October 31, 2024 • 24 mins
Unlock the secrets to affordable travel as I share a wealth of money-saving tips for your next getaway. Discover how a simple browser extension like can transform your booking experience by scouting for the best coupon codes, and learn about exclusive resources for active, retired military and veterans. These tools could be your ticket to a more budget-friendly vacation, whether you're planning a solo escape or a group adventure.
Craving a bargain on flights and accommodations? I will tell you about sites where you can score the best deals on airfare. And, when it comes to booking hotels I will give you sites and strategies that even the thriftiest of travelers can explore new destinations without breaking the bank.
Intrigued by the possibility of saving even more? I will give you some more tips on how to save money when it comes to traveling.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Traveling
Fool.
I'm your host, bob Bales, andtoday we are going to talk about
how to save you some seriouscash on your next travels.
I've already given you a coupleof tips in the last two or
three episodes, and today we'regoing to give you some more on
how to save some serious moneywhen it comes to traveling, so
(00:22):
stay tuned.
Hello, this is Bob Bales of theTraveling Fool, and I want to
(00:43):
welcome you to this week'spodcast, where we're talking
about saving money for travel.
Travel is expensive.
Every time you want to take abreak, you got a big four-day
weekend coming up.
You're thinking, man, I wouldlove to go spend some time at
the beach, but to do that, I gotto catch a flight, then I got
to get a hotel, and by the timeI do that, I might as well just
(01:05):
sell a kidney, because it isexpensive.
However, there's a lot of waysthat you can save money on
travel, and everybody has asuggestion, but I'm going to
tell you about some websitesthat can save you some serious
money when it comes to travel.
Now, I'm not getting paid forany of these recommendations.
These are all sites that I useor have used in the past, and
(01:29):
they can save you some seriousmoney when it comes to travel.
So let's get into it Now.
This first one I'm going togive you could actually save you
money anytime you're shoppingonline or buying anything, but
it also works on travel.
It's a browser extension forChrome called Karma K-A-R-M-A.
(01:53):
Now Karma is absolutely free.
You download it.
It sits in the background, butwhen you go to sites like
TripAdvisor, expedia orHotelscom, priceline, tripcom
and a whole bunch more, theysearch in the background for the
very best coupon codes to applyat checkout, so you can save
(02:16):
anywhere from $40, $50, $60 anight on a hotel room, because
it's searching for a coupon codethat you would have not known
otherwise.
Now it doesn't just stop attravel, it also does prices on,
like I said, amazon and a wholebunch of other sellers.
Karma saved well over $300million for their consumers.
(02:37):
And it's easy.
It doesn't cost you a dime.
Just pop it up in your browserand it sits there and looks at
the background.
It's well worth checking out,trust me.
Now, these next two I'm going togive you.
Not everybody's going toqualify for them, but I would be
willing to bet a whole lot ofpeople will.
Now I'm retired military, sothis is how I found out about
(03:01):
these years ago.
The first one is called ArmedForces Travel.
Now it's supported by Pricelineand it is a US Department of
Defense official online leisuretravel site for active military
guard, reserve Coast Guard,retired military, reserve Coast
(03:21):
Guard, retired Military andeverybody that's eligible for
their MWR program, which isMorale, welfare and Recreation.
So if you qualify under thosecriteria, it will save you a
bunch of money.
It looks at hotels, flights,car rentals, cruises and even
(03:46):
event tickets.
I did a little quick search onit and found results ranging
from Lakers season tickets to aKing Tut exhibition at the Luxor
Hotel in Las Vegas.
All you got to do is go totheir website, which is
AmericanForcesTravelcom.
Now, at the end of the podcast,I'm going to list all of these
websites in the show notes,which will be on the blog, and
you can check them out so youdon't have to worry about taking
(04:06):
notes Now.
The next one is called ArmedForces Vacation Club.
This one is really cool.
Military, including Gold Starfamilies and civilian employees
of the Department of Defense andthe immediate families of all
(04:29):
those above.
That's a whole lot of peoplethat qualify for this one.
Now you gain instant access totheir R&R resort rentals
worldwide, and they start off atjust $419 a week.
Now, that's what the websitetells you, but it gets even
better.
The regular R&R resorts giveyou locations around the world,
(04:52):
places like the Sands Ocean Clubin Myrtle Beach or Banff Rocky
Mountain Resort in Canada.
Plus, there's other places justall over the world.
You can search by R&R resorts,high-demand resorts, short-term
resorts and a bunch of others.
Now you will occasionally findresorts less than $419 a week,
(05:16):
and some are more in the reallyhigh-demand areas.
I went on there just before Itaped this and I did a search
and found Calypso Cave Resort inKissimmee, florida, listed at
$379 a week.
Now, that's not bad if you'regoing to go to Disney World.
(05:37):
Or how about $579 a week forthe Interlux Club Royale in
Thailand or the Le Club?
