The more flexible you are with your travel dates, the more you can save on a hotel room. Brian Ek of Priceline recommends choosing a destination and then pricing the cost of a hotel over a few different weeks or months to spot the best rates.
You can save even more on the cost of a hotel room if you’re willing to be flexible with your destination, Ek said. “Same sand, same water, same sun — only difference is the rate,” he said.
Travelers can often get special deals on hotels by booking through travel apps, said Ek. For example, the Priceline app has “Tonight Only” deals that offer savings of up to 60 percent on last-minute hotel rooms.
Emerson of Tourico Holidays recommends the Last Minute Travel app, which offers discounts of up to 60 percent. You also can get $25 off your first hotel booking through the app.
You can save money on hotel rooms by taking advantage of other people’s canceled traveled plans. The Roomer website and mobile app let you book discounted rooms that travelers have reserved but can’t use.
Or, if you’ve reserved a nonrefundable room but have to cancel your trip, you can get some of your money back using this service. Roomer recommends that sellers offer at least a 20 percent discount on the market price.
You can get discounts of up to 60 percent if you take advantage of the option to book a room and pay online without knowing the exact hotel where you’ll be staying at using sites such as Hotwire and Priceline. With Hotwire’s “Hot Rate” hotels, you’ll see a rate — and how much of a discount it is below published prices — along with the general location, hotel details and reviews.
With Priceline’s “Name Your Own Price” option, you can specify your preferred neighborhood and minimum hotel star class. Ek recommends seeing what the published rates are for hotels in the neighborhood and then entering a bid that’s 60 percent below the going rate. And with Priceline’s “Express Deals,” you can pick the exact amenities you want — such as number of beds — in addition to star rating and location.
There are plenty of coupon websites that offer codes to save money on purchases with online retailers, but coupon codes aren’t just for products.
“By using online coupons for travel, people can expect to save up to 20 percent,” states Scott Kluth, founder of CouponCabin, a site that offers both coupon codes and cash back on purchases at certain retailers.
The benefit of using coupons is that you can stack them with other discounts and cash-back offers to maximize your savings, Kluth says.
You can save up to hundreds of dollars by taking advantage of deals offered by travel sites that bundle airfare and hotel accommodations into one price, says Ek.
These package deals allow hotels to offer lower rates because the room price isn’t disclosed separately from the airfare. “It gives a hotel cover for selling at a lower rate,” Ek said.
Most of the major hotel chains such as Hilton, Hyatt and Marriott have loyalty programs where you can earn points for staying at their properties and cash in those points for free stays. Many of these programs also offer benefits such as discounted room rates, room upgrades and free internet access.
Some travel booking sites have their own rewards programs that members can join for free and earn points for free stays at a variety of hotels.
For example, the Orbitz.com Orbitz Rewards program lets you earn 1 Orbuck for every $1 spent on eligible hotel bookings. Hotels.com also offers a rewards program that’s free to join and allows members to get a free hotel night after booking 10 hotel nights through the site.
Major hotel chains aren’t the only ones that reward their guests for being loyal. You can get free stays at independent hotels through Stash Hotel Rewards. This free program lets you earn points by booking through StashRewards.com and redeem them for rooms at more than 150 hotels in 100 cities.
International travelers can join Voilà Hotel Rewards at VHR.com to earn points for free stays at independent hotels and resorts around the world. Members also get other benefits, including early check-in, late check-out and room upgrades.
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