glutton

I started bidding for a 4* in the Downtown - Pike Place zone, using free re-bids to bid from $70 up to $95 with no success, so I dropped to 3.5* and bid $80, and it was accepted. Maybe I should have started lower for the 3.5*! Looks like a great location, a short walk to Pike's Place Market, and near the monorail, so I'm happy. I used the PRICELINE link from this website to start my bidding. :) And I got $20 off using my membership in the Entertainment Book. The total charge for 3 nights after the taxes and fees, minus my coupon, was $266.62. Does anyone know the cost of parking at this hotel? Need to decide whether to rent a car or not.

Over the past 3 days, I placed many bids for both the Dublin and Worthington-Polaris zones of Columbus, for 3.5 stars and 3 stars, starting at $40 and using many rebids to eventually end up at $66. My bids from $52 up to $63 were all denied tonight at the 3* level. I believe the OSU graduation is that weekend, so perhaps that drove prices up for our dates. I was sort of hoping for the Hyatt Place in Dublin, but the Crowne Plaza Dublin seems acceptable. I used your PRICELINE link to start my bidding.

Strange, on Priceline tonight, the highest star level shown for the Columbus North zone is 2.5 stars (searching for dates in early June.) I wonder if it is just a temporary change in hotel availability.

I started bidding a few days ago for the Downtown Pike Place zone and bid from $80 to $115 for 4* and $76 to $95 for 3.5* using free rebids, all denied. This morning, I started bidding at $95 for 4* and went up in $5 to $7 increments, and finally my bid for $129 was accepted by the Hyatt At Olive 8. Looks like a nice property. Last year, I got a room at the Westin for about $100, but that was in October, so it seems like $129 isn't so bad for a summer weekend rate. The parking will probably be an arm and a leg, but I guess you can't really avoid that in the downtown area! I attempted to start my bidding using your PRICELINE link, but I was using a different computer than usual, and I got an error screen when I clicked the link, so I don't know if it 'counted' or not.

Thank you for the info, Aaron. When I looked on the hotel website, I saw where they mentioned that they had both valet and self-parking available, but I couldn't find any rates.

I had $20 bonus cash from my Entertainment Book membership, which added $6.67 per night to all of my bids. I started bidding yesterday using your PRICELINE link, and placed bids from $80 up to $100 (+ $6.67 bonus cash) for 4* in either Downtown Vancouver or the Granville Entertainment District, and also added North Vancouver and City Hall zones (we decided any of those zones would be acceptable) at the 3* level and bid $90 for that, but all were denied. Today, I tried again starting at $95 for Downtown and Granville 4* and used free rebids at $5 increments up to $115 USD, which was finally accepted by the Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre in the Granville Entertainment District. It looks like a great property, and the lowest rate showing on their website is about double my price, so I'm quite happy with my results. Can anyone tell me the parking fees for this hotel? And when they refer to the pool and jacuzzis as being part of their "health club," are they still included with our room rate, or does it cost extra to use those?

I used the PRICELINE link from this website & started bidding a few days ago, first trying for the Brentwood/Westwood zone at the 3-4*, then adding Santa Monica/Marina Del Rey, for bids from $60-$68 (inlcuding this morning), which were all denied, and I added Beverly Hills/West Hollywood and bid from $55 to $65 for the 3* level, also denied. (I only had 1 free rebid, using the Lawndale zone.) After I was rejected for the above 3 zones for 3* for up to $68 this morning, I added 2.5* and dropped my bid to $60, which was accepted at the Marina Del Rey Hotel. I was hoping to be a little closer to Westwood, and this is kind of at the far end of the Santa Monica/Marina Del Rey zone, but it looks reasonably nice, and has free parking, so I can't complain much for the price. Not quite a Christmas miracle, but still a pretty good deal :) Length of Stay: 1 night (1/20/11, 1 room) Your Offer Price Per Room, Per Night: $60.00 Subtotal: $60.00 Taxes & Fees: $15.90 Total Charges*: $75.90

I just got a room at the 2.5* Marina Del Rey Hotel for $60 (I'll post that 'win' separately). Thanks for the bidding advice.

