Flight Hacks: Getting There for Half the Price

The biggest mistake people make when deciding if they can afford to travel, is just going to Expedia, looking up a price/date, and getting discouraged. Me too! If the tickets swallow up our whole budget, Teena isn’t going to be too happy sleeping in a tent outside of Paris without a car. There are other ways to get there and back affordably.

 

Let’s say you’re wanting to go to Rome. It’s your dream destination, and you only have one general date you can get away from work (or find somebody to watch the kids). Chances are, that flight price is not going to be a bargain. Let’s throw in a budget. 2 people, and you can’t go over $3500 total (you could certainly do it cheaper - or you cold spend MUCH more - but that’s a good starting budget). Let’s try this:

Ok. Rome is the destination, and you have to leave around May 9 - 19. I do a quick search on Google Flights. The best price I can find from XNA is $1,614 per person. That would only leave a couple hundred bucks for everything else. That won’t work.

Let’s fly from Kansas City instead of XNA - another Google Flights search - That’s only $1200 per person for flights. So now we have $600 to spend in our 9 days in Europe. Nope.

Dallas flights to Rome get you down to $1000 per person, but $1500 for the trip would be extremely tight. Teena wouldn’t be happy with the accommodations I’d be booking.

Now, lets get creative… (NOTE: You’ll need a laptop or PC for searching flights. Many of the features don’t work on phones/tablets) Using the map feature on Google Flights, I click on the map and look at all fares to Europe. Something pops up —— a $578 fare from Dallas to Dublin. Interesting. I also see that the Kansas City fare is $600 (that saves a couple hours of driving). We’re getting so much closer to Rome now - and haven’t even left our computer.

So, now we know we can get from Kansas City to Dublin for $600 round-trip. A quick search later, and I find out that the round-trip Dublin to Rome price is only $62 (and a 2.5 hour direct flight). Now, we can get to Rome and back for $700 per person, leaving us more than a couple thousand of our $3500 budget for our vacation! That’s very doable. Also, we can plan to spend a day or three in Dublin - an amazing bonus.

I have an idea. What is the price to NYC? I see that right now (as of March 9, 2018) I can book flights round-trip to New York City from XNA for $240! I suddenly see there’s a $400 fare, round-trip from New York to Rome! If I bump up my flight a day from XNA to New York - the fare is just $222 - I can hit that fare. So - I just figured out how to get from XNA to Rome in May for $622. I can plan a couple days in New York City on the front end or back end of the trip to give some room for error. That’s would leave about $2400 for fun in Italy.

That’s how our vacation planning typically starts; find the best rate to any one of 100 places we’d like to see, book the flights, and then start filling in the blanks. The adventure begins! Don’t let that initial ticket price keep you from seeing the world. With just a little creativity, and some help if needed, you can reach your destination with enough money left in your budget for a room with a view!