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Jun 3, 2008 7:00 am US/Central
Stretching The Dollar On Family Vacations
(CBS)
These days every dollar counts and when some families try to make ends meet, vacations can be one of the first things to go. Will your family have to skip it this year?
Before you decide, here are some travel tips that could help keep your vacation plans on track.
Even with gas prices nearing $4 gallon, it's still cheaper to travel by car.
A family of four can usually travel by car for what it takes to fly one person by plane. That's according to the Car Care Council, which compares that family of four traveling 1,000 miles round trip by car -- including tire wear and maintenance – will cost $343 as opposed to traveling by air, which comes out to about $1,324 and climbing.
Coupon Mom Stephanie Nelson says there are lots of ways to cut down vacation spending.
She likes to do her planning on hotwire.com. Just being flexible on flying dates can save you money as much as 25 to 30 percent.
"If the fare is still too high, I like to go to sites like Travelocity or Expedia and sign up for their fare watchers so you can say I want to go to this city but I'm not willing to pay more than 'x' amount and if the price drops to that amount they will send you an email."
For families that still plan to fly, what about car rentals and hotels?
Again, flexiblity can pay off.
Go to sites like Hotwire.com, look at the destination city, select the star level -- like a four star or three star --- then select the part of the city you want to be in. The clincher here is you can't select the exact hotel, buy by doing that you can save a lot of money.
Nelson said she found a four star hotel for $79 instead of $188 a night – a savings of 58 percent.
Nelson said for those in the mood to gamble, Priceline can be fun and profitable.
"You kind of look at what the going rate is," she advised. "My rule of thumb is you divide it in half. I take 50 percent off and make that my bid and you can get really good deals if you are ready to roll the dice."
There is a down side to priceline and hotwire. Taking advantage of a deal on one of these websites and you're stuck with it. They're non-refundable.
For more flexibility, Nelson suggests purchasing a coupon book from entertainment.com for your destination city. Currently, some are on sale for $9.99, but are usually are $35-45.
Even for a weekend trip, the book offers a lot of restaurant coupons, buy-one, get-one free specials, and a lot of coupons for the museums and other attractions for those cities.
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