Travel Deal of the Day (October 17, 2008)

Though economic downturns normally mean quite a few deals, usually finding a sale during the week between Christmas and New Years Eve has been next to impossible in major tourist destinations. Well, this year is quite different. You have an opportunity to find excellent deals, especially through blind bidding websites such as Priceline.

The Deal:

Look out for excellent deals on hotels in leisure destinations, even during the week between Christmas and New Years Eve, on blind bidding websites such as Priceline and Hotwire. Here is a prime example, BiddingForTravel.com, a website where people post their successful hotel bids on Priceline, is showing successful bids at the Hyatt Maui over New Years Eve for $199/night. The fact that Hyatt is putting its rooms in Maui on Priceline during its busiest few days of the year demonstrates that there are going to be incredible deals using Priceline over time periods which have been off limits previously - such as Christmas week and the week between Good Friday and Easter. In most situations, hotels can offer huge discounts using the bidding feature on Priceline and Hotwire and generally not worry about impacting traditional rates, as only a small segment of travelers would be willing to bid for a hotel room (at a deep discount) and accept whatever hotel is given to them by Priceline or Hotwire. Hotels generally did not have to engage in this kind of discounting over truly high demand weeks (such as Christmas week) as all the rooms would be purchased at standard rates. This is not the case this year, and you may benefit tremendously by using Priceline and Hotwire this holiday season.