No, no, I'm going to screw thisup.
Mugins M-O-U-G-I-N-S big fancyclub for $500 a week just
outside Cannes, france, rightnext door to Monaco.
And the prices now?
(05:58):
Now here's the kicker theprices are not per person, but
for the entire room, so when youdo the search, it will tell you
how many people can stay in theroom.
For example, the room in France.
The one for what was it?
$500 a week is one bedroom witha partial kitchen and it sleeps
(06:20):
four.
So I'm assuming it's got like apull-out couch or something.
So four people can stay inCannes, France, for $500 a week
at this resort.
Now you can also spend $669 aweek and get a two-bedroom at
the same location with a fullkitchen that sleeps six people.
I mean, good Lord, that's $100a person a week.
(06:42):
You can't even get a hotel roomin Houston for that price.
Now just look at some of theinformation section on each
property Down at the bottom.
It'll tell you more informationand when you do that, it'll
give you all the criteria forthe property, because some of
these are all-inclusives, somemay require deposits.
The all-inclusives actuallyrequire an extra fee per day,
(07:05):
may require deposits.
The all-inclusive is actuallyrequired extra fee per day.
And I've looked at some of themand they're like anywhere from
$10 or $20 a person per day andeach one is different.
Some of them have absolutely norestrictions.
Everything's up at the top butdown at the bottom and the more
information will tell you aboutit.
Now, this company has been inbusiness for over 20 years and
I've known a lot of people thathave used him and been extremely
(07:26):
satisfied.
It's a great website.
You can find properties allover the world and it's well
worth checking out.
That one is the Armed ForcesVacation Club.
Now for flights Now.
I previously gave you some tipson finding cheap airfares and
how to do it using Kayak andGoogle Flights, but there's some
(07:47):
other sites that can also saveyou money.
The first one is Skyscanner.
It's been around for a longtime.
I've used it in the past.
With Skyscanner you can do asearch by putting in your
departure airport, thedestination section.
You just put everywhere andthen put your departure month
and your return month and hitsearch and you will find all
(08:10):
kinds of flights at some reallygood deals.
It's worth checking out.
If you say you know I'd love togo on vacation somewhere, don't
really want to know where I wantto go, do a search for two or
three months out and just hit itand you'll say'll see all these
flights come down.
You're like, oh my Lord, youmean I can go to London for $300
(08:30):
round trip, because it'll findthem for you.
The other site is MomondoM-O-M-O-N-D-O.
This one you go to the exploresection in the left-hand column
you put in your departureairport.
You leave the destination toanywhere and the dates to any
(08:51):
time, and it'll do the samething.
I found flights like Houston toTokyo for under $600 round trip
and a lot of other really greatdeals.
So, just like searching kayak orGoogle flights, you need to
check on them daily If you'relooking for deals.
It takes two or three minuteseach one.
I just leave an open tab on mybrowser and once a day I go in
(09:15):
there and hit it and go oh, lookat this, there's a cool flight.
Living there Doesn't take verylong at all, just check them.
If you don't want to check themdaily, check two or three times
a week Takes a couple minutesand you can find all kinds of
deals.
I've been thinking about takinga trip to South Korea and,
depending on when I check, I'veseen prices ranging anywhere
from $1,400 round trip down to$790 round trip.
(09:39):
I haven't narrowed down thetime frame I'm looking to go,
but I just keep monitoring it tosee when I can go and things
like this.
It's a great tool.
So Google Flights, kayak,momondo and Skyscanner those are
the sites you want and ifyou're flexible on your travel
dates or if you're adventurousand you're just looking for a
(10:01):
great deal on flights.
There's a couple of other sitesyou can sign up for that offer
both free and paid plans.
Now I'm signed up for both ofthese.
The first one is Matt's Flights, A fellow named Matt M-A-T-T
Matt's Flights.
You sign up for his emailalerts with Matt's Flights and
you will get deals on flightsfrom your home airport.
(10:25):
It'll ask you what airport youwant to put in there.
You might get three or fouremails a month.
Sometimes you get a few more,and what they do is they'll send
you an email anytime they finda really good deal.
That's leaving out of theairports that you designated
Deals like Austin to Denver for$48 round trip.
Now they also offer a two-tierpaid plan.
(10:46):
For $97 a year, you getdomestic and international
flight deals from your homeairport.
Mistake deals, which are themistake airfares that sometimes
the airline will publish a dealand they'll screw up on the
pricing.
There's also economy classdeals and up to five times as
many deals as the freemembership will get you, and you
(11:09):
get that for $97 a year.
Now, for $149 a year, you getall of that.
Plus, you receive the bestairfare guaranteed for your
specific travel plans.
All you have to do is emailthem your trip details and they
do all the work, so you don'teven have to search for the
flights.
