How far in advance should I book a hotel?

Whether you stay in a budget friendly hotel or luxury resort, we all want to save money on a hotel room. Most of us estimate what our trip will cost in advance in order to decide if we can afford a trip. I always want to know exactly what my trip will cost, and I don’t want to spend the most money possible.

The best way to get a good deal on a hotel room is to understand some basic hotel practices like booking rooms in advance, renting without a reservation, and exactly how far in advance that you can book hotel rooms. After you know these common practices, then you can look over our best list of often overlooked discounts and ways to save on hotel rooms.

Do you have to book a hotel in advance?

Most hotels do offer rooms to walk in travelers, so you don’t always have to book a hotel in advance. There are some situations that you may be able to get a better deal with a walk in instead of booking a room in advance.

If you are taking a road trip where it will take you multiple days to get to your final destination, then you may want to consider not booking your one-night hotel rooms in advance.

When you book your hotel room in advance while on a road trip with multiple stops, you are basically making that stop a destination. If you don’t already have a reason to stop there, like visiting friends and family, then there really isn’t any benefit from just picking a place along the map.

A lot of booking agencies like Trip Advisor, Priceline, and hotels.com have apps that you can download on your phone where you can check pricing for upcoming hotels. As you are driving, you can pick when you start to feel tired and pick a hotel to stay in, rather than pre-planning where exactly you will stop in advance.

My favorite way to find a hotel on a road trip is to start looking for billboards on the side of the road. You will start to notice that many of the hotels are all located on one exit.

If we are about ready to call it a day driving, we will stop at one of these exits and go walk into a hotel and see about getting a room for the night.

Can you get a hotel room without a reservation?

Most hotels will tell you that they prefer guests to make a reservation. This has more to do with the hotel and less to do with the guest.

Hotels charge rates on their rooms based on supply and demand. If they can get people to book in advance, they know exactly which days have lots of reservations and which days have very few reservations.

This allows the hotel to charge more for the days that already have lots of reservations, and to start offering a price break on days that have very few prescheduled reservations.

Almost every hotel will rent you a room without a reservation, if they have a room available. If you are looking to rent a room on a holiday, a busy weekend, or when a special event is occurring in town; there may not be any available rooms.

If you are travelling during an off season for your location, then getting a room without a reservation can be fairly easy. If it is peak tourist time like at a beach side resort, it may be very difficult to find a vacancy.

How far in advance can you book a hotel?

Most hotels will allow you to book rooms a year in advance. This comes in handy if you enjoy your stay at a hotel location and know that you want to return the following year around the same time.

In some instances, where a hotel is hosting a convention or special event every year, they may allow reservations up to 3 years in advance.

Dragon Con is a huge convention that occurs every year in downtown Atlanta and is hosted by 5 hotels. Each of these 5 hotels block off space and hotel rooms just for this Pop Culture mega event. The hotels not only host different vendor areas, workshops, displays, and meeting areas; they also charge a pretty high premium for their hotel rooms.

This allows attendees to this gigantic three-day event to be located right inside the hotels that host all of the individual things to do. People that go to these events will book hotel rooms up to 3 years in advance to ensure that they secure their rooms.

Now the caveat here is that even though you book your hotel way in advance for a large event like a convention, sporting event, or a New Year’s Eve Bash in New York all you are doing is making sure you get a room. Booking this far in advance is not the best way to save money.

In fact, according to some research by Nerd Wallet booking this far in advance can mean that you actually pay more for the room then you would have by booking closer to the event.

Travel Tips for getting the Best Deals on Hotels

In booking a hotel, timing truly is everything. There is a sweet spot to securing a hotel for a trip and for getting the best deal.

When planning your next vacation, think about these tips to get the best deal on hotel rooms:

1. 4 months out – as a general rule of thumb, you want to start looking for a hotel room around 4 months before your expected trip. This is because typically rooms booked further out than 4 months can cost more. At this time, I would start narrowing down exactly where you want to stay. Are you trying to be close to the beach or close to an airport? Check out rates for all hotels in the area and what amenities each hotel offers.
2. Hotel Loyalty programs – most hotels offer a loyalty program that is free to join. The programs typically give special offers to loyal travelers and even offer bigger discounts for more travels. If you have stayed in a fair number of hotels and have a preference for a certain chain, then you should definitely sign up for these discounts. You can actually sign up for multiple loyalty programs and see which ones offer the best deals.
3. Check your Credit Cards – one of the benefits of many credit cards is discounted hotel rentals. Check the websites of your credit card companies and see if they have any special offers for hotels. A lot of people use their credit card rewards or points to book hotels in order to secure additional discounts. Keep in mind that credit card companies offer these benefits in order to get you to use your credit card, so save up for the trip ahead of time, and pay off the card as soon as the bill comes so you don’t lose all your savings with interest charges.
4. Warehouse Clubs – if you are a member of a warehouse club like Costco or Sams, check to see if you have any discounts available for travel. Most of these clubs offer member only discounts as a perk of your membership fee. The only downside is that you have to book through their website, but the savings could be huge. Always compare the members only hotel room rates against the regular rate for the hotels to see if the savings is actually significant. Some of these sites can be misleading by telling you that you are getting a huge deal for a room rate, but they are not showing you the true regular rate for that date. (It is based on the highest rate for that month or season).
5. Check the individual hotel’s website – If you find a great deal on a travel or booking website, go directly to the hotel’s website and see if the deal is actually better than booking directly. The booking sites make a commission on each reservation that they book, so some hotels offer cheaper rates on their own websites.
6. Call the Hotel – If you are wanting to stay at a hotel or resort that is not part of a chain, you may have good luck by calling the location directly. If you call in the early morning or early evening when the front desk of a hotel is not super busy with check-ins and check-outs, you may be able to speak at length with a hotel clerk to get a better deal. You can call the hotel directly and see if they offer any additional discounts and what is needed to qualify. Some hotels will offer you a discount just for staying more than 2 nights in a row, others offer in-state renter discounts, and some even offer discounts for teachers/police officers/etc. It never hurts to spend an hour to call a couple places and see if you can find an unpublished deal!
7. Avoid Weekend Stays – most travelers on vacation are going to stay at a hotel over a weekend, so prices are typically higher on the weekends. If you can try to book your stays for during the week, then you may save a lot of money on room rates.
8. Flexibility – If you are flexible on your dates for vacation, you can score some great deals. My husband and I were once able to book a hotel for 4 nights cheaper than staying for 3 nights because we made our check in day start on a Tuesday. If we had booked on Monday or Wednesday, the room rate would have been higher for the total vacation. We actually extended our vacation an extra day because it was such a great deal on the overall per night price. On the other hand, if you know what month you want to stay in but are not sure the week, check out rates for each week to find out which one is cheaper.
9. Last Minute Reservations – if you are booking a hotel during an off season in a non-touristy town, you will probably save the most money by booking in the 15 days before the trip. Most hotels will start to heavily discount rates if they have lots of non-booked rooms in the days to come. This is one of the few times that procrastinating can really pay off.
10. Price Alerts – Price Alerts can be an amazing way to snag a deal on a hotel rate. I love to set up google alerts for specific hotels in a city to see how often the price really changes. In some cases like booking a hotel in Vegas, the price can fluctuate widely for weeks at the same location. I typically will set up for alerts for multiple hotels, and then keep an eye on any upward or downward trends in price. If I notice the hotel prices are progressively getting larger, I might go ahead and make my decision very soon. If the prices are repeatedly going down, then I know I still have more time to make a decision.
11. Check reviews – It seems obvious to check reviews for a hotel before booking your room, but most people only look at the reviews on one site. I would check the reviews for each hotel on their own website and also check the reviews for the same hotel on multiple booking sites. This will give you the best idea of what you can expect and will also keep you from only seeing biased reviews. Some travel sites allow compensated reviews where the person doing the review was actually paid or comped their rooms in order to leave a good review.
12. Widen your area – Did you know that by booking a hotel 5-10 miles further away from your destination can save you a lot of money? Sometimes this means being a few exits further down the road or could mean just a short distance further away. Instead of staying inside a Disney resort, you can save money by staying in a hotel further away from the attractions. Most hotels offer complimentary shuttles and bus service to local attractions, so it could easily save you more money by being further away.
13. Cancellation Policy – Always check out a hotel’s cancellation policy before booking. Some allow you to cancel or reschedule your trip as long as you give the hotel 24-48 hours advance notice. There is no standard in cancellation policies for hotels so they each will have a separate policy. Things do come up that make you have to cancel, so it is better to be safe than sorry. This cancellation policy can also come in handy if you want to prebook a hotel to secure a low rate, and then see if you can get an even cheaper rate at another hotel later.
14. Taxes, Surcharges & Resort Fees – If you are staying in a touristy area make sure that you look at the resort fees as well as the taxes that are added to your hotel bill. Some of these taxes and fees can be very reasonable, but others can be extremely high. Hotels can even charge you extra for amenities that you don’t even end up using like a pool fee or newspaper fee. More and more hotels are charging additional fees for additional people. These fees are a way to make sure you aren’t booking a 2-bed hotel room for 8 adults. You can avoid some resort fees by staying further away from an attraction as well.
15. Bundling– If you are going to be flying, renting a car, going on a cruise, or visiting a particular attraction, check to see if there are any bundle options. These flat rate deals can cover multiple pieces of your trip and may save you money. Always check the prices individually to make sure that the bundle is a good deal. Just because a website says that a bundle will save you a ton of money, doesn’t mean that is always the case. The people offering the bundle don’t actually care if the bundle saves you money, they just want to sell a bundle. A common marketing ploy is to tell you the value of the bundle and how much you are saving, but if you don’t check those prices yourself you may actually end up overpaying.

Saving Money on Hotels

Staying at a hotel can be a very large part of the expenses associated with a vacation. They can also be an expected expense for a business trip or visiting family.

The number one hands down way to save money on a hotel room, is to do your research. This means check multiple websites for prices, pick up the phone, and check every possible benefit that you may have available to you.

The only way to know exactly when to book your hotel, is to look at all the factors that go into your trip including the location and time of the year.

A hotel stay can easily be 50% of your budget, so saving money can not only help you stay under budget, but it can also free up more money for fun on your trip!

If you need a fun tracker to keep your motivation high while saving up for a vacation, check out this free printable “$500 Nutty Saver Tracker“.

For more tips on saving money on vacations, check out “When to Buy Skis to Save Money.”