Booking Travel on a Budget

I don’t know about you, but I can’t stand to pay full price for something. There are so many ways in this world to get discounts or cash back, that it just doesn’t make sense for me to pay full price or not get rewarded in some way. This philosophy doesn’t change when I’m planning my next big trip either. In fact, you can save some major cash when booking travel. Who says traveling has to break the bank? Here are some of the secrets I use to score a great deal while traveling & just in everyday life.

Ebates:

If you do not have an Ebates account, I need you to run, don’t walk, to the nearest computer and make an account. Before you even consider booking the first hotel, plane ticket, or rental car, you must do this. In fact, don’t buy ANYTHING online before doing this. What is Ebates? It’s free money…basically. When you’re about to do some online shopping, first go to Ebates. From there, you can search the store you want to do some shopping at (Amazon, Macys, Priceline, Walmart, Groupon, etc. etc. etc.). There are so many different stores/websites and most of them offer cash back on your purchase simply by going through Ebates first. So, say I am going to make an Amazon purchase (because, why not?): In order to get cash back, I simply go to Ebates.com, search for Amazon, click “shop now,” and it directs me to the Amazon website where I complete my order. Simple, right? It really is that easy. Sometimes, stores will offer double the cash back and then it really adds up. I use Ebates on all of my online shopping, but especially when I am booking travel. 5-10% cash back on airline tickets can add up quickly.

So. If you’re not convinced, then I would love for you to share with me what you’re doing to where you don’t need to earn free money. ;) For everyone else, use my referral code below to score $10 after your first purchase of $25 or more.

https://www.ebates.com/r/JILLIA3860?eeid=28187

Priceline:

Priceline is a website used for finding discounted rates for travel-related purchases. I mainly use Priceline when searching for hotels, but I have used it for flights here and there. I have found that Ebates typically has a decent amount of cash back through Priceline, so I usually combine the two for added savings. Priceline also has a mobile app where you can often find additional mobile deals that you wouldn’t find on the desktop. In order to maximize your savings, not only should you use Ebates in conjunction with Priceline, but you should also utilize the “Express Deals” function. Express Deals are discounted even further, but the catch is that you don’t know the name of the hotel until after you’ve booked it. Wait, what? Yeah, that was my reaction at first, but when you’re a savvy shopper, and you want the best deal, there is a pretty good way around this “mystery hotel offer.”

I have booked Express Deals quite a few times, and every time I have known which hotel I was booking. How?? Well, you can narrow it down. When you see this express deal, you can still read about the hotel. You know how many stars it is, the guest score, the amenities, which part of town it’s located in, and which brand of hotel it is “Westin, Hilton, Mariott, etc.” or “Best Western, Quality, Hampton, etc.” So, you’re not going in completely blind. You have a good idea of where you could stay, but I like to know exactly where I’m going to stay. So, what I do is compare the Express Deal amenities, guest score, and the hotel location with the hotels listed in the regular deals section. When we booked our recent trip to San Francisco, I narrowed my search down to “amenities: pet friendly” and “neighborhood: Union Square.” I saw that The Westin was listed and right below it, there was an express deal listed. It had the exact location, number of stars, guest rating, and it was pet friendly. Oh, and it was $50 cheaper. It seems complicated on paper, but if you get into the app and start playing around with it, you can figure it out pretty easily. I just went into the app myself to check out Express Deals, and under one of the mystery deals, it says “Hint: You’ve booked here before ;)” So, there’s that.

Airbnb:

Before you blindly book a hotel on any platform, I recommend checking AirBnb first. AirBnb is a platform where people can rent out rooms in their home or the entire home. Sometimes, you can find great deals on AirBnbs that are just as nice, if not nicer, than nearby hotels & at a fraction of the price. However, there are other times when it makes more sense to book a hotel. It all depends on the location. When we visited New Zealand, I always checked AirBnb as well as hotels in the area. Most of the time, I went with AirBnb because there were many nice options, and other times, it made sense to just go with a hotel. Just know your options and don’t assume an AirBnb will always be cheaper or the best option. Also, don’t assume an AirBnb won’t be as nice as a hotel. Check the reviews—people are pretty accurate and honest when describing a place. J

New to AirBnb? Use my link to sign up and get a $40 travel credit!! Win!

https://abnb.me/e/IHt5LD6XwQ

Google Flights:

Once you have traveled, it’s impossible to turn the switch off and go back to normal life. I’m always looking at flights & Google Flights is one of my favorite tools. It allows you to see how much it is to fly to a location each day. So, once you input your beginning city and your destination, you can see which dates are going to save you the most money. Now, flight prices change daily. Which means that the “cheap” days to fly will also change. When I’m booking flights, I typically already know the dates I’m wanting to travel, so I keep an eye on Google Flights over a long period to see the flight trends. That way, I know what a good price is when it comes up, and I can book at the best time. Say that you’re wanting to fly to Atlanta on the 2nd but you can be flexible with your schedule. You can go to Google Flights, check the price for flying in on the 2nd, and see if that is the best price, or if there is a cheaper flight arriving on the 1st or 3rd instead. If the prices seem steep, keep an eye on it because again, flights change daily.

Hopper App:

Another noteworthy tool is the Hopper app. When you input your travel dates, it tells you if prices are expected to rise (and you should buy now) or if prices are expected to drop (and you should wait). I think this is a great tool because even if you see prices on Google Flights, there’s really no telling if you should expect flight prices to increase or decrease.

Check out other booking websites:

When it comes time to book the flight, you can shop around for who to book through. Google Flights will give you the airline with the best price, but I typically do not book directly with the airline. I don’t have one specific go-to website for booking my flights, but I like to shop around and see who has the best price or which website has the most cash back offer on Ebates (Don’t forget to use Ebates!!!). For our New Zealand trip, I booked through CheapOair but check out Kayak, Priceline, Booking, or any other sites that may be offering a great deal with cash back options.

RentalCars.com

Zach and I do not rent cars very often, so I’m definitely not an expert or know all of the tricks (in fact, I don’t claim to be an expert on anything). However, I have found that RentalCars.com has worked well for us. What I love about this website is that you don’t have to have 10 tabs open from different rental car companies. Instead, you put in your information and they do the hard work for you. They compare rental car prices from multiple brands such as Hertz, Avis, Alamo, Enterprise, and Budget. This way you know you’re getting the best price. And, an added bonus, you can usually use Ebates to book through RentalCars.com so you’re getting an even better deal with extra cash back. Win, win, win!

These were just a few suggestions of how I like to save money when booking travel. This is by no means an exhaustive list, but this is what has worked for us in the past. I also like to take advantage of Credit Card savings by using their rewards and cash back bonuses, but I’ll save that for another post. J In the meantime, if you don’t get anything else from this post, I want you to take away one thing: Get an Ebates account! ;)