You'll also receive businessand first class flight deals and
(11:32):
their custom itinerary services.
Now they have some greatbusiness class flights.
You'll find business classflights in a lot of cases are
cheaper than some people arebooking for economy, which you
won't do unless you pay them the$149 a year.
Now you book the flightsdirectly with the airlines, not
through Matt's Flights.
(11:53):
They're just searching for thedeals and they say that they
will save you an average of $500per flight.
Now I'm assuming that they meaninternational flights, since
you can get domestic flights fora whole lot less than $500.
I found some fantastic dealsand all you have to do is go to
Matt's Flights, subscribe totheir newsletter.
Now there's another one thatworks the same way, sort of.
(12:16):
It's called Secret Flying.
Secret Flying is another emaildeal alert program where you
select the airport you want tofly out from and they show you
deals, including the airairfares, and they give you a
link that goes directly toPriceline and Skyscanner.
They partner with these twocompanies, so that's how they
(12:37):
get paid and you're booking withPriceline or Skyscanner Secret
flying lists, deals flying outof your selected airport and
some are short notice.
So it's not the best if you havea particular travel date or
destination in mind.
But if you can book a flightleaving in the next month to a
dream destination at half thenormal advertised price, it
(12:57):
might be worth it.
Destination at half the normaladvertised price, it might be
worth it.
For example, boston to Dallasfor $127 round trip with JetBlue
, and it had dates going out two, three and four months.
Now both sites are really goodto sign up for and you get deals
directly into your inbox.
Those are the best ways thatyou can save some money on
(13:18):
airfares.
Now I'm going to give you acouple of sites to save money on
hotels.
One works everywhere in theworld.
It's a travel site that not alot of people have heard of, but
it's been around for a longtime.
It's called Agoda.
The deal with Agoda is it worksbest in Asia.
You find the very best dealsfor rooms in Asia with Agoda,
(13:41):
but they also have deals thatare comparable to bookingcom and
everybody else if you'relooking in the US or in Europe.
But what?
I was traveling a lot to Asia.
That was my go-to site.
It has listings all over theworld, like I said, and
sometimes you can find a betterprice in the US if you go to one
(14:01):
of the other websites.
But for prices in Asia, agodadoes the deal, man, for example,
the City Garden Hotel in Manila, philippines, which I
personally stayed at.
You go to Bookingcom and theylist it for $140 a night, but
Agoda the price is $48.
Now, not all their hotels havesuch a huge difference in price,
(14:23):
but you can almost always findthe best price on anything in
Asia by going through Agoda.
Another site that worksworldwide is Hopper H-O-P-P-E-R
Hopper.
Hopper is actually an onlinetravel agency and they offer an
app that you download and use onyour phone.
Now the way Hopper works isthey've collected an archive of
(14:48):
millions of flight, hotel andcar rental prices.
Then they analyze the data toproduce predictions with a 95%
accuracy.
To produce predictions with a95% accuracy and they notify you
of when they predict the pricewill be at its lowest point.
So you can book it quicklyright from your phone, helping
you find the best possible deal.
(15:10):
They encourage you to use theapp.
The website works, but itdoesn't work for all of the
things.
I think it only works forhotels, but for flights, car
rental prices and everythingelse, you've got to use the app.
Now they've been in businesssince 2007 and Hopper has done
this algorithm thing.
They're like the Google of thetravel industry and they have
(15:34):
got this down to a science andthey will find you some
excellent deals.
So go to Hopper, download it.
The app's free to use, doesn'tcost you anything, and if you
book it, you just book itthrough them, so that's how they
get paid.
Now, on a previous podcast, Igave you an app that I use for
road trips, and I'm going totell you about it again.
It's called Gas Buddy.
I use it all the time wheneverI go on a road trip.
(15:56):
All you got to do is downloadthe app and it does a search of
the gas prices near you, andthey have a couple of plans also
.
They have the free one, whichis what I use, but you could
also get a free Gas Buddy card,and what that does is, if you
use that card, it debits itdirectly from your bank account
and it saves you a little bitmore money than just using the
(16:19):
free app, and they also have acredit card, which you could
earn even more savings.
Like I said, I just use the freeapp, but once you open it, all
you got to do is hit find gas,and it uses GPS to figure out
where you're at and searches allthe gas stations around you.
You can hit I want to look forregular premium or diesel, and
then it gives you the prices ofthe gas at multiple gas stations
(16:42):
that are near you within likefive or ten mile radius, and you
can review those results oneither a list showing you from
the cheapest all the way down tothe most expensive, or you can
open up the map and see wherethey're at with the prices, or
you can open up the map and seewhere they're at with the prices
.
Now, the thing about this isthe prices are reported by the
(17:04):
users.
So while you're getting guests,you can input the price that
you paid and it updates the app.
