Crazy Airfare! :(

[klwdisney]

Hi! We're planning a trip to WDW in August with the Room Only sale. We are working around our Youth Football Schedule and are on a tight budget. Currently booked at CBR Mon 8/19- Sat 8/24 with 2 Day Hopper Plus Options Passes (This is not our first trip and will not be our last so we opted to stick with Park Must Do's only and lots of pool and water park action... but it will be our last trip for quite a while.)

We are flying from Mass so we have a few options as far as airports go, but I am floored by the flight prices!! Are the prices so high because we're still so far out? Is it the days of the week we're flying? I'm having a hard time deciding when to book. We booked this trip when the sale was released and I've been watching the prices ever since. Should I just take a deep breath and hold out a while longer?

 

[mojo1117]

Don't quote me on this but as you won't be staying over the weekend, your tickets may be priced higher. I looked at the flights/prices from BDL (Hartford) to MCO (Orlando) for your dates and it appears that Monday to Friday is more expensive than Monday to Sunday/Monday. The cheapest flights I saw are for Spirit, but bear in mind they have a very poor rating for being on-time as well as cancelled flights. Whatever you do, please bear in mind that you are now less than five (5) months away from your trip and the cheapest tickets/flights can be sold out, especially during the Summer school vacation time. Good luck!

 

[siren0119]

We fly out of Boston, and TBH we bought our fares back in February. Your length of stay as well as the days you are flying are very likely what is driving up the prices of your flights. You may have better luck if you book one-way flights instead of a round trip, this will give you the flexibility to use different airlines for each leg of your trip (That's what we ended up doing - Delta for BOS-MCO and SW for MCO-BOS). Use an aggregate like Kayak or Google flights to track the prices of your flights, they will send you notifications when the prices go down (and kayak will let you know if the prices are unlikely to get any better).

You may also want to consider flying out of Hartford, I've noticed that the rates from there to Orlando can be a bit lower than Logan, and almost always lower than Providence.

 

[Queen of the WDW Scene]

Flight prices depend a lot of the specific airport and airline plus supply and demand.
Honestly I don't think its because its "too early". I personally don't find prices to drop at a certain time.
The general rule is book when you are comfortable with the prices.
At this point it probably wouldn't hurt to wait a tad longer just to see but at some point you're gonna have to bite the bullet.
I booked my flight with SWA mid December for a late July trip and I watch the flight prices daily just because I'm curious.
Prices have gone up up up and then down a bit.
I don't see the prices coming back down to the price I paid and certainly not lower than the price I paid.

ETA: I should add that my prices for RT non stop flights from BUF to MCO and back were $217 per person so I was happy with my price hence I booked it.

 

[Rach3975]

I've been hearing a lot of complaints about airline prices over the last few months, both here and IRL. My sister's family watched prices until their February trip arrived; finally the week before they decided to drive from NYC to WDW because the prices never came down much. (And presumably by that point they'd gone up from what she first saw, though I don't know that for sure.)

 

[NikitaZee]

We just booked JetBlue from Boston Logan Thanksgiving week, over the weekend when they released their new schedule. First price $360 r/t which I was happy with. I got timed out before I booked it - minutes later when I re-did my search it had gone up to $395. I took it. Out of curiosity I’ve been checking the flights and they’ve gone up to over $1000 (Return leg on Sat after Thanksgiving alone was $799!).

 

[jec6613]

We just booked JetBlue from Boston Logan Thanksgiving week, over the weekend when they released their new schedule. First price $360 r/t which I was happy with. I got timed out before I booked it - minutes later when I re-did my search it had gone up to $395. I took it. Out of curiosity I’ve been checking the flights and they’ve gone up to over $1000 (Return leg on Sat after Thanksgiving alone was $799!).

Airlines use pricing buckets - there will be 5 seats at $360, then another 10 at $395, but then it might jump up to over $1k even 5 or 10 seats later.

