Doing something at the last minute is almost always a guarantee that it's going to be expensive — particularly when it comes to travel. Conventional wisdom says that if you want to save money, flights and lodging need to be booked months in advance. Booking a trip with weeks (or days) to spare? That’s a good way to kiss your money goodbye.
But this isn’t always the case. In fact, booking last-minute travel can sometimes save you a lot of money — you just need to know the right ways to do it. Here are some foolproof methods to save money on a last-minute vacation.
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Be flexible with your destination
Got the travel bug, but don’t really care where you end up? If so, you can let an algorithm decide where you should go, based on how much you'd like to spend. Flight aggregator Momondo has an "anywhere" option that shows you flights to different locations based on your budget and travel dates.
Be flexible with your dates
Starting a vacation in the middle of the week could be the best way to get a good deal on a flight. According to Forbes, traveling in the middle of the week is the best way to save money.
This means that flying in somewhere on a Friday night and leaving on a Sunday is usually more expensive than, say, flying in on a Tuesday and leaving the following Wednesday.
Fly during off hours
When you're booking a flight, keep a wide berth on your arrival and departure times. According to NerdWallet, "undesirable" flight times (which usually mean red eyes or super early morning flights) are often cheaper than their prime-time counterparts.
Sure, this might make for a rough first day of the trip, but if saving money is your goal, it's worth powering through the extra jet lag.
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