So when you get the results,it'll tell you the station, the
price, the user that reportedthe price, his screen name and
when it was reported and it'susually been reported either
that day or one day previously.
I did a quick search next to meand prices differed anywhere
(17:26):
from 13 cents a gallon andthat's within a five mile radius
.
So if you're going on a roadtrip, you can say, okay, I can
pay $2.87 a gallon for this offthe highway, but wait a minute,
if I take this little side road,go down three blocks, I can
save 20 cents a gallon.
Well, that adds up if you're ona long road trip.
(17:48):
So that's the best way to savemoney on gas when you're
traveling.
So here's just a generalizedtip and this will save you money
.
Generalized tip and this willsave you money.
Trust me, if you're looking tobook a hotel in another country,
try using a VPN, a virtualprivate network.
All it does is it masks whereyou're logging into.
(18:08):
It shows you logging intosomewhere else.
I've got one installed.
They're great for security.
I use them all the time, justso I have it.
I mean, I use one at home, butI especially use one when I'm
traveling.
But I can go into my VPN andlog in from anywhere in the
world.
If somebody were searching andsays where's this guy logging in
from, it could say Moscow,london or Dallas, texas.
(18:29):
But use a VPN and log into thecountry that you're looking at
hotels for.
So if you're going to Germany,log into Germany on your VPN and
then search for rooms on thewebsites that you go to search
for.
It doesn't always work, butI've found drastically different
(18:49):
prices by doing this.
You do a search from whereyou're living in Philadelphia,
because you're fixing to go toFrankfurt on vacation, and
you're seeing hotel rooms for$140, $150 a night on this
website.
Well then, you open the webbrowser in incognito mode, which
is easy to do.
(19:10):
You just go up on theright-hand corner and hit search
incognito, turn on your VPN anddo the same search with the
same website out of Frankfurt,germany, and you'll see prices
$20 and $30 cheaper than theprice you just saw in America.
Why, I don't know.
I guess they're doing thatforeigner's tax.
I have no idea, but it doesn'talways work.
(19:33):
But it does a lot.
And if you book a room using adifferent currency than US
dollars, it also helps.
So up in the top it'll say whatcurrency are you looking at?
Well, I'm going to book it ineuros.
It'll give you a differentprice than if it would if you
were booking it in dollars fromPhiladelphia.
Now, if you're using yourcredit card, the credit card
(19:54):
company will convert it and insome cases they might charge you
a foreign transaction fee,which ranges around 3%, but more
and more these days, cards arehaving zero foreign transaction
fees, so sometimes you can get awhole lot cheaper rate and save
a good chunk of money on yourhotel just by searching, using a
VPN and booking it from thehost country currency.
(20:17):
I've done it numerous times andit saved me a bunch of money.
Now the other one can get realcomplicated, so we'll keep it
simple.
There's what they call, youknow, hacking points.
You sign up for a travelrewards program.
You get credit cards which giveyou multiples of the deals, and
you rack up your credit card toget multiples of travel points.
(20:41):
And people get hundreds ofthousands of airline miles and
things this way by jugglingthree or four credit cards, and
there's websites that deal withthis.
I personally don't have thepatience to do it, but I do have
travel rewards cards.
For me, the simplest way to doit is every time I buy something
, I use my credit card.
If I'm going grocery shopping,I use my credit card.
(21:02):
If I'm filling up my car, I usemy credit card.
Go out to eat use my creditcard.
I don't pay cash or debit cardsor checks for anything.
You could also pay your billswith it.
You can pay your rent with it.
You can do all kinds of things.
The key is don't spend any morethan you normally would if you
were writing a check or usingyour debit card, and pay off the
(21:26):
balance at the end of each andevery month.
So if you spend, we're justgoing to pick a number out of
the air.
If you spend $2,000 a month onbills, gas, groceries,
everything else all combined,and you're using your debit card
to do it, you're keeping trackso you don't overspend Well,
just have the wherewithal to sayI'm not going to spend more
(21:46):
than $2,000 and I'm not going togo crazy buying stuff just to
buy it.
I'm going to use my credit cardfor what I would normally use
my debit card for and rack upthe same $2,000, but pay it off
at the end of every month.
So you don't owe any interest.
Works out great and you wind upracking up a bunch of miles.
That's a simple way to do it.
(22:07):
But here's the thing if youdon't want to do all that, you
can still get good deals just bychecking out the sites that I
mentioned.
Now imagine going and tellingyour co-workers after a four-day
weekend that, hey, I just gotback from this great beach
resort and the flight, the hotel, everything cost me less than
$500.
And that was for four days.
I flew to another state and hada blast.
(22:30):
Now, if you go tothetravellerpoolcom, this
podcast is going to be therealong with all the others and
all these websites are going tobe posted in the show notes and,
like I said in the beginning,I'm not getting paid for any of
these recommendations.
The links on the site godirectly to that site, so I hope
you got something out of it.
