December 15th. So, not so much warning either. And thus, this person here on Reddit who was raving about the 4.5% in value they're getting from the 3x on mobile wallet and then using the points at 1.5 cents per point for travel. Well, sorry buddy. Party's over. You'll be getting 3% now and that's limited to $5,000 in spend per month and then it's only going to be 1%. But on the bright side, they are bringing in transfer partners and presumably those will be announced on December 15th as well. That's what people expect. So maybe you will still have a way to get higher value from the points if you're good at redeeming through partners. But the sad thing is this card is just becoming the same as every other premium card out there. 10x and 5x through the travel portal. Yeah, Chase and Capital 1 both do that. And now 1 cent per point with possible higher value through transfer partners. That's what every other card does, too. In my opinion, they should have just raised the annual fee to $550 and kept everything else the same. But what do you think? Leave your comments down below. And guys, that is the video for today. Don't forget to sign up for the Built Dining program down in the links below. If you sign up for Built Dining, that gives you access to all of Built as well. So, you can hang on and wait until they bring in the, you know, the new Built credit cards. If you want to sign up for one of those next year, you will have a Built account ready. And don't forget to link any existing card from your wallet. All right. The dining program gives you an extra three points per dollar on top of your credit card rewards at those built restaurants. So, if you use the MX Gold, it's going to be four points per dollar from MX and three points per dollar from Built for a total of seven points per dollar. Link for that is down below. Please subscribe to the channel if you're new. We'll see you in the next video. Bye-bye.