Priceline Hotel: Miami - Thanksgiving Weekend

[redhead_pt]

My partner and I are taking a cruise on November 22-30, and we are looking to book a hotel for two nights before and after the cruise.

Do you have any suggestions about when we should start submitting bids? I know it is way too early at this point, but I'm not sure when I should come back to book? We are ideally looking for a 4-5* in the Miami Beach area - Nov 20-22 and Nov 30-Dec 2.

My concern is that with the Thanksgiving holiday on Nov 27, hotels could be more fully booked than usual, and therefore we might be better booking a bit earlier...? But no idea sure how far in advance is ideal!

Any tips or advice would be greatly appreciated!

[AaronJB]

Welcome to Betterbidding. :)

You can bid any time for a ways in advance if you are okay with a non-refundable reservation. However, if you do, I would not be aggressive early on and pick a "ceiling" that you could bid up to every so often. If a few months go by and nothing accepts, you can move up the ceiling. Or, if you want to wait, I'd say you could likely wait until at least around Spring to start looking at November.

Thank you for using the board's HOTWIRE or PRICELINE links to start your purchases and searches.

[redhead_pt]

Sorry, I guess I should clarify... how late can I leave it and still get a good price?

As part of our cruise booking, PRICELINE will be sending us a "Free Hotel Stay Voucher" for $150. The problem is that they won't send it until around 3 weeks to a month before the cruise departure date of November 22. Would this be too late to book a name your own price hotel deal for November 20 and/or November 30?

[thereuare]

If you haven't yet, please start by reading your messages.

There is no way to know if rates will come down, or move even higher, between now and your trip. Hotels are constantly trying to predict demand and are adjusting hotel rates accordingly (and they have a LOT more data about previous rates than you or i do). Given that you need two different sets of dates, why not at least begin bidding for one of them? (since i'm assuming your PRICELINE credit will need to be used on one purchase)

Please use the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board to begin your travel purchases.

[redhead_pt]

Sorry, it's just that I am from Canada and Thanksgiving is not such a big deal up here - not to mention that it's on a separate date entirely!

I'm just wondering if I need to book well in advance given the proximity of my dates to Thanksgiving, or if I can get away with leaving things until I receive the Priceline voucher. I understand that pricing cannot be well predicted in advance, but based simply on history (insofar as you are aware), is the Sunday night after Thanksgiving typically an incredibly busy one for hotel stays in the Miami Beach area?

[Romelle]

A really easy way to get a sense of how busy hotels think they will be is to just check the rates for individual dates via Hotwire, Priceline Express, hotel web sites or even a general site like Expedia.

Besides holidays, there are all sorts of other things that impact rates. Sporting events, business conferences, weather, weddings, ?? Some you might not even imagine.

You certainly can explore things now, and be very happy if you nail a good deal. But there is some logic to waiting it out. The whole idea of Priceline, Hotwire and other "deal" sites is to help hotels fill rooms that would otherwise go unsold. While there certainly can be deals very far in advance (based on all those predictions), deals can show up later when the hotels have new information or things aren't filling up quite like their predictions suggest.

Is the voucher for a specific hotel for a specific number of nights no matter what the hotel rates, or just an amount off a booking? If it gets you the specific nights, it would be best "spent" when the hotel rates are higher. But it will take some research to determine that.

Just to get your thinking started, I checked Hotwire 4* Central South Miami Beach

11/20 $150

11/21 $212

11/30 $153

12/1 no 4* availability

This tiny bit of research suggests your first set of dates will be less expensive, so your voucher (if it is for a room for a couple nights) would be best saved for the second set of dates.

But I'd definitely do more research - other zones, other star levels, other venues.

Romelle

[thereuare]

For a historical perspective you can also:

1) go to the Priceline and Hotwire Calendar of Wins and search for this region and/or zone for Thanksgiving dates over the last few years

2) use our Priceline Maps, filter for just the month of November and timeframe 'all', and for each of the hotels in the region you're looking at click the VIEW link next to the hotel to see all wins reported for that property (and it will be just for the month of November since you include that in the filter ;) )

Any questions using the above tools let us know and let us know once you're ready to move forward with either of your dates.

Thanks for using the PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links on the board.

[redhead_pt]

OMG, these are great tools! Thanks so much for the tips guys!

[thereuare]

Glad you're enjoying them and finding the information here useful. :)

Let us know once you're ready to move forward and we'll advise accordingly.