(22:50):
Please hit the like orsubscribe button, check out a
few of the articles onthetravellingfoolcom and next
time I'm going to tell you aboutfour or five destinations that
you can go to this winter, noteven have to use a passport, and
enjoy a great, warm beachvacation.
So stay tuned until next timeand safe travels.
Thank you you.
Hello and welcome to another episode of the Traveling
Fool.
I'm your host, bob Bales, andtoday we are going to talk about
how to save you some seriouscash on your next travels.
I've already given you a coupleof tips in the last two or
three episodes, and today we'regoing to give you some more on
how to save some serious moneywhen it comes to traveling, so
(00:22):
stay tuned.
Hello, this is Bob Bales of theTraveling Fool, and I want to
(00:43):
welcome you to this week'spodcast, where we're talking
about saving money for travel.
Travel is expensive.
Every time you want to take abreak, you got a big four-day
weekend coming up.
You're thinking, man, I wouldlove to go spend some time at
the beach, but to do that, I gotto catch a flight, then I got
to get a hotel, and by the timeI do that, I might as well just
(01:05):
sell a kidney, because it isexpensive.
However, there's a lot of waysthat you can save money on
travel, and everybody has asuggestion, but I'm going to
tell you about some websitesthat can save you some serious
money when it comes to travel.
Now, I'm not getting paid forany of these recommendations.
These are all sites that I useor have used in the past, and
(01:29):
they can save you some seriousmoney when it comes to travel.
So let's get into it Now.
This first one I'm going togive you could actually save you
money anytime you're shoppingonline or buying anything, but
it also works on travel.
It's a browser extension forChrome called Karma K-A-R-M-A.
(01:53):
Now Karma is absolutely free.
You download it.
It sits in the background, butwhen you go to sites like
TripAdvisor, expedia orHotelscom, priceline, tripcom
and a whole bunch more, theysearch in the background for the
very best coupon codes to applyat checkout, so you can save
(02:16):
anywhere from $40, $50, $60 anight on a hotel room, because
it's searching for a coupon codethat you would have not known
otherwise.
Now it doesn't just stop attravel, it also does prices on,
like I said, amazon and a wholebunch of other sellers.
Karma saved well over $300million for their consumers.
(02:37):
And it's easy.
It doesn't cost you a dime.
Just pop it up in your browserand it sits there and looks at
the background.
It's well worth checking out,trust me.
Now, these next two I'm going togive you.
Not everybody's going toqualify for them, but I would be
willing to bet a whole lot ofpeople will.
Now I'm retired military, sothis is how I found out about
(03:01):
these years ago.
The first one is called ArmedForces Travel.
Now it's supported by Pricelineand it is a US Department of
Defense official online leisuretravel site for active military
guard, reserve Coast Guard,retired military, reserve Coast
(03:21):
Guard, retired Military andeverybody that's eligible for
their MWR program, which isMorale, welfare and Recreation.
So if you qualify under thosecriteria, it will save you a
bunch of money.
It looks at hotels, flights,car rentals, cruises and even
(03:46):
event tickets.
I did a little quick search onit and found results ranging
from Lakers season tickets to aKing Tut exhibition at the Luxor
Hotel in Las Vegas.
All you got to do is go totheir website, which is
AmericanForcesTravelcom.
Now, at the end of the podcast,I'm going to list all of these
websites in the show notes,which will be on the blog, and
you can check them out so youdon't have to worry about taking
(04:06):
notes Now.
The next one is called ArmedForces Vacation Club.
This one is really cool.
Military, including Gold Starfamilies and civilian employees
of the Department of Defense andthe immediate families of all
(04:29):
those above.
That's a whole lot of peoplethat qualify for this one.
Now you gain instant access totheir R&R resort rentals
worldwide, and they start off atjust $419 a week.
Now, that's what the websitetells you, but it gets even
better.
The regular R&R resorts giveyou locations around the world,
(04:52):
places like the Sands Ocean Clubin Myrtle Beach or Banff Rocky
Mountain Resort in Canada.
Plus, there's other places justall over the world.
You can search by R&R resorts,high-demand resorts, short-term
resorts and a bunch of others.
Now you will occasionally findresorts less than $419 a week,
(05:16):
and some are more in the reallyhigh-demand areas.
I went on there just before Itaped this and I did a search
and found Calypso Cave Resort inKissimmee, florida, listed at
$379 a week.
Now, that's not bad if you'regoing to go to Disney World.
(05:37):
Or how about $579 a week forthe Interlux Club Royale in
Thailand or the Le Club?
No, no, I'm going to screw thisup.
Mugins M-O-U-G-I-N-S big fancyclub for $500 a week just
outside Cannes, france, rightnext door to Monaco.
And the prices now?
(05:58):
Now here's the kicker theprices are not per person, but
for the entire room, so when youdo the search, it will tell you
how many people can stay in theroom.
