I'm just wondering what's your experience to book a hotel.
Most of the time I'll book my flights tickets when there are special prices.
One year or two before I'll check on a regular base what these prices are.
Of course they can go up and down but most off the time you see a returning special price.

Only with booking a Hotel it seems to be impossible when it's the right time to book.
Of course not in a holiday season but there are a lot of discounts ,codes which suddenly appeared.

For instance do you make a booking 1 year before or a couple of months or even a very last minute.
I'll know it also depends how many free rooms the hotel have and many othe parameters.
Still I'm looking forward to your strategy.

I make all mine ahead of time, fully refundable, but then check a couple times before the actual stay. I just saved a few hundred bucks in New Orleans when the same room came up cheaper. It took just a few seconds to make the second reservation and cancel the first.

If I'm not booking with points, I generally book a refundable hotel room at a price I'm comfortable with paying immediately after I book my flight. That way, I know that no matter what, I have a reservation and I don't have to worry about prices going up any further than that and me not having a place to stay that fits my budget/tastes/preferred location.

Then, I will periodically check to see if I can find a better deal than the hotel I booked. If I see a better deal, I'll book that and cancel the refundable room that I originally booked. If I don't find a better price at a comparable hotel, I will just keep the hotel room I originally booked. That usually works out pretty well for me. Generally, I've found that prices don't seem to go down much - I usually end up sticking with my original hotel reservation.

This is how I go about booking as well.

I'll echo what's already been said, I usually book refundable then watch for lower rates or sales before my trip. Or I'll book with points and cancel when something good for cash comes up. My only general exception to this is during Hiltons big sales like the frequent 50% off in Asia or 33% off in Middle East, Africa, Europe which are non-refundable but I also know a better deal isn't coming around. That applies to any of your preferred chains, just happens to be Hilton is mine with Marriott a distant second. I'll go SPG, Accor and Carlson after those, rarely ever even check others.

Thank you very much for your answers.
When you have booked a refundable room directly at the hotel site do you also use afterwards the hotel compare sites such as kayak or tripadvisor ?

The problem which I see now is that amoma , getaroom,otel do have prices which are too good to be truth.
When a market price will be $145 for instance they offer the room for $55.

So I do use priceline and hotwire a lot and I save a lot off $ but I use them the most for 5* Hotels.

Are the big sales off Hilton always at December which I do use once or are there other fixed sales periods ?

Echo what others said...book the best refundable rate you can find the moment you think you're going to take the trip. (Or, the moment you've bought the nonrefundable airfare.)

For me, Priceline is either for one of two cases:

- 5* hotels in their nomenclature (I realize these are often really more like 4* hotels), especially when I am likely to get a Fairmont, OMNI, or other niche brand that doesn't penalize a lack of elite status or penalize a Priceline user for, well, using Priceline. Often booked the morning of the stay, or now (with many "regular" rates having a 1-day cancel rule), 24 hours prior.

- Rural 2.5* hotels where elite status is irrelevant. Cases where my choice is to pay $90 for an HIX or $40 for the same HIX and not earn points. I will often book these *after* I drive around the hotel and confirm that it's a clean-looking place.

Yeah, depends on the market, but happens sometimes and unfortunately the price differences are real. In these cases I'll sometimes forgo the points and book with these other sites found from Wego.com, Hotelscombined.com, Kayak.com, etc. So many chains won't honor rates that issue a voucher, which those you mentioned all do. I've gone back and argued numerous times, why would they rather pay a consolidator or third party site to sell their rooms than price match and sell directly for no commission, but except for one particular chain, most won't budge. I will always try a BRG if possible though before resorting to other sites, not as simple with non-refundable rates though with most chains.

Hilton sales come and go depending on the region. I want to say the Middle East, Africa, Europe sales I use most frequently come quarterly or so. Asia sales I've noticed nearly as often. Domestic USA, I have absolutely no idea but so many properties in the US are allowed to opt out of Hilton promos it's almost pointless anyway.

I hate Priceline with a passion but have used them for these same reasons too. I really hate giving up my status benefits and points if I don't have to, so I try my best to find a BRG that they will match though before giving up on booking with the chain.