Your current situation: You heard that there are some cards with lucrative limited time welcome offers. Pretty awesome.

Credit card links have been removed from posts and added to the menu bar at the top of every page of MileValue under the heading Top Travel Credit Cards.

But you haven't redeemed many hotel rewards before and are a little intimidated about where to begin.

The Starwood Preferred Guest personal and business credit cards from American Express come with 35,000 bonus Starpoints for spending $5,000 and $8,000 respectively in the first six months of card membership. These offers end tomorrow, April 5, 2017.

Credit card links have been removed from posts and added to the menu bar at the top of every page of MileValue under the heading Top Travel Credit Cards.

The normal sign up bonus is 25,000 points per card.

The Starwood Preferred Guest personal and business credit cards from American Express come with 35,000 bonus Starpoints for spending $5,000 and $8,000 respectively in the first six months of card membership. These offers end this coming Wednesday, April 5, 2017.

Credit card links have been removed from posts and added to the menu bar at the top of every page of MileValue under the heading Top Travel Credit Cards.

The normal sign up bonus is 25,000 points per card.

There are two American Express Hilton credit cards with limited time increased sign up bonuses--the highest we've ever seen--that should catch your attention.

Apparently if you already have a credit card issued by American Express, the bank will not initially hard pull your credit report upon subsequent applications. They only pull your credit report if you are conditionally approved from internal information Amex already has on record, to double check nothing major has changed since then.

The Business Platinum Card from American Express is offering 100,000 total bonus points through January 25, 2017 (which is just a couple weeks from now):

50,000 bonus points after spending $5,000 in the first three months
50,000 more bonus points after spending another $10,000 in the first three months

Credit card links have been removed from posts and added to the menu bar at the top of every page of MileValue under the heading Top Travel Credit Cards.

Check out Scott's full review here.
A Short History Lesson
In October of 2016, American Express added

Virgin Atlantic is dramatically altering its award charts for bookings made January 16, 2017 or later.

The United States goes from two regions to three.
The year round price is no more. Now we will have off peak and peak prices.
Economy and Premium Economy prices for most of the year drop dramatically.

There are data points rolling in from Reddit of people claiming the $450 annual fee on their American Express Business Platinum card is (unexpectedly) waived the first year.

This is not true of every single report, but many have noticed in their card agreements with American Express a line about the $450 annual fee being waived for the first year of card membership.

In case you missed the news: through January 25, 2017, the American Express Business Platinum Card is offering 100,000 total bonus Membership Rewards after spending $15,000 in the first three months.

Through December 31, 2016, you can earn double the rewards on purchases that normally fall into the non-bonused category of spend when you use your Amex card at eligible small businesses. The only stipulation is that you register your card first.

In 2014, American Express made it so you could get the bonus only once per lifetime on personal cards, and in February 2016 that rule was extended to business cards.

But there might be a targeted exception. Reader g passes along a targeted offer he got for the American Express Platinum Card.

The offer is to open the American Express Platinum Card with 50,000 bonus Membership Rewards after spending $5,000 in the first three months.