I just checked the Marriott/Courtyard Century City website, and they are showing ZERO availability for 1/20, so I guess I won't get THAT hotel on PRICELINE. :) There must be a convention or something going on there.

Thanks for all of the input, Colfax. It's not a big issue if we have to pay for parking, I just wasn't sure what the norm was in those areas. I know I'll have to pay for parking at downtown hotels in most big cities, but I wasn't sure about other zones for LA. I think I'd go as low as 2.5* for this bid, since it is just for 1 night and we won't be in the hotel for much time. I worry that 2* might get me more of a dive.

Ideally, I'd like to stay in the Westwood/Brentwood zone, or maybe the Santa Monica/Marina Del Rey zone. I guess LA traffic is unpredictable (or predictably bad), but I'd prefer to be within a 20-minute drive of the UCLA campus. The Culver City zone looks reasonably close, but I am not very familiar with that area and am wondering if that is a generally safe area, particularly since we probably won't arrive at the hotel until around 11:00 pm. I saw a recent winning bid in the Culver City zone for $50, but didn't see much posted for the other zones recently. The night we are looking for is Thursday 1/20/11, and I was hoping to stay under $60, but I am asking for feedback on whether that is feasible.

I am going to an event at UCLA on a Thursday night in January, and want to find an inexpensive hotel for that night. From the posts in this forum, there don't seem to be a lot of Priceline rooms available in the Brentwood/Westwood zone. Since it is just for one night, for my husband & I, I just want a clean room in a safe area that isn't too long a drive from UCLA. Free parking would be nice. We might also spend some time the following day in Santa Monica. Can you advise me on what zone might be suitable and have a room available for less than around $60?

Do you know if the cheaper private lots in the area would have in & out privileges? I had reserved a rental car a few weeks ago through a special offer from Southwest, and now it seems that if I shorten the length of my car rental, it would actually cost MORE, so it might be cheaper to keep it!

I've been bidding on and off for the past 2 weeks, starting at $70 for 4* and gradually working my way up. I had also bid up to $101 for 3.5* with no luck. I had $10 bonus cash per night that I was bidding with. Before tonight, the highest that I had bid was $103 including the bonus cash, then tonight I started at $85 and used free re-bids and my 5th bid for $99 plus $10 bonus cash was finally accepted, for the Westin Seattle. I clicked the PRICELINE link from this website before starting my bidding, but since I had to paste in a URL for my bonus cash, I'm not sure if using your link 'counted' or not. Does anyone happen to know the fees at this hotel for self-parking? I'm not sure if we should keep our rental car for this portion of our trip or not. Thanks.

I've been trying the same zone for the following weekend 10/1-10/4, at about the same bid amounts as you, and no luck for me either.

What is the typical correlation between the rates on HOTWIRE vs. PRICELINE? If Hotwire is offering 4* properties for a certain price, is PRICELINE likely to have hotels in the same area for a lower price?

Your winning bid has renewed my hope, although I've been bidding unsuccessfully for *weekend* dates, 10/1-10/4. Are weekends in this zone typically a lot more difficult or expensive than weekdays?

My first bid of $100 for a 4* in the Monterey/Pacific Grove zone was rejected, but Priceline offered to allow me to re-bid if I added $22 to my bid. Instead, I added the Carmel zone as a free rebid and bid $110 for a 4* and received a room at Inter-Continental: The Clement Monterey. With all of the people on this website who have received this hotel lately, I hope that they aren't sticking all of the Priceline customers in crappy rooms. It looks like a very nice hotel. I used the PRICELINE link from Betterbidding.com to start my bidding.

