Bilt Expands Into Student Housing, Introduces Paying Student Loans With Points

Bilt Rewards, known until now for letting people earn rewards on rent while paying no administrative fees, is expanding into 2 new areas. You can now earn Bilt Points on student housing payments, and you can also redeem your points to pay student loans.

Let’s see how this works in practice.

How Bilt Rewards’ New Student-Related Features Work

Bilt Rewards is expanding from rental properties to student housing. And, in another move aimed at growing its user base among students, it’s also introducing the ability to pay student loans using Bilt points.

With the first new feature, students 18 and older will be able to earn rewards on their student housing payments.

Bilt said in an emailed statement that the student housing program is launching in cooperation with American Campus Communities (ACC), the largest developer, owner, and manager of student housing in the U.S. Owned by private equity firm Blackstone, ACC has housing units on 93 campuses across the U.S.

The collaboration will begin in late May with 2 properties at Baylor University in Waco, Texas (U Pointe on Speight and The Union properties). Bilt said it plans to expand to more properties in the ACC portfolio in the coming months.

Bilt is also introducing another feature in which members can redeem Bilt points toward eligible student loan payments.

When using points this way, 1,000 Bilt Points equal $10 in redemption value on eligible student loan payments. It should be noted that we value Bilt Rewards points at 1.8 cents each, so getting 1 cent per point undervalues them by 80%. You could get much better value by transfering your Bilt Rewards points to travel partners, but this option may not be as attractive to students or recent graduates who want to pay off their student loans as quickly as possible.

Presently, outsanding student loan debt in the U.S. is almost $1.8 trillion, according to Education Data Initiative.

“Research shows that student debt is now the second-largest form of consumer debt in America,” Bilt Rewards’ CEO and founder Ankur Jain said. “By enabling members to redeem Bilt Points toward student loan payments, we’re addressing a critical financial need,” he added.

Bilt Rewards points can be redeemed, starting now, on student loans serviced by Nelnet, MOHELA, Sallie Mae, Aidvantage, and Navient. Bilt says more loan servicers will be available in the coming months. Bilt points can be redeemed directly toward eligible student loan payments via the Bilt website or the Bilt mobile app.

Final Thoughts

There is a potentially vast public for the latest 2 features of the Bilt Rewards platform. American Campus Communities, Bilt’s partner in the student housing initiative, has nearly 140,000 students in its housing units, meaning that tens of thousands of new Bilt members could begin collecting points on their housing payments.

As for paying student loans with Bilt points, around 51% of college undergraduates finish their education with student loan debt, with an average balance of $38,000 per borrower, according to data Bilt cited. That’s another potentially huge audience that could enter the Bilt Rewards ecosystem.