海角大神

After a few weeks of discussing bill paying strategies in this series, we鈥檙e going to shift gears and look at vacations during much of the month of December.

Vacations? The kind of things that most people take in the聽summer? Why would we talk about them in December?

贵谤补苍办濒测,听right now is about the latest time you want to be planning your vacation for next summer if you want to maximize the bang for your buck.

Why would you want to plan vacations so far in advance?

For starters,聽the earlier you know where your destination is, the longer you have to shop around for bargains on travel.聽No matter what you鈥檙e purchasing, the longer you give yourself to find bargains on that purchase, the more likely you are to find a bargain.聽

Another advantage of deciding where and when you鈥檙e going to travel far in advance is that聽it鈥檚 much easier to get the exact days off that you want.聽At most jobs, it鈥檚 very difficult to get the days off that you want 鈥� particularly if you want several days off 鈥� if you wait until the last minute.

Even more important, it allows you to take advantage of truly low rates. For example,聽flights on Wednesdays are generally the least expensive flights.聽So, if you鈥檙e going on a weeklong trip, plan both of your flights on Wednesdays.

To do that, of course, you鈥檒l need a lot of advance notice at work in order to get off a Wednesday through Friday stretch followed by a Monday through Wednesday stretch.

Another important factor to note is that聽airline and hotel prices vary throughout a week as well as throughout a year.聽Generally, prices hit a low point several months away from the actual date of the trip, and it鈥檚 been established pretty clearly that Tuesday afternoons tend to be the cheapest time of the week to reserve a flight.

Knowing those facts 鈥� and having your trip planned out well in advance 鈥� enables you to save a聽lot聽on an airline ticket. I recently traveled to the Indianapolis area, a trip I knew I鈥檇 be taking about eight months in advance. I sat there and watched the ticket prices fluctuate over time, and I was also somewhat flexible on the days and the time of day that I flew out.

The end result of planning that far in advance is that my airline tickets were incredibly cheap. I flew round trip for roughly what my gasoline cost would have been to聽drive聽there and back 鈥� and it took me about six hours less time 鈥� and I didn鈥檛 have any wear and tear on my car.

Planning ahead 鈥撀�far聽ahead 鈥� for your travel saves you real cash.

This post is part of a yearlong series called 鈥�365 Ways to Live Cheap (Revisited),鈥� in which I鈥檓 revisiting the entries from my book 鈥�365 Ways to Live Cheap,鈥� which is available聽at Amazon聽and at bookstores everywhere.聽