For example, the room in France.
The one for what was it?
$500 a week is one bedroom witha partial kitchen and it sleeps
(06:20):
four.
So I'm assuming it's got like apull-out couch or something.
So four people can stay inCannes, France, for $500 a week
at this resort.
Now you can also spend $669 aweek and get a two-bedroom at
the same location with a fullkitchen that sleeps six people.
I mean, good Lord, that's $100a person a week.
(06:42):
You can't even get a hotel roomin Houston for that price.
Now just look at some of theinformation section on each
property Down at the bottom.
It'll tell you more informationand when you do that, it'll
give you all the criteria forthe property, because some of
these are all-inclusives, somemay require deposits.
The all-inclusives actuallyrequire an extra fee per day,
(07:05):
may require deposits.
The all-inclusive is actuallyrequired extra fee per day.
And I've looked at some of themand they're like anywhere from
$10 or $20 a person per day andeach one is different.
Some of them have absolutely norestrictions.
Everything's up at the top butdown at the bottom and the more
information will tell you aboutit.
Now, this company has been inbusiness for over 20 years and
I've known a lot of people thathave used him and been extremely
(07:26):
satisfied.
It's a great website.
You can find properties allover the world and it's well
worth checking out.
That one is the Armed ForcesVacation Club.
Now for flights Now.
I previously gave you some tipson finding cheap airfares and
how to do it using Kayak andGoogle Flights, but there's some
(07:47):
other sites that can also saveyou money.
The first one is Skyscanner.
It's been around for a longtime.
I've used it in the past.
With Skyscanner you can do asearch by putting in your
departure airport, thedestination section.
You just put everywhere andthen put your departure month
and your return month and hitsearch and you will find all
(08:10):
kinds of flights at some reallygood deals.
It's worth checking out.
If you say you know I'd love togo on vacation somewhere, don't
really want to know where I wantto go, do a search for two or
three months out and just hit itand you'll say'll see all these
flights come down.
You're like, oh my Lord, youmean I can go to London for $300
(08:30):
round trip, because it'll findthem for you.
The other site is MomondoM-O-M-O-N-D-O.
This one you go to the exploresection in the left-hand column
you put in your departureairport.
You leave the destination toanywhere and the dates to any
(08:51):
time, and it'll do the samething.
I found flights like Houston toTokyo for under $600 round trip
and a lot of other really greatdeals.
So, just like searching kayak orGoogle flights, you need to
check on them daily If you'relooking for deals.
It takes two or three minuteseach one.
I just leave an open tab on mybrowser and once a day I go in
(09:15):
there and hit it and go oh, lookat this, there's a cool flight.
Living there Doesn't take verylong at all, just check them.
If you don't want to check themdaily, check two or three times
a week Takes a couple minutesand you can find all kinds of
deals.
I've been thinking about takinga trip to South Korea and,
depending on when I check, I'veseen prices ranging anywhere
from $1,400 round trip down to$790 round trip.
(09:39):
I haven't narrowed down thetime frame I'm looking to go,
but I just keep monitoring it tosee when I can go and things
like this.
It's a great tool.
So Google Flights, kayak,momondo and Skyscanner those are
the sites you want and ifyou're flexible on your travel
dates or if you're adventurousand you're just looking for a
(10:01):
great deal on flights.
There's a couple of other sitesyou can sign up for that offer
both free and paid plans.
Now I'm signed up for both ofthese.
The first one is Matt's Flights, A fellow named Matt M-A-T-T
Matt's Flights.
You sign up for his emailalerts with Matt's Flights and
you will get deals on flightsfrom your home airport.
(10:25):
It'll ask you what airport youwant to put in there.
You might get three or fouremails a month.
Sometimes you get a few more,and what they do is they'll send
you an email anytime they finda really good deal.
That's leaving out of theairports that you designated
Deals like Austin to Denver for$48 round trip.
Now they also offer a two-tierpaid plan.
(10:46):
For $97 a year, you getdomestic and international
flight deals from your homeairport.
Mistake deals, which are themistake airfares that sometimes
the airline will publish a dealand they'll screw up on the
pricing.
There's also economy classdeals and up to five times as
many deals as the freemembership will get you, and you
(11:09):
get that for $97 a year.
Now, for $149 a year, you getall of that.
Plus, you receive the bestairfare guaranteed for your
specific travel plans.
All you have to do is emailthem your trip details and they
do all the work, so you don'teven have to search for the
flights.
You'll also receive businessand first class flight deals and
(11:32):
their custom itinerary services.
Now they have some greatbusiness class flights.
You'll find business classflights in a lot of cases are
cheaper than some people arebooking for economy, which you
won't do unless you pay them the$149 a year.
Now you book the flightsdirectly with the airlines, not
through Matt's Flights.
