The Internet is your best source for finding cheap hotels. Each website offers a different saving, so look at at least three hotel websites to get an idea of what current rates are. Some good hotel websites are hotels.com, travelocity.com, expedia.com, orbitz.com and priceline.com. These travel sites will generally be much lower than the hotel's own website. The main exception to this are Las Vegas hotels - - they often run promotions on their own websites that cannot be beat. You also can save money by purchasing a package deal of airfare, hotels and a rental car together through these websites.
The Name your Own Price option on priceline.com and the anonymous hotel selection on hotwire.com can offer tremendous savings on a great quality hotel if you know how to use it right.
Through priceline, you normally get the best deal on 3- and 4-star hotels. Choose the hotel star rating you would like to get, and select an area. If unfamiliar with the area you will be visiting, do additional research on the safest and most tourist-friendly areas before making a selection. Place a bid at approximately forty percent lower than the current advertised rate. Priceline will then inform you whether your attempt was successful or not. Make sure you have plenty of time before travel though, as you can only make one bid per 24 hour period.
Hotwire works slightly differently. It gives the hotel's star rating and the area that it is located, without revealing the name of the hotel. Hotwire also lets you know the hotel amenities and the percent of customer reviews. Often, the customer reviews percentage coincides with the customer satisfaction ratings for hotels on TripAdvisor.com, but this is not always the case.
Be careful though; once a reservation is made through either of these sites, it is nearly impossible to cancel them. Also, before booking on either of these websites, refer to hoteldealsrevealed.com. This is an unofficial user-contributed guide to the hotels you may get through priceline or hotwire.
Before making a hotel reservation, also look into cash-back sites like ebates.com and cashbaq.com. These websites can offer you up to 5% cash back for a purchase made through their website. Also check on websites like promotionalcodes.com and retailmenot.com to see if there are any promo codes you could use to reduce your cost.
There are many credit cards through which you can get points for your purchases. You can then redeem these points for free hotel night stays. Many cards also offer extra points for staying with their hotel brands, and offer exclusive deals and promotions. The American Express Starwood card is one such credit card. There also are credit cards such as the Discover More Card that gives you extra cash back for many travel websites.