Here's a decent video that explains it, it's about 12 minutes long:

 

[kitkat4622]

I am going 10/1 to 10/10 out of Boston on Jetblue, I booked on 2/3 the day they were released, $657 for 2 non stop round trip tickets, all fees including one bag...those same tickets are now 1053.00 it's crazy

 

[Darcy03231]

Have you considered flying into a different airport. When prices have been high we've flown into Tampa and rented a car at a substantial savings.

 

[Donna M]

I was able to get JetBlue tickets cheaper 3 months out for our April 3-10 trip this year out of Boston. They went down when I got them and have gone back up since. They stayed at the lower price for a couple weeks. But this is a Wed to Wed trip.

 

[AngiTN]

I've been watching flights and was actually shocked at how low they dropped today. I jumped on them, for late August.
At least low for what I've been watching.
I got round trip from a small regional airport, Tuesday to Saturday for $250/per. They've been running nearly 3 times that. This was on Delta. American is still high.
So anyway, check. Maybe they've dropped elsewhere?

 

[AngiTN]

You may benefit from signing up for one of the watching sights like Hopper or even Google Flights. It tells you when it thinks prices are good. I've heard good things about their track records

 

[jec6613]

Some other ideas: Have you thought about taking Amtrak down to NYP and flying out of LGA, JFK, or EWR? (You can search all three at once by searching airport code NYC).

You could also head out of BDL, PVD, or even HVN instead. HVN is a bit of a hike but the parking is cheap and it's a nice tiny airport that connects into PHL via CAB subsidy.

 

[ClapYourHands]

So, not your exact dates, but Frontier will be flying BDL to MCO starting this spring. They don't fly every day, but if you were willing to fly down on 8/19 and return on 8/25 (so, extend your trip one day in each direction to fly Sunday-Sunday), you can easily keep it under $200 round trip per person, even if you buy seats, check luggage, etc.

 

[cmwade77]

I use Kayak as I can tell it to check up to three days before and after to see if I can save money.

We usually end up round trip from LAX to MCO around $250 even during the busiest seasons. So it may be where you are flying from as well.

 

[1911]

We paid $257 each round trip main cabin from lax to mco non stop for our late July trip.this was the best price we could find for our dates back in December.I have been checking since and prices have done nothing but go up,same tickets are now over $400.
flights this year seem higher than last year from my observations though I have no hard data to prove it.

 

[cmwade77]

We paid $257 each round trip main cabin from lax to mco non stop for our late July trip.this was the best price we could find for our dates back in December.I have been checking since and prices have done nothing but go up,same tickets are now over $400.
flights this year seem higher than last year from my observations though I have no hard data to prove it.

Watch JetBlue for sales, they had a flash sale a couple days ago for about $130 round trip for June.

 

[klwdisney]

Thanks for your input everyone! I'll just keep watching and will try to follow all your great advice. I gave some thought to driving but honestly I don't think I could handle the ride. I just can't sit still for that long lol Frontier is offering GREAT rates for my travel days but we're nervous to try them. I'm afraid of "if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is".

 

[JustCallMeMommy]

Thanks for your input everyone! I'll just keep watching and will try to follow all your great advice. I gave some thought to driving but honestly I don't think I could handle the ride. I just can't sit still for that long lol Frontier is offering GREAT rates for my travel days but we're nervous to try them. I'm afraid of "if it sounds too good to be true, then it probably is".

Frontier makes money by charging for every little thing - seat assignments, checked luggage, carry-on bags, etc. BUT, they are very upfront in their prices. If they are new to your area, the prices will be even lower to encourage people to try them out. I did fly with them last month, and they were fine. I checked one bag and with a little planning only needed a large purse onboard. My only complaint was that the seats didn't have as much cushion as other airlines, but it wasn't too bad.

 

[klwdisney]

Thank you JustCallMeMommy! I'm tempted by Frontier but I'm sure in the end we'll end up sticking with one of our preferred airlines. I"m always afraid of change! lol