PricelineNegotiator
by Stephen Mattson,
Finding a hotel is easy, but finding an affordable price during the exact dates you want to book can sometimes be nearly impossible. In today’s market, unless you’re traveling via a business expense account, all travelers should first check availability through a third-party online hotel site. These websites can easily save you hundreds of dollars on your reservation, and all it takes is less than five minutes of your time and a few simple clicks of the mouse. Here are some of the best discount sites available:
* Priceline.com
Priceline is the largest and most well-known travel discount site on the internet. They offer a wide variety of deals for an array of hotels ranging from one to five stars. The interface of the site is easy to manage, and they offer locations all around the world – even to small-market communities. The site automatically opens up on their flight page, so simply click the tab that says ‘hotels’. Since Priceline is so popular, most hotel chains and locations work through them, so there will be plenty of options to choose from.
* Hotwire.com
Hotwire is almost as good as Priceline, but doesn’t have the same name recognition; therefore it’s slightly less popular among both hotels and customers – but just as effective at getting discounted rates. Another drawback to the site is that it doesn’t always give you an exact name of the hotel you’re booking until after you’ve booked it, and has slightly less hotel options as Priceline.
*Orbitz.com
Orbitz is another good site that is similar to both Hotwire and Priceline. They’ll be plenty of hotels to choose from, and although the prices are within about $10 of both Hotwire and Priceline, the site is worth a look if a hotel happens to already be “completely booked” at one of the other online locations. Since hotels divide their available rooms and allocate them to various online third-party vendors, Orbitz always serves as a good backup site.
*Hotels.com
Hotels.com is another good secondary site to visit. Again, this site is very similar to the three sites just listed, but it’s always good to check it out just in case it has a cheaper rate or a different hotel option that isn’t available elsewhere.
No matter where you decide to book, always make sure to check out these main online sites first. Most offer rates with at least a 25 percent discount and all of these sites are financially safe to use and offer some sort of money-back guarantee.
