BILT Rewards Mastercard Approval Guide: Will You Get Approved?

The BILT Rewards Mastercard is an extremely popular credit card for anyone paying rent on their apartment, house, or living space.

The BILT Rewards Mastercard from Wells Fargo is one of the most unique credit cards currently on the market. While the Bilt card gives its holders typical credit card bonuses, such as 3x points on dining, 2x points on travel, no foreign transaction fees, and trip delay/reimbursement, the Bilt card has one completely unique benefit: the ability to use your credit card and earn points on your rent payments without any fees.

Bilt has a special rent payment system, where instead of sending money to your landlord, you submit your payment into the Bilt system and Bilt wires the money directly to your landlord. This system allows you to submit your rent payments via credit card without any fees, and earn 1 point for every dollar you spend on rent. Since most renters’ biggest source of spending is their rent payments, this allows Bilt cardholders to rack up points that can be used for travel (see travel point transfer partners below), dining, gift cards, rent payments, and even a downpayment on a house!

The full list of BILT Rewards travel transfer partners. You can transfer the points you earn with Bilt by paying your rent to each of these airlines/hotels at a minimum of a 1:1 ratio

You can even use the BILT card’s special payment system for a variety of other common payments, such as gas/electric/water utility payments, HOA fees, and cable/internet fees. And the best part? You get all of these benefits and rewards for no annual fee!

However, like with any credit card, the biggest barrier between you and getting all of these benefits is getting approved. The biggest factor in determining your approval chances will be your credit score and credit history. Therefore, to help you figure out if it is worth applying for the BILT Mastercard, in this blog post we'll break down the likelihood of being approved for the BILT Rewards Mastercard based on your credit score! We have gone through data points on various forums on the internet (such as the credit card Reddit) and calculated your approval odds, so all the numbers below are based on users.

With the background out of the way, let’s jump into the guide:

How Likely Are You to be Approved for the BILT Rewards Mastercard?

The Bilt Rewards Mastercard offered by Wells Fargo

Credit Score Range: <600

If your credit score falls between 500 and 600, you're considered to have a fair credit score. This credit score range indicates that you may have had some financial difficulties or may be new to using credit. While getting approved for the BILT Rewards Mastercard with this credit score range is not theoretically impossible, we could not find a single example of someone getting approved for the BILT Mastercard with this low a credit score.

If you’re in this position, consider taking steps to build or improve your credit before applying for the BILT Rewards Mastercard. Paying your bills on time, reducing outstanding debt, and checking your credit reports for any errors or discrepancies can make a significant difference in your credit score. However, the simplest way to improve your credit score is through repeated on-time payments; make sure to check our guide on key tips to improve your credit score and manage your cards if you’re new to credit.

Approval Odds: ~0%

Credit Score Range: 600-700

A credit score ranging from 600 to 700 is considered to be average. Individuals falling into this category are not likely to be approved for the BILT Rewards Mastercard, but we were able to find a few isolated examples of people being approved. The only link between those who got approved is they all had annual incomes of >$100k, so we recommend not applying for this credit score range unless your income exceeds this amount and you either already have a Wells Fargo card or you’re extremely confident in your credit history. Again, maintaining a good payment history and keeping your credit utilization ratio low are crucial factors that influence credit decisions like these.

Approval Odds: ~10%

You can use the BILT Rewards Mastercard for anything from dining to rent!

Credit Score Range: 700-800

With a credit score between 700 and 800, you fall in the good credit score range. This range indicates that you have a solid credit history and demonstrate responsible credit management. For individuals in this range, approval for the BILT Rewards Mastercard is now becoming much more likely, with the majority of applications we found proving to be successful. However, there are a few credit markers that seem to result in people getting denied for the Bilt card:

• Applying for multiple credit cards in a short period (e.g., high application velocity, 2-3 months)

• Not having enough time since your first account (e.g., length of credit profile)

Given these reasons for denial, the best options to improve your approval odds are to give your credit profile time to mature and to make sure you wait at least a few months in between credit card applications. However, one clear link that seemed to improve people’s approval odds is setting up a checking account with Wells Fargo. While not a guarantee of approval by any means, those who had the checking account set up for a few months were far more likely to be approved!

Approval Odds: ~70%

Credit Score Range: >800

If you have a credit score of greater than 800, you fall into the excellent credit score range and clearly are well in control of your credit and credit history. If your credit score is over 800, you have very likely odds to get approved for the BILT Rewards Mastercard. Of all the data points we found from people with credit scores >800 and no extenuating circumstances (e.g., just applied for many new cards), only a select few were not approved! Therefore, while you are not guaranteed to be approved, you should have very little issue with your application; this is as close as you can come to being pre-approved for the BILT card.

Approval Odds: ~90%

With the BILT card, you can pay your rent with none of the typical fees!

Summary

Overall, the BILT Mastercard from Wells Fargo is a card we recommend for anyone currently spending more than 15% of their income on rent. The ability to get points from your rent without fees is an incredibly useful feature not matched by any other card out there. If your credit score is >700—and especially if your score is >750—you’ve got a decent chance to get approved for this card! If you really want to bolster your approval odds, we recommend opening a checking account with Wells Fargo as this appears to improve the chances that you will get approved.

However, regardless of your credit score, there are always other specific factors that can lead to you getting approved or denied, so make sure to evaluate your own personal credit situation to get a better idea if you are likely to be approved. Even a great credit score isn’t a guarantee of getting approved and the numbers here are purely estimations based on others’ feedback—your own experience may be different!

We hope this article helped you figure out if you might be likely to get approved for the BILT Rewards Mastercard! If you’re unsure if the BILT Rewards card is right for you, or want to see it stacked up against some of the other top cards on the market, make sure to check out our comparisons between the BILT Card and the Chase Sapphire Preferred, as well as between the BILT card and the Capital One Venture X!