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Aaron suggested I start a thread to ask for advice. I will be attending a small convention in Northbrook from Thursday to Saturday. We're going to take the opportunity to have the family come into downtown Saturday morning and see the dyeing of the river and the parade. The plan was to get a hotel in the Loop, park the mini van, and walk everywhere the whole weekend. Unfortunately as Aaron pointed out there is a huge convention at McCormick Place starting Saturday, and the few rooms still available are north of $200-300. My plan at his point is to wait til the last minute and try another round of rebids. Assuming that fails, I'll add a night on to the hotel in Northbrook and we'll just have to drive out and back. Any thoughts from the Chicago/Priceline experts? Thanks.

Thank you.

Aaron, Can I ask what is going on that weekend? I'm trying to book one room in the loop area for that Saturday night, and having no luck at the moment. Obviously Sunday is St Patrick's Day, but it doesn't seem like that would be much of a tax on Chicago's hotel inventory (now liquor inventory, that's another matter).

Appears to be new to the list? I won on my first bid. I had tried 3.5 rebidding up to 47 first. Used your link. Thanks.

Is there a PRICELINE EXPRESS Deals list? If not, do you plan to eventually make one? I noticed in a post further down you mention that you seemed to lump them in with the retail side of things. Do you think there's any carryover at all with either the Priceline or Hotwire list, or is it better to just assume it's totally random. Thanks.

Are there any websites that allow you to search by city to see if that city has a lot of special events or conventions going on that would affect your Priceline bids? Also - is there a recommended time in advance of your stay that you should try to book (early enough to make plans, but not so early that the hotels are unwilling to accept deals because they may fill up)? Thanks.

Thanks, that helped. I ended up with the Crowne Plaza Chicago Northbrook for $55 from 3/13 to 3/16, and the Marriott Chicago Deerfield Suites for $46 from 3/16 to 3/18.

Perhaps I do not understand rebidding as well as I thought I did, or perhaps they changed how it works. I just did the following: North Shore 40 +Deerfield 42 +Waukegan 44 +Lincolnshire 46 +Libertyville 48 +Gurnee 49 My assumption was that I could then continue trying different combinations (NS+W, NS+Lin, NS+Lib etc). So, I closed that browser tab and used your link to open a new one, and tried the following: North Shore + Waukegan 50 And got this message: "We were not able to process this request since our records indicate you have already made a request for this same trip."

Absolutely. I was actually leaning toward what you suggest (although my thinking was backward - I thought that if perhaps St Patrick's Day were having an effect, then splitting off Friday and Saturday might get me a better weekday rate). Regarding Deerfield, having read your other comments on the area, I added that zone in as my first rebid (I'd like to stay at the Northbrook Hilton, otherwise I would have targeted Deerfield only per your recommendations). Thank you for your help, I'll report back.

Does a longer stay adversely affect your chances getting a low rate? I am up to $48, which higher than most reported wins in that zone. There is a small convention, and it is the weekend of St Patrick's Day, but I don't see either of those having that great of an impact, especially in a suburb.

Linked through savingsbarn.com. :/