Bilt, Wells Fargo, and the Cost of Misreading Loyalty Economics

This botched marketing program provides a case study on how to avoid major snafus in co-marketing programs.

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When Bilt Rewards and Wells Fargo teamed up in 2022, the promise sounded ground-breaking: let renters pay rent by credit card without their landlords eating the credit card fees, while earning points redeemable for travel and other rewards. According to The Wall Street Journal, the co-branded Bilt Mastercard was meant to run through 2029, with the bank hoping to attract a younger, rent-heavy demographic.

The program failure provides a lesson in forecasting. It was one thing for Wells Fargo to invest in attracting new customers. It was another to subsidize the investment by giving up its bread and butter source of income—credit card fees—in the hopes that it would generate other fees later.

The model apparently failed to address the two ways credit card companies make money: enough non-rent spending to generate credit card fees not provided in the rent payments, and enough unpaid balances to generate interest income. It turns out that Wells Fargo badly misjudged what cardholders would do. A report by Zacks Equity Research summary estimated that the bank was losing up to $10 million a month on the product by mid-2024.

According to a report in The Real Deal, cardholders largely used the product for rent, transactions upon which Wells Fargo largely subsidized the fees in the hope of getting new profitable customers. Many paid their balances in full, sharply limiting interest income. In the meantime, Wells Fargo was subsidizing the rent-payment fees.

So far, Bilt has survived what could have put it out of business. Over the summer of 2025, it raised another $250 million in funding at a $10.75 billion valuation, according to View From the Wing, a travel publication.

Under a new “Bilt Card 2.0,” launching in February 2026, the company moves from a single no-fee card to a three-card offer (no-fee, $95, and $495 annual-fee products) issued via a company known as Cardless. The program will expand beyond rent to cover mortgages, student housing, condos and HOA (home owner association) fees, with members able to earn points on eligible mortgage payments regardless of lender, according to details from Bilt and multiple card-industry outlets. Existing members keep their Bilt Rewards accounts and point balances during the transition, the company says. Overall, various analysts report that some Bilt members may be hurt but others could benefit by the new arrangement.

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