Over the last 2 days, I had placed bids for 4* up to $73, for 3.5* from $42 - $54, and 3* up to $46, all rejected. My bid tonight for 3.5* in Philly - Downtown $56 was accepted by the Sheraton City Center. Looks like a pretty good deal, although some reviews don't seem to think this hotel should have 3.5 stars. I used the PRICELINE link from Betterbidding.com to make my bid.

I used the PRICELINE link from BetterBidding.com this morning. My first bid @ $36 for 3* in the Philadelphia Airport zone was rejected. I used a free re-bid (Gloucester zone) and increased my bid to $40 and that was accepted, for the Holiday Inn Philadelphia Stadium, which looks like a decent hotel. With taxes and fees, the room is $53.28. We're arriving at PHL around 6 in the evening, then heading to Hershey the next day, so this should be pretty convenient for our short stay. With this cheap deal, now we can afford to spend a little more on our hotel near Hershey - yay! We'll probably spend a couple of days in Philly the following weekend, but haven't decided what zone we want to stay in for that. Any suggestions for a nice & affordable area to stay & see the sights? Ok, my topic title seems to have been cut off so the price & dates don't show, and it looks like I can't edit that part. My dates are 8/2-8/3/09. Can an admin person edit this so it displays properly? Thanks.

I was looking for a good hotel deal for one night near Six Flags Magic Mountain. After being rejected over the last few days with bids of $40, $43, and $46 for a 3* hotel in the Valencia-Stevenson Ranch area of LA (for 4/23-4/24/09), tonight my $49 bid was accepted, and I received a room at the "Courtyard by Marriott Santa Clarita Valencia." (I had to wait 24 hours between bids, since there were no free re-bid zones available for this area.) With taxes and fees, my total charge for 1 night is $62.27. The best rate I could find on the hotel's website was $127, so I'm pretty happy with my winning bid! I used the PRICELINE link from Better Bidding when making my bids.

I was wondering if the hotel star levels that are listed if you use the 'choose your hotel' option on priceline are the same as the star levels they assign for hotels you might get through the opaque Priceline service. The reason I am asking is that when I was searching recently for hotels in Virginia near Kings Dominion (Doswell, Ashland, etc.), the transparent program lists 2-star hotels that range from $59 up to over $100 per night, but when I have tried bidding on the 'name-your-own-price' for the same area, my bids have been rejected all the way up to $53. 2-stars is the highest level available in the areas I have been searching. I'd be happy if I got a room at the Holiday Inn Express (normally $100+ per night) for around $50, but if I bid that much and ended up at the Howard Johnson($59 on transparent), I'd be rather disappointed. Those 2 hotels both were listed as 2 stars on the transparent program, but the H.I. Express appears to be a much nicer hotel, with an indoor pool, free hot breakfast, etc. Does Priceline use the same ratings criteria for both the opaque and transparent services? Thanks for any feedback.

I'm a few months late, but just an update: When we arrived at the Hunt Road Extended Stay, they were out of rooms (someone else had Extended THEIR stay, imagine that), so they had arranged for us to stay at the Kenwood Road location instead. That worked out ok, since the Kenwood location is actually slightly closer to Kings Island. It was just a minor hassle. The desk clerk at the Hunt Rd location was very helpful, drawing us a map to get to the other location and then telling us locations & giving us directions to a couple of food places we had asked about.

This is the Extended Stay America on Hunt Road. (I think it is the 'South' location in Blue Ash.) After several failed bids last weekend for the 'Kings Island' zone for 3* (up to 40), 2.5* (up to $40), and 2*(up to $35) I decided to expand my search to include the Blue Ash zone. Blue Ash bids for 3* $35-$40 and 2.5* $36 were rejected on 5/9, dropped star level to 2* and was accepted for $32. I'm a little wary of this hotel, as their website provides very few details, but it should be adequate for 2 nights.

Booked one week ago. Had bids of $35 and $40 rejected. Re-bid of $43 accepted, received room at the Crowne Plaza City Centre. Booked through savingsbarn. With taxes and fees, total cost for 2 nights = $107.24