Great Deals on Travel to Vegas

About a week ago I received a large envelope in the mail on high quality paper, addressed to "Mr. and the Future Mrs. LAMoneyGuy."  Clearly a wedding invitation.  I was in a hurry, so I opened it up enough to see whom it was from and what the date was.  Of course, my fiancee wanted to know where it was going to be.  I assumed it would be local, as both the bride and groom are in the area.  I was surprised when I opened the invitation again and saw that it was going to be in Las Vegas!

Not that I minded having to go to Vegas, but I then only had about four weeks to book the travel plans.  I was worried that we would not be able to find a good deal on flights because time was getting short.  turns out I was able to get great deals on both the flight AND the hotel.  Let me tell you how.

For the flight I checked around on Southwest.com, Expedia, Orbitz, ual, aa, etc.  I figured we would most likely fly out of LAX, but was willing to consider other airports.  I discovered sidestep.com from pluggedinfinance. He recommended using them for rental cars, but they were awesome for both flights and hotel rooms.  Here are the deals that I found.

My flight plans were unique in that I had to fly to Vegas on Friday afternoon/evening and return Saturday night in order to make it back for another commitment.  This actually helped a lot on the cost.  We only needed a hotel room for one night, and flights on Saturday night are much cheaper than Sunday afternoon.

Sidestep basically takes all the major sites, like the ones that I mentioned above, and searches them for flights that fit your travel schedule.  They search not only the ones that have selling agreements with third party sites (like United Airlines has with Expedia and others), but carriers like Jetblue, which only sells via its own website.  Also, the site is incredibly user friendly.  You can sort by price, stops, departure or airline.  You can check boxes on the side that allow you to filter out certain departure or arrival times, local airports or airlines.

The flight that it found for me, I would not likely have found on my own.  It was a Jetblue flight out of Burbank Airport.  Burbanks works well for me, but I have never flown out of there, so I would not have thought of it.  Also, the flight was about $40 less than any other flight that I found.  So, I am paying only $139 each for the flights for my Fiancee and me.

The hotel was even better.  I am not particularly picky about the hotel, but wanted to stay at one of the major hotels on the strip.  Again, I turned to sidestep.com.  Again, it searched multiple travel sites, some I had never heard of.  It found me a great rate at Harrah's.  Only $129 for Friday night.  So, I went to the Harrah's site, and found two things of interest.  First, the rate was $150 per night.  Second, they have a "Best Rate Guarantee," which basically says that if you find a cheaper rate for their hotel somewhere else, they will give you the lower rate plus 25% off.  So, I booked through Harrah's, submitted the Best Rate Guarantee Claim and got the reduced rate of $96.96.  I just received an email from them confirming this rate.

So, it's pretty expensive for one night of travel, but $375 for two flights and a night at a major Vegas strip hotel is a really great deal.  Especially for arrangements booked less than four weeks away from the event.

Comments

[mapgirl]

Flying an alternative airport really is the best way to get cheaper airfare. I regularly fly out of BWI even though it's the furthest of the 3 airports in DC. Between the cost of shuttle service vs long term parking fees + cheaper airfare, it ends being economical. Then the only factor is whether or not I feel like waking up at 3am or BWI or 5am for DCA.

You're lucky that Vegas is a place where you can book Friday night by itself. A lot of hotels make you book two weekend nights whether you need the second night or not, hence the problem I was having with my wedding travel. I was being forced to book 6 nights for three weddings when really I only needed 3.

You're also lucky to be able to travel with a 'roommate' to share costs. Us singletons don't have that option. *winky*

[lamoneyguy]

Yea, I always check Long Beach, but I forget about Burbank. Luckily, I'm pretty central between the three (LAX, LB and Bur).

I guess with all the rooms, Vegas is pretty flexible about that stuff. Maybe it depends on the hotel.

Yea, sharing with a 'roommate' helps. For this wedding, I would have roomed with other singletons if I were still in that boat. Actually, we probably would have crammed 4-5 into a room, so maybe cheaper! But, of course, I would much prefer just the one 'roommate.'

[financial freedumb]

Wow, nice work. Not many alternative airports where I live though...

Hopefully you'll come back with enough to cover your trip! Good luck!

[financial freedumb]

Wow, sidestep.com is pretty awesome!

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nice to have you do all of the research for us. It makes our decision making so much easi