Travel Experts come in! (NBR)

RustyGirl3

After 25 years in the military my brother is retiring next year.

He is a Navy Seal and he lives in San Diego. We are in NY. The retirement ceremony is planned for November and I want to get the best deal possible on tickets since I have 4 to purchase.  I hate how complicated it is, the time of year you buy vs travel, the day of the week you fly and time of day you purchase all seems to matter when looking for a good price.  It makes my head hurt.

Anyone have some great tips for buying airline tickets?  TIA!!

MichelleKirkpatrick

Rule of thumb in our house is buy on a Tuesday or Wednesday.  Usually the best prices.  However sometimes its best to do research for yourself due to different destinations, gas prices, etc. Try searching every day at different times and note different price changes for about a week, then I'd decide when to purchase.  When money was tight, my husband used a site called "CheapOair.com" it had some great deals on it.  Haven't used it in a while, but we used to get fab deals on international flights through that site. Summer is always more expensive, so are holidays.  Good luck!! Travel is kind of a pain to plan but super fun and worth it in the end IMO!!

jenanns

I struggle with this one!  Seems the best time of the week to buy the ticket is Tuesdays. From what I have read and experienced weekends are the worst since everyone has time to look then.

The day you fly that is cheapest is usually Tuesday - Thursday but that isn't a given either.

I would probably book a little more in advance than 60 days due to it being a holiday month.  Also if your price checking daily for a while be sure to clear out your search history/cookies as they track you and will not give you the best price since they know your looking and waiting.

Good luck!

MichelleKirkpatrick

Good tip on the clearing cookies jenanns!

samiamagirl

Keep an eye out for Southwest deals, they sometimes offer super cheap ticket deals which are always great. Travel websites like Expedia will try and swing you the best deals by combining your round trip flights with different airlines.

Also, if you need to do hotels check out Groupon, Living Social, etc. They often have good deals for places in San Diego. Sometimes if you go directly to the hotel's website they'll list their own deals.

RustyGirl3

Lots of great info!  Thanks ladies!

Great tip about searching.  I have heard that before but forgot until now!

He's retiring on November 6th...so no worries with Thanksgiving thank goodness!  Hopefully prices wont be too bad since most people will be traveling later that month!

beebe918

I am flying into SD the day after Christmas.  

When booking the tickets I searched everyday for a couple weeks in advance and took note of price changes.  

If you use google chrome you can just start an incognito browsing session instead of clearing cookies.  

Kayak.com allows you to book one way tickets through different carriers and that sometimes saves some money.  

For SD I found Virgin America to be the cheapest but they charge for bags, we are only using carry-on so it isn't an issue for us.  We booked the first week of October so about 3 months in advance and I've been checking the prices since then and they've continually gone up.  We bought tickets on a Wednesday and got them for $444 round trip IAD to San Diego (they had been that price since at least Monday, it just took us until Wed to bite the bullet).  They went up that Friday (2 days later) and have been going up since then.  

sthrncharmer

Another thing to think about is when you are looking at the cheapest ticket, look at the airline fees they charge. Although you may be getting a cheaper ticket you may be paying more through fees.
For instance in my area spirit always has the cheapest rates but they charge you to carry on a bag, check a bag and other fees etc. By the end of it all you might be paying more for the cheaper ticket. Research, research, research! It takes me a couple of months to find the best rate.