You don’t have to spend a lot to have an amazing vacation. Using these tips you can save a lot of money on your next trip without making a lot of compromises. Of course, you don’t have to follow every suggestion here and instead you can pick and choose which ones you are comfortable with.
Even though we have comprised this list especially for vacations in Hawaii, many of these apply to vacation destinations anywhere in the world.
- Travel during the low season
- All vacation destinations have a high and low season. If you go to a ski resort, it might have a short high season – when there’s snow. But, then there is a long low season when it’s cheaper, but there might be nothing much to do. Hawaii is not like that. It has a short low season and even during the low season the weather is warm and there is plenty to do. It might rain a little bit and have some overcast days. But, it’s still warm and you can enjoy almost all the local attractions.
- For these reasons, traveling during the off season might be a great way to save money and the downside isn’t too bad. In fact, some might consider it better because there is lesser crowd to deal with then. These are generally the months of September and October on the Big Island. The prices during these months can be up to 60% of the peak season.
- The peak season by the way is between late November to early January. This is because of the holidays and people wanting to escape the cold in their home towns.
- Stay on the less popular side
- Usually the more popular sides of the Hawaiian islands are on the leeward side. The less popular side is the windward side, where it can rain quite a bit. So for the Big Island, Kona is the more desirable side and Hilo is not as much. Kona can easily be twice or more than the cost of staying at Hilo.
- The downside of staying on the less popular side might be that you are far from the airport, it could rain a lot, there wont be as many options to stay at or restaurants to go to. So yes, there are some downsides to this option, but the savings might be significant and worth it to some.
- Travel in a larger group
- If you can manage to coordinate and travel with friends or family, there can be several cost saving opportunities. As a group you can split the cost of car rental, accommodation and even on activities where they give group discounts. You could also potentially save by not having to spend on baby sitting services or sharing the burden of cooking even if its just breakfast.
- Many people are apprehensive about traveling in a group though. We travel with our family friends during the summer or spring break almost every year. And btw, we don’t do it with the intention of saving money. We do it because we all, especially kids, have a lot of fun. So, if you haven’t tried it before, you might want to consider it.
- Book a vacation rental house
- If you are traveling in a group, a vacation rental home, as opposed to a hotel, can save you a lot of money. For instance, our 4 bedroom beach house can easily accommodate two families with kids. If you split that cost, it will certainly become cheaper than staying at a hotel.
- Even if you are not traveling in a large group, there are several advantages to staying at a vacation rental. Since you are living in a home that has a kitchen, you can cook a few meals and save a lot on food.
- In our beach house we provide beach towels, sunscreen, beach chairs and other essentials so you don’t have to purchase or rent them. We also have a washing machine so you can save on laundry services.
- Even if you don’t plan to cook, you will almost certainly save a bunch in parking costs. Hotels can charge around $40 a day for parking and that adds up quickly!
- There can be a few downsides of staying at vacation rental though. For instance, you don’t get some conveniences and amenities like room service, daily cleaning, huge pools with slides etc.
The Big Island Beach House Oceanfront Rental
- Use the cheapest booking platform
- If you are looking for vacation rental homes, the most popular booking platforms are AirBnb and Vrbo. These are great sites to search for a large variety of properties, read reviews and they have well defined and standard cancellation policies etc. To be profitable, they have to charge their guests fees though.
- If you want save on those fees, you can do that by booking directly at the vacation rental’s website. Also, these websites may have more information about the house than these platforms do. Our site for example shows more details of our beach house like a virtual tour, things to do around and of course has a direct booking page.
- The problem with this approach generally is that very few of the vacation rentals have their own website and those that do have them, they can be hard to find.
- Book a vacation rental that’s newly listed
- If you use a vacation rental platform like Airbnb and Vrbo, they will show you houses that have lots of ratings and those that are newly listed. These newly listed houses have to compete with well established houses and to do that they have to lower their prices. This is great news for you though because you can book a great house for less.
- The caveat is that these are houses that may not have enough bookings to understand what it takes to provide that higher level of service. I said “may” because there is a trick to know if they do or not. If they are using a property management company, that will not be an issue. For instance we use Elite Pacific and they have the super host status because they have managed thousands of short term rentals. So, if you go with a property that has a management company like them, you know you will have a great experience.
- Book far in advance
- Almost always prices go up. This has been particularly true the last few years as more and more people want to travel and the prices has been going up due to inflation. So if you can book months in advance, it allows you to get today’s rates.
- People usually refrain from booking so much in advance because they are uncertain if their plans change. But, if you book using a platform that provides good cancellation policies, like airbnb provides aircover, or if you buy Travel Insurance along with your booking, you are protected.
- Look for last minute deals
- On the other side of the spectrum, you can book last minute. Most vacation rentals will drop their price days before an opening in their calendar. The downside with this of course is that you may not find a great place to stay because all the good places are booked. But if you are ok not going on the trip when you don’t find a deal, or are ok staying at any available place during the time you want to travel, this might be an option for you. This works better if you are traveling off season.
- Consider renting a car using locals
- If you want to save on a car rental, instead of reserving from a large national chain, search for local rental agencies. To compete they will most likely have to lower their price.
- The other less know option is Turo. You can think of Turo as Airbnb for cars. The locals rent out their vehicles on Turo to you directly. You will often find a larger variety of vehicles on this site and often for less. It’s a win-win for you and the local renting his/her car in my opinion. So, you should definitely check it out.
Hopefully this helps you save on your next vacation. Please leave a comment about any ideas you found useful here of if you have any other ideas that you would like to share.