Bilt has just announced massive changes. This includes a new portfolio of three credit cards — the no annual fee Bilt Blue Card, $95 annual fee Bilt Obsidian Card, or $495 Bilt Palladium Card — plus a new system for paying rent and mortgages.
Central to the concept of being able to pay rent and mortgages while earning points is Bilt Cash, which is a Bilt currency separate from points. In this post, I’d like to go over the details. The reality is that there are still more questions than answers about Bilt Cash, though I’d like to cover what we do know.
How can members earn Bilt Cash?
There are two main ways that Bilt Cash can be earned.
The first is that members can earn $50 in Bilt Cash for every 25,000 Bilt points earned. It doesn’t matter how those points are earned, and of course Bilt Cash is in addition to whatever Bilt points you ordinarily rack up.
The second is that Bilt Cash can be earned with all three Bilt credit cards. So not only do the cards earn points, but they also earn Bilt Cash:
- The no annual fee Bilt Blue Card earns 1x points + 4% back in Bilt Cash on everyday purchases, plus a welcome bonus of $100 in Bilt Cash
- The $95 annual fee Bilt Obsidian Card earns 3x points on your choice of dining or groceries (on up to $25K of spending per year), 1x points on all other purchases, and 4% back in Bilt Cash on all purchases, plus a welcome bonus of $200 in Bilt Cash
- The $495 annual fee Bilt Palladium Card earns 2x points + 4% back in Bilt Cash on everyday purchases, plus a welcome bonus of $300 in Bilt Cash, plus $200 in Bilt Cash every year on an ongoing basis (this is the obvious choice to apply for)
As you can see, all Bilt credit cards will earn 4% back in Bilt Cash on all spending. Bilt Cash is valid through December 31 of the year in which it’s earned, though up to $100 in Bilt Cash can be carried over to the next year.
How can members redeem Bilt Cash?
The ability to redeem Bilt Cash is expected to launch in February 2026. Let me just directly quote Bilt when it comes to how Bilt Cash can reportedly be redeemed:
Starting in February, use your Bilt Cash toward what matters most to you — as dollar-for-dollar value or one-time access to status upgrades.
- Unlock points on housing payments (Bilt Card 2.0 exclusive benefit)
- Hotel credits
- Lyft credits
- Dining credits
- Home Delivery credits
- Fitness credits
- Bilt Collection credits
- Unlock higher transfer bonuses
- Unlock access to Home Away from Home hotels
- Unlock early access to Experiences
Keep in mind that with the changes we’re seeing to Bilt, the ability to pay rent or mortgages using a Bilt credit card while earning points and not paying a fee is tied to Bilt Cash. Specifically, every $30 in Bilt Cash can unlock up to 1,000 points on rent or mortgages. As an example:
- If you spent $15,000 on a Bilt card, you’d earn $600 in Bilt Cash (since you earn 4% back in Bilt Cash on all spending on all cards)
- $600 in Bilt Cash would allow you to earn $20,000 in fee free rent or mortgage payments, while earning 1x points
There’s a lot we don’t know about Bilt Cash
All three Bilt credit cards, including the Bilt Blue Card, Bilt Obsidian Card, and Bilt Palladium Card, will earn 4% Bilt Cash on spending, in addition to the standard rewards. Bilt of course markets with these cards how you can use that Bilt Cash to earn rewards on your rent or mortgage without paying fees, since that’s one of the primary selling points of the Bilt ecosystem.
However, if this is half as lucrative as it sounds, then it seems like there’s a better play here. If you can actually unlock Bilt Cash for “dollar-for-dollar value” for things like hotels and Lyft credits, well… that just sounds too good to be true, no?
It would mean the direct opportunity cost of paying your rent or mortgage with Bilt Cash is 3%, since you could otherwise use that credit for things that are a cash equivalent. If I had $100 in Bilt Cash, I’d rather have $100 in Lyft credits than essentially “buying” Bilt points for three cents each.
So what’s the catch here, because it can’t be this generous, can it? If I earn rewards plus 4% in Bilt Cash, even if it’s money that has to be spent through Bilt’s partners, that just seems unsustainably good, no?
Well, Richard Kerr, Bilt’s GM of Travel, recently explained this as follows (thanks to Ian for flagging this):
There will be monthly credits you can choose to redeem Bilt Cash for at a dollar for dollar value, but honestly we are still working on what we think these should be and what precedent we want to set. If something doesn’t work for you one month or you’ve already tapped out that redemption channel for the month, you will have plenty of other options to redeem your Bilt Cash on top of unlimited rent and mortgage payments to earn up to 1x points.”
So my guess is that the catch is that there will be huge limits on the types of ways that you can redeem Bilt Cash. In other words, maybe Bilt Cash can only be redeemed in small increments toward larger purchases? Maybe something like redeeming $200 in Bilt Cash toward a hotel if it costs at least $2,000, or redeeming $10 in Bilt Cash toward a $50+ Lyft ride, or something like that?
So we’ll have to mark this as “developing” for now, but I suspect there’s a catch here. Bilt obviously wants to incentivize people to use its portal and partners, but allowing a straight dollar-for-dollar redemption with no caps seems highly unlikely to me.
Bottom line
Bilt Cash is a currency that’s separate from Bilt points, and it’s increasingly important in the overall context of how Bilt is evolving with rent and mortgage payments.
All Bilt credit cards will earn 4% Bilt Cash on spending (in addition to standard rewards), plus you can earn $50 in Bilt Cash for every 25,000 points earned.
Bilt Cash redemptions are expected to go live as of February 2026, and if you have a Bilt credit card, every $30 in Bilt Cash can unlock up to 1,000 points on rent or mortgages. But what’s interesting here is that Bilt Cash can also reportedly be redeemed “dollar-for-dollar” toward all kinds of other purchases, ranging from hotels, to Lyft credits.
There must be more to this story, since there’s no way that Bilt’s credit cards are earning 4% back through the Bilt ecosystem, in addition to the standard rewards. If Bilt Cash earned through Bilt’s credit cards can actually efficiently be redeemed for things other than rent or mortgage payments, then it’s not even worth paying your rent or mortgage that way, since you’re basically “paying” three cents per Bilt point.
That’s why I suspect that there will be great caps on the ways Bilt Cash can be redeemed for these kinds of things, so that it’s still profitable for the company.
What do you make of the Bilt Cash concept, and how do you see this playing out?
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