(11:53):
They're just searching for thedeals and they say that they
will save you an average of $500per flight.
Now I'm assuming that they meaninternational flights, since
you can get domestic flights fora whole lot less than $500.
I found some fantastic dealsand all you have to do is go to
Matt's Flights, subscribe totheir newsletter.
Now there's another one thatworks the same way, sort of.
(12:16):
It's called Secret Flying.
Secret Flying is another emaildeal alert program where you
select the airport you want tofly out from and they show you
deals, including the airairfares, and they give you a
link that goes directly toPriceline and Skyscanner.
They partner with these twocompanies, so that's how they
(12:37):
get paid and you're booking withPriceline or Skyscanner Secret
flying lists, deals flying outof your selected airport and
some are short notice.
So it's not the best if you havea particular travel date or
destination in mind.
But if you can book a flightleaving in the next month to a
dream destination at half thenormal advertised price, it
(12:57):
might be worth it.
Destination at half the normaladvertised price, it might be
worth it.
For example, boston to Dallasfor $127 round trip with JetBlue
, and it had dates going out two, three and four months.
Now both sites are really goodto sign up for and you get deals
directly into your inbox.
Those are the best ways thatyou can save some money on
(13:18):
airfares.
Now I'm going to give you acouple of sites to save money on
hotels.
One works everywhere in theworld.
It's a travel site that not alot of people have heard of, but
it's been around for a longtime.
It's called Agoda.
The deal with Agoda is it worksbest in Asia.
You find the very best dealsfor rooms in Asia with Agoda,
(13:41):
but they also have deals thatare comparable to bookingcom and
everybody else if you'relooking in the US or in Europe.
But what?
I was traveling a lot to Asia.
That was my go-to site.
It has listings all over theworld, like I said, and
sometimes you can find a betterprice in the US if you go to one
(14:01):
of the other websites.
But for prices in Asia, agodadoes the deal, man, for example,
the City Garden Hotel in Manila, philippines, which I
personally stayed at.
You go to Bookingcom and theylist it for $140 a night, but
Agoda the price is $48.
Now, not all their hotels havesuch a huge difference in price,
(14:23):
but you can almost always findthe best price on anything in
Asia by going through Agoda.
Another site that worksworldwide is Hopper H-O-P-P-E-R
Hopper.
Hopper is actually an onlinetravel agency and they offer an
app that you download and use onyour phone.
Now the way Hopper works isthey've collected an archive of
(14:48):
millions of flight, hotel andcar rental prices.
Then they analyze the data toproduce predictions with a 95%
accuracy.
To produce predictions with a95% accuracy and they notify you
of when they predict the pricewill be at its lowest point.
So you can book it quicklyright from your phone, helping
you find the best possible deal.
(15:10):
They encourage you to use theapp.
The website works, but itdoesn't work for all of the
things.
I think it only works forhotels, but for flights, car
rental prices and everythingelse, you've got to use the app.
Now they've been in businesssince 2007 and Hopper has done
this algorithm thing.
They're like the Google of thetravel industry and they have
(15:34):
got this down to a science andthey will find you some
excellent deals.
So go to Hopper, download it.
The app's free to use, doesn'tcost you anything, and if you
book it, you just book itthrough them, so that's how they
get paid.
Now, on a previous podcast, Igave you an app that I use for
road trips, and I'm going totell you about it again.
It's called Gas Buddy.
I use it all the time wheneverI go on a road trip.
(15:56):
All you got to do is downloadthe app and it does a search of
the gas prices near you, andthey have a couple of plans also
.
They have the free one, whichis what I use, but you could
also get a free Gas Buddy card,and what that does is, if you
use that card, it debits itdirectly from your bank account
and it saves you a little bitmore money than just using the
(16:19):
free app, and they also have acredit card, which you could
earn even more savings.
Like I said, I just use the freeapp, but once you open it, all
you got to do is hit find gas,and it uses GPS to figure out
where you're at and searches allthe gas stations around you.
You can hit I want to look forregular premium or diesel, and
then it gives you the prices ofthe gas at multiple gas stations
(16:42):
that are near you within likefive or ten mile radius, and you
can review those results oneither a list showing you from
the cheapest all the way down tothe most expensive, or you can
open up the map and see wherethey're at with the prices, or
you can open up the map and seewhere they're at with the prices
.
Now, the thing about this isthe prices are reported by the
(17:04):
users.
So while you're getting guests,you can input the price that
you paid and it updates the app.
So when you get the results,it'll tell you the station, the
price, the user that reportedthe price, his screen name and
when it was reported and it'susually been reported either
that day or one day previously.
I did a quick search next to meand prices differed anywhere
(17:26):
from 13 cents a gallon andthat's within a five mile radius
.
So if you're going on a roadtrip, you can say, okay, I can
pay $2.87 a gallon for this offthe highway, but wait a minute,
if I take this little side road,go down three blocks, I can
save 20 cents a gallon.
