I've never used Priceline.com for anything. I'm not even sure how it works. What I hear is you NAME your own price? I have the inlaws driving up to Wmsbg, VA from Houston around the 22nd of the month and I need to get them a hotel. I hear this is the cheapest way to go to find hotels. The site I always use is either sidestep.com or hotels.com (they have alot of buy 2 nights get 1 free deals) So which site is best for finding cheap hotels?
with name your own price for hotels you set the amount you want to pay per night and the minimum # of stars you want your hotel to have (1-5) then it will go through and try to find something if nothing is found then you will have to up your daily price OR drop your min # of stars if it does find something you have to agree to pay for the price after any fees and only after you pay will you be given the name and address of the Hotel. I used it for a trip to phoenix back in Feb and got a good deal on a hotel, I used it to rent a car this past thankgiving weekend and got a great deal on a 5 day holiday rental
with priceline's set your own price, you pick an area and hotel quality and bid. If your bid is accepted -- you pay -- no refunds, no changing your mind if you don't like the hotel etc, no specifying room type. Check this site: http://biddingfortravel.yuku.com/ which gives you recent bids and hotel lists of which hotels are in each area. If you're super flexible, won't need to cancel, and don't mind which of a specific set of hotels you end up in, it can be great. I've used it several times for LA, and love it.
Priceline and Hotwire are both excellent venues to cheap hotels, I've used both for all my hotels for about 2 years now, cheapest around.
Go to biddingfortravel.com or betterbidding.com to see how it works. Read some responses to posts or successful bids posts on there and you'll understand how it works. When I need a hotel, I always bid on it. If you don't want a specific hotel, but are content with a "star rating" and a region of the city, you'd be nuts to not try Priceline. Oh, and if you are sure you won't cancel because there are no refunds. I've gotten $125-$190/night hotel rooms for $30-$55 using priceline. Also, you can sometimes tell which hotels are on Hotwire (since they don't tell you until you book a reservation) using the above sites and their list of hotels.
I use priceline pretty much every time I stay in Austin. I'm usually able to get a 4 star downtown hotel which normally go for $200+ for around $75 each time I've gone. As long as their isn't a convention or some other big event going on that will draw in a lot of visitors, it's absolutely the best way to get a hotel.
Yeah I tried Priceline for my Miami, but IIRC, you only get to bid on a price once a day or something like that...that sucked...
Be warned, though: if you try to enter in something too ridiculous, like a 5-star for $10, William Shatner shows up and kicks you in the nuts.
well you can only bid in one category per day... Say you say you want a 4 star hotel in 77478 for 100 dollars. If your bid doesnt get approved, you MUST change atleast one of the categories, either the stars, or the zip, or the price.
http://www.groupon.com/tucson/ the groupon in tucson has priceline credit if you want to purchase and save even more but there are not too many left so hurry
Basically you bid on a hotel room and put in a cheap price, then William Shatner gathers the ghosts of the dead Star Trek ensigns and they go haunt the hotel until no one will stay there. Once that happens the hotel decides your price is better than no one staying there and accept your bid.
There is some gamesmanship you can do. For example, if someone wants a 4 star hotel in downtown Houston, they can put in a bid at $50. If it is rejected, they can put in another bid at $60 for downtown Houston or Conroe for a 4 star hotel. Since Priceline does not have any 4 star hotels in Conroe, it is really just another bid for a 4 star hotel in downtown Houston. In a big city like Houston with lots of different areas, you can make a lot of bids in a row if you know what you are doing.
