Booking trips months in advance?

I see people booking their trips months and months in advance. All the time. I am talking 6 months or more in advance.

Being the perpetual procrastinator I find it impossible to book anything more than a couple weeks in advance and 9 times out of 10, it's usually a decision made the day before.

With life being what it is, so many things could come up in the meantime when you book so far ahead.

Just throwing that out there. Bravo to you if you have the patience to book months in advance. I know I will never be able to.

By the way, leaving for LV in a couple hours! Please tell Mayor Goodman and Tony Hsieh to roll out the welcome mat for me.

 

If I'm really far out in advance, I'll go the extra $20 for trip insurance. I'll book really early to lock myself into some really cheap airfare and free room combo if it happens to come along at the right time.

 

I usually book a few months in advance...and then change plans a dozen times. I'm not a spur of the moment traveler. The anticipation is half the fun.

 

Ditto. It drives me nuts if I don't have a trip planned.

Have a great trip VegasVegan!!!

 

We seldom plan more than a month in advance, always start by reserving rooms (which often change), and then look for air. For example, last week we reserved 8 nights around Memorial Day; but if decent airfares don't show up, we'll cancel the rooms and not go. That seldom happens, but that's how we play the game.

 

We pick a month we want to go (spring every year) as soon as SW has a great sale we book. Generally Dec/Jan book the air for an April/May trip. I look at the convention calendar and room rates to try to avoid a busy week. Always 4 months or more out. I won't fly during the snowy months and we can't wait for spring, booking our trip gets us through the winter. We won't go if we can't get a decent rate, hence the book early.

 

Because I always use FF miles I have to book well in advance to get a good flight. Then I wait for offers from Boyd and wait out a rental car price.

 

Due to the crazy airline prices I book a fare whenever I see it priced right. I know the months I like to go to LV, so I jump right on a good fare. I booked my trip for Sept. of this year last Dec! Glad I did, fare has gone nothing but up.

 

I have several trips planned / prebooked up to a year in advance. Gives me something to look forward to.

 

got you beat captainron, I booked my September trip the first week of last November!! Airfare always goes up, by a couple hundred dollars actually. I have never seen it go down, at least for me flying out of Detroit. I would of booked sooner but the MGM reservation system didn't have rates published for September 2013 back in October 2012, so I had to "wait" unit November. I book directly with the hotel so that I can call and change my reservation as many times as I want if/when they run a better promotion. They had a black friday facebook promotion that I called and got the better deal on.

I book all vacations at least 6-8 months in advance.

 

I typically book 3-4 months ahead of time. The most advanced I booked was 6 months out. I booked in early June to go mid December because I got a freak deal on SWA for two august tower rooms for three nights, 3 plane tickets, and tax for $1,400.

 

We're retired now, but I used to book 330 days in advance, as soon as it was permitted on Midwest Airlines. They're gone now, but with SWA I'm just waiting for for the November window to open on May 9th.

Other trips already booked for July, Sept & Oct.

 

I book in advance also...as soon as I am comfortable with a price. Booked my going flight a few months ago, and just booked my return flight this last week for my Sept trip. Still have not booked hotel, but that will happen within this next month. I have found that if you wait, then the price goes up and you are kicking yourself. I like to plan way in advance and have things pre paid by the time I get there...that way its not spending so much all at once...works great for those of us on a tight budget. I now live in the middle of nowhere, and flights are limited...airports are over 2 hours away for one with more than one airline.
I call the planning process "studying" and keep a close watch on the airfare and hotels so I know when a good deal comes about.

 

You should really make an effort, it will save a bundle. The best example is when my wife and I were in Vegas to get married. When we made the plans 4 months before it was a regular weekend. I booked 3 rooms at MSS: Fri, Sat, Sun for a grand total of 140 each. Well after we made the plans, they announced that the Electric Daisy Carnival would be the same weekend. The room rates increased 10fold. My family that waited, ended up paying 300-400/nt and almost didn't get a rooms at all. If you book direct, its always refundable(unless otherwise stated). Since this, I've always booked 4 months or more in advance.

 

We always book in advance.

We need to arrange for my parents to take the kids. And the flight prices from Canada can get insane if you don't book in advance. We booked our September trip right before Christmas and paid $500 return for DH and I. The same flight right now is $700 each. So we just saved $900.

 

I am lucky, being from Hawaii I know that Hawaiian airlines drops their airline prices down quarterly and also drops their prices if the flight doesn't fill up. Like others I watch their site and check out airline prices regularly. I will book if I have to be there at a certain date but lots of times I just hold out and wait until they drop their prices. All a crapshoot as they may or may not drop prices. Usually for me $380 for a r/t from hnl to las is a good price so I just wait until it gets down to around that price but I have seen prices drop down lower too.

I try to book rooms using booking.com as they allow reservations without charging to your charge card (not all though, many charge at least the first night, but usually easy to cancel and get your money back). That way I can book early just in case and cancel and rebook if rates go lower.

I am a procrastinator also. I just booked a trip to europe that is leaving in about 4 weeks. I was checking the sites since January and was lucky that award seats were still available. Glad that I finally booked because the flights now started going up and no award seats anymore (guess 1 month is the cutoff with the discount rates).

 

Patience??????
When our son was in school our options were limited to 2-3 months out of the year. Factoring in having to make reservations at the kennel and having to schedule with people at work who also have kids and want to plan a vacation at the same time ........Well, you have no other option than to schedule months and months in advanced.

 

Okay, I quoted my own post, but we just booked next month's trip. While rooms were reserved a couple weeks ago, we waited until this afternoon when we saw airfares dip from ridiculously out of the question to just expensive to buy tickets. Sure, we might have saved more had be booked several months ago, but we seldom know what end is up that far in advance. We look at it like gasoline prices. You might save a few bucks if you fill up today, but over the "grand scheme" of things, it isn't going to make much of a dent.

 

I guess i'm lucky living in LA. Don't have to worry about booking flights. I booked in Feb. for Rio and Bally's (May-Nov. no resort fee), and i also booked Caesars for August. All rooms comped and i decided on Caesars because it was also comped, however i do have to pay the resort fee.
But i always have planned Vegas by season..........Spring, Summer, and Fall, with an occasional Winter visit. So in 2014 i plan on doing the same thing by using my casino rate calender for the whole year.

 

Guess I just like quoting myself, but we just booked another trip this afternoon that departs a week from Friday. I'm constantly amazed that we're able to find free or cheap rooms and semi-reasonably priced air on such short notice, but it's definitely doable. It sure can be an exhausting experience, however!