Well, that adds up if you're ona long road trip.
(17:48):
So that's the best way to savemoney on gas when you're
traveling.
So here's just a generalizedtip and this will save you money
.
Generalized tip and this willsave you money.
Trust me, if you're looking tobook a hotel in another country,
try using a VPN, a virtualprivate network.
All it does is it masks whereyou're logging into.
(18:08):
It shows you logging intosomewhere else.
I've got one installed.
They're great for security.
I use them all the time, justso I have it.
I mean, I use one at home, butI especially use one when I'm
traveling.
But I can go into my VPN andlog in from anywhere in the
world.
If somebody were searching andsays where's this guy logging in
from, it could say Moscow,london or Dallas, texas.
(18:29):
But use a VPN and log into thecountry that you're looking at
hotels for.
So if you're going to Germany,log into Germany on your VPN and
then search for rooms on thewebsites that you go to search
for.
It doesn't always work, butI've found drastically different
(18:49):
prices by doing this.
You do a search from whereyou're living in Philadelphia,
because you're fixing to go toFrankfurt on vacation, and
you're seeing hotel rooms for$140, $150 a night on this
website.
Well then, you open the webbrowser in incognito mode, which
is easy to do.
(19:10):
You just go up on theright-hand corner and hit search
incognito, turn on your VPN anddo the same search with the
same website out of Frankfurt,germany, and you'll see prices
$20 and $30 cheaper than theprice you just saw in America.
Why, I don't know.
I guess they're doing thatforeigner's tax.
I have no idea, but it doesn'talways work.
(19:33):
But it does a lot.
And if you book a room using adifferent currency than US
dollars, it also helps.
So up in the top it'll say whatcurrency are you looking at?
Well, I'm going to book it ineuros.
It'll give you a differentprice than if it would if you
were booking it in dollars fromPhiladelphia.
Now, if you're using yourcredit card, the credit card
(19:54):
company will convert it and insome cases they might charge you
a foreign transaction fee,which ranges around 3%, but more
and more these days, cards arehaving zero foreign transaction
fees, so sometimes you can get awhole lot cheaper rate and save
a good chunk of money on yourhotel just by searching, using a
VPN and booking it from thehost country currency.
(20:17):
I've done it numerous times andit saved me a bunch of money.
Now the other one can get realcomplicated, so we'll keep it
simple.
There's what they call, youknow, hacking points.
You sign up for a travelrewards program.
You get credit cards which giveyou multiples of the deals, and
you rack up your credit card toget multiples of travel points.
(20:41):
And people get hundreds ofthousands of airline miles and
things this way by jugglingthree or four credit cards, and
there's websites that deal withthis.
I personally don't have thepatience to do it, but I do have
travel rewards cards.
For me, the simplest way to doit is every time I buy something
, I use my credit card.
If I'm going grocery shopping,I use my credit card.
(21:02):
If I'm filling up my car, I usemy credit card.
Go out to eat use my creditcard.
I don't pay cash or debit cardsor checks for anything.
You could also pay your billswith it.
You can pay your rent with it.
You can do all kinds of things.
The key is don't spend any morethan you normally would if you
were writing a check or usingyour debit card, and pay off the
(21:26):
balance at the end of each andevery month.
So if you spend, we're justgoing to pick a number out of
the air.
If you spend $2,000 a month onbills, gas, groceries,
everything else all combined,and you're using your debit card
to do it, you're keeping trackso you don't overspend Well,
just have the wherewithal to sayI'm not going to spend more
(21:46):
than $2,000 and I'm not going togo crazy buying stuff just to
buy it.
I'm going to use my credit cardfor what I would normally use
my debit card for and rack upthe same $2,000, but pay it off
at the end of every month.
So you don't owe any interest.
Works out great and you wind upracking up a bunch of miles.
That's a simple way to do it.
(22:07):
But here's the thing if youdon't want to do all that, you
can still get good deals just bychecking out the sites that I
mentioned.
Now imagine going and tellingyour co-workers after a four-day
weekend that, hey, I just gotback from this great beach
resort and the flight, the hotel, everything cost me less than
$500.
And that was for four days.
I flew to another state and hada blast.
(22:30):
Now, if you go tothetravellerpoolcom, this
podcast is going to be therealong with all the others and
all these websites are going tobe posted in the show notes and,
like I said in the beginning,I'm not getting paid for any of
these recommendations.
The links on the site godirectly to that site, so I hope
you got something out of it.
(22:50):
Please hit the like orsubscribe button, check out a
few of the articles onthetravellingfoolcom and next
time I'm going to tell you aboutfour or five destinations that
you can go to this winter, noteven have to use a passport, and
enjoy a great, warm beachvacation.
So stay tuned until next timeand safe travels.
Thank you you.
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