[sersi]

2 business class tickets is definitely not $18k in value. There are regularly sales with various airlines when you can get a business class to Japan for around $2k per ticket. And since availabilities for rewards vary and are sometimes hard to come buy, you cannot compare them to the price of a fully flexible airline ticket.

But that said, you can get good value from using miles.

[bonesinger]

I know they aren't normally that much, but at the time they were like 8800 per person. I had a specific airline in mind when I flew because I wanted the full experience. ANA currently is like $6500/person for business but I felt it was well worth the cost. I know you can get cheaper tickets.