Priceline Hotel: Downtown DC insane 3/10-3/14/08, where else for Metro?

[CrazyOne]

Wow. Never seen it like this. I often bid for a hotel in downtown DC when I do a one or two night trip for work. Small company, can't be laying out for $300 hotel rooms all the time. I usually bid 4* to avoid the various 3* issues. I pick from Foggy Bottom, Dupont/Woodley and/or White House areas. Usually I'm in around 100 bucks or so, sometimes less.

Now this time it's not me but another employee needing an all-week 4 nights beginning 3/10. I started on it last week. We were prepared to take $210 at the Holiday Inn Key Bridge across the river, but that rate was a lovely disappearing Travelocity deal (still showed when searching, even after I tested and found it not bookable). Now it might be $250 at the same place.

I have bid progressively higher over the past few days, and now this morning I topped it out at $210 for 4* in White House, Dupont and Foggy (and Springfield and Crystal rebids of course). Convention/Capitol is usually something I avoid, but I may try it in a minute.

Is there any sure bet for walkable Metro access outside of downtown? It could be 3* even I suppose. Just wondering, might be willing to try it, might just go for a sure thing somewhere despite the price.

[thereuare]

Washington DC can get very expensive at times.

If you're looking outside the city, HOTWIRE (Alexandria perhaps?) may be a better option as you can likely guess (or take an eduated guess) as to the property beforehand and determine how close the nearest metro stop is and if it is on a 'good' line to where the worker head on most days.

Not sure it will help, but is SPLITTING YOUR PRICELINE BID an option?

[thereuare]

To add, i took this a step further...

If you are willing to SPLITTING YOUR PRICELINE BID, HOTWIRE has a 4* in the Dupont Circle zone for 'just' $235/nite... at least that's more palatable, and then you can make other plans (either a more expensive hotel inside the city limits or stay outside for those two nites). You could also try bidding on PRICELINE for these two nites in an attempt to beat the $235/nite rate.

Please use these PRICELINE and HOTWIRE links to begin your purchase(s).

Let us know youur thoughts, if the above is an option we'll try to find something reasonable for the first two nites.

[CrazyOne]

It's a good thought. Maybe if it were me staying I would do the split, but I don't want to inconvenience the guy that much just to save a few bucks. It's clear that Monday and Tuesday nights are the hardest, with Wednesday to a lesser degree and Thursday somewhat more available. I still so far seem to have decent fallback at $250. (I can't book it because it's a prepay, so I could lose it. Prepay for this is actually *better* although I suppose I should make a refundable booking if I find an acceptable one.)

By now I'm spending so much time on it that arguably it's costing more than just booking something, but then I like the challenge.

I did try Convention/Capitol, not right up to $210 for 4* but up to $180 with nothing. I've been contemplating 3* in Dupont and Foggy; some of the 3* in White House just hold bad memories (Washington Plaza, shudder) and couldn't bear to see someone stay even though they are probably renovated since then.

Most outlying areas would be fine with the right place but it seems most of them have possible hotels that wouldn't be near the Metro. While they may have shuttles this isn't as convenient when going back there in the evening. I'm kinda avoiding Crystal City because I hear it's just kinda desolate at night, like staying near the airport (which it is, kinda, for DCA). Looking again though it does appear that perhaps the 4* Westins in Alexandria and Arlington could work. It's the 3* that's a problem. Hmmm.... Maybe I'll try that (although now I see Alexandria is probably sold out.) And look at the Hotwire again, seems to change all the time.

I will note anything else I try (and of course use your links).

[CrazyOne]

Heh, well, I bid up to $215 for all 4* including Arlington/Alexandria. Someone had a hit the other day on one of those for pretty low, for just 3/10. But it won't give me anything for all 4 nights. Ugh.

Interesting new behavior on Priceline. First this morning it was new maps from Microsoft. Now it's every unsuccessful bid you get prompted to use the regular booking engine instead. I dunno, maybe that's not new, but it didn't do that yesterday for me.

And I bid up to $180 for 3* in Dupont (decided against GT/Foggy). Used Springfield to rebid. Nada. going to have to bite the bullet on something here.

[thereuare]

Try GTA Hotels, Quickbook, and LastMinuteTravel... it could be tough given the high demand, but since they operate on slightly different business models than most hotel booking sites, you can sometimes get 'regular' rates when the area has otherwise 'inflated' rates.

[CrazyOne]

Well, I ran out of time at work today to finalize this in between other stuff so I may end up bidding some more tomorrow morning. As you can see by the other winning bid posting, clearly 3/13 is not a problem, just the earlier days.

There may be a possibility on EasyClickTravel assuming the amazing reverse search here is correct. :-) It's showing $236 downtown for what the reverse search says is Capital Hilton.

I always hit Quikbook and I had little luck with that or with GTA Hotels which was very flaky for me actually. Last Minute Travel is a new one to me and I'll take a look, thanks. Now that I can settle down instead of trying to fit it in between other stuff I might have a clearer head for zeroing in on some ideas if one last round of bids tomorrow is nil. I'm assuming the Priceline inventory still gets refreshed at least daily, though I don't know if we know that for sure anymore....

EDIT: oh, I see, Last Minute Travel looks same as Easy Click Travel. Ah well. At least it's obvious; sometimes it's not 100% clear when you're getting info from the same source at different sites....

[thereuare]

As of this writing, EasyClickTravel will dying a slow death... the company has determined to not promote the brand or do any marketing behind it, instead choosing to move forward with the LastMinuteTravel brand (a mistake to not continue with both, but they didn't ask me)

They do have the same inventory so please use our LastMinuteTravel link.

Also note, to count on an EasyClickTravel or LastMinuteTravel property it should be listed as "available" and not as "On Request". See our PRICELINE FAQ for the difference between the two.

[CrazyOne]

Well, based on my searching today I thought I might have better luck this afternoon, but I didn't. I bid way up (to $250 once for the downtown zones) and got nothing. Just no inventory there for me I guess.

Based on a few new appearances (I knew the listings fairly well after the last couple days) I thought something might loosen up. It still might, but I was getting hounded to finalize it so I did, with a $279/night booking at the Hilton Embassy Row. This rate appeared sometime last evening, looked to be gone from Hilton's own site at some point this morning, then appeared there again. It was on Orbitz throughout that time.

Thanks for that tip about the "On Request" at LastMinute/EasyClickTravel. Because of that I didn't bother going further. If I had time I would, but today I just needed it done. Too bad. I'll bet if I tried some bidding on Friday morning it would get better. But I won't have a chance to try that out. (We're not going to change the guy's plans at the last minute.)

I still wonder what is going on in DC those days; I haven't been able to quite pin that down. Anyway, thanks for all the tips.

[thereuare]

Glad you got it settled.

There are so many conferences, rallys, protests, etc, in addition to corporate business, going on in DC that there's almost always something happening... and it's not uncommon to see hotel rates out of reach one day and then low just a few days later.

Thanks for the board donation.