mejallen

I will be traveling to DC and staying from Oct. 20-23 (Wed - Sat) and would love some advice. I'm looking at either Georgetown or the Downtown (Capitol, Dupont, area) hotel. They seem expensive so I thougth about bidding on Priceline or Hotwire but have never used them.

My choice of Georgetown or Dowtown is because I wanted to see things and shops other than the Mall and have things to do around the hotel.

Can anyone tell me about these areas and if bidding or name your own price it the best option.

Please share your thoughts and advice.

As of 2:00 PM 09/27/10 I tried bidding through the Name Your Own Price option and bid several times finally up to $150 a night for a 3.5 - 4 star property and have been rejected. I can get a 3 star property from the hotel's website for $150 so I don't understand why the bidding isn't going well if it is trully discounted. I have seen on the forum that other bidders have been accepted for $95 - $125.

Any advice?

Thanks,

slawecki

the hotels offered at 4* level are just fine. they can sometimes be real cheap.

gtownguy

Check out Bidding for Travel (www.biddingfortravel.com). It's a website where people list their winning Priceline bids. It can give you an idea of what to bid and what hotels are possible to win.

Georgetown is a great area with lots of good restaurants and shopping. On the down side, it's not on any Metro line though it does have good bus service. Dupont is very central and has good restaurant choices and Metro access.

Not sure if either would be any cheaper, but the close in areas of Arlington (Pentagon City or Rosslyn) and/or Alexandria (Old Town) would be good choices as well. All of these are a short Metro ride into the city.

mejallen

Thanks for the info, i'll check it out.

I tried and bidding isn't working. I updated my original email with details.

Any advice?

gtownguy

Sometimes it will help if you expand your bidding area.

paytonc

Hotels may not have made inventory available on Priceline yet, since they expect that they'll sell more rooms in the coming weeks. DC hotels during the week can expect to sell lots of rooms to last-minute business travelers; the ~$100 rates that you've seen might have been weekends, or slow periods (i.e., when Congress is out of session).

The rates listed on Hotwire are usually a bit higher than what you can expect winning Priceline bids to be; for those dates, Hotwire hotels will cost $190-$260 a night.