Rubiman

4* Westin Beach Resort - $115/night Amenities: Resort, Oceanfront, Restaurant, Pool, Fitness, Smoke Free, Hi-Speed Internet, Business, Laundry, Tennis, Childrens Activities Funny thing is, I was browsing prices earlier this morning, and the amount was $128/night. I came back 3 hours later to book, and saved about $13 for my procrastination! How's that for luck? Better Bidding has always been a great source of info for me, so I made sure that I used the HOTWIRE link here in the site.

My wife and I are planning to re-visit Las Vegas just prior to Thanksgiving for our anniversary this year. Our itinerary has us landing at McCarran on 11/19, and then leaving Las Vegas on the 23rd. My wife had been dropping hints about wanting to stay somewhere nicer than our previous visit (the Excaliber), and with this in mind, I'd been monitoring all the usual web sites for 5* rates for a couple of months. Wynn Las Vegas has been available for our dates on EasyClickTravel at an opaque $179-$182 for quite a while, and Hotwire has had the obvious Venetian listed at $127-$133 for a couple of months, too. However, this morning the Wynn rate on ECT suddenly jumped to about $219, just $20 below the standard rate on Wynn's home site. Also, the Venetian has inexplicably dropped off Hotwire entirely for our travel dates! When I discovered this, I shifted immediately into panic mode. I booted up Priceline and started to bid for the Venetian, hoping something big didn't just hit the north strip area. I mean, c'mon, did someone actually schedule a large convention the week of Thanksgiving?! My first bid was $115 for a 5* in the strip area. I was denied, but I received a counter of only $22 over my bid (i.e. $137). I was relieved that Priceline rates were still relatively low, and I systematically added free re-bid zones at $116, $117, and $118, until I was finally accepted at $119. Still a pretty good rate, I think, given that the four nights on Venetian's web site list individually as $299, $299, $259 and $219, respectively (also shown as $259 cummulative for all four nights). ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Key stats . . . Check-In Date: Sun, Nov. 19, 2006 Check-Out Date: Thurs, Nov. 23, 2006 Number of Rooms: 1 Number of Nights: 4 Subtotal: $476.00 Taxes & Service Fees: $60.97 Total Charges: $536.97 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ By the way, just for giggles I checked ECT about an hour later, and the opaque price for Wynn was magically back down to $182. Perhaps the earlier price was just a fluke bad read from their database? I guess it wouldn't surprise me if the Hotwire omission turns out to be a temporary thing as well. Just thought I'd share . . .

I finally got around to bidding on PriceLine. I bid $75 a night for a 4* in NMA, but got turned down. I added Evanston (no 4*'s there apparently) and re-bid at $80, and was accepted at the Swissotel. I think you're right; the $100 4.5* Customer Favorite on Hotwire probably is the Swissotel, and if PriceLine fell through I might have taken their $100 offer just to make sure I got it. I researched many of the downtown Chicago hotels, and I liked the Swissotel more and more as I went along. Paying $40 less overall with PriceLine was icing on the cake. So far I'm a satisfied customer! Thanks for the input -- I plan to help spread the word that this forum is here. I'll sure I'll be back.

Hi, I'm back. I suppose I would pay a little more to have a better handle on where we stay, but I thought that Hotwire was also somewhat vague on where you wind up. If you think my chances of nailing a locale are significantly better with Hotwire, I would probably go that route. Otherwise, I would give PriceLine a shot. Thanks again for all the help; I'm still tickled to have found a website like this!

Thanks for the quick reply! In reality I suppose I could live with any 4* hotel I got in the NMA area. If I won a low bid, I'd have more money for cabs, wouldn't I? Are you suggesting I might get the other hotels to bite if I bid a little higher? Would I risk getting the Hyatt anyway but paying more than I needed to? I might pay a bit more if I thought it would make a location difference.

I'm planning to fly my wife into Chicago for our anniversay the weekend before Thanksgiving (specifically, the 19th - 21st). I've never used PriceLine before, but have had it recommended to me to save some major dough. Common sense would tell me that I'm not going to get a terribly low bid accepted this early, but am I wrong? I want to book a 4* hotel in the NMA area, but it looks like about 2 out of 3 bidders wind up at the Hyatt. Not a bad hotel by any means, but it's on the southern fringe and I'd hoped to be able to avoid taxi fare to northern Michigan Avenue (I know first hand it's a chilly walk up there in late November). Does anyone have any suggestions that *might* get me up a little further north in this area? Also, am I better off waiting until closer to that weekend? I don't know whether the weekend before Thanksgiving is actually a busy time at hotels or not. I'm not entirely comfortable with waiting until the last minute and then running the risk of not having anything decent available. Thanks for any help I can get!