<p>It took me two years to learn this, and my best attempt at it is this year. I have officially made my hotel reservations for D2's parents weekend this year, for late October. I know it seems far away, especially for parents who won't even be sending their oldest child off to college for two more months. But take this piece of advice from an old pro...</p>
<p>If you have any inclination that you might be attending your student's parent/family weekend activities and staying overnight, I highly advise you to make those accommodation reservations now. At some schools, the choice places might already be sold out. </p>
<p>I also might add, if your method of taking your kid to college will involve an overnight stay or two, make those hotel reservations now, too. That stuff fills up so darn quickly.</p>
<p>We wanted to make reservations for DD's graduation, but the hotels in her school's area do not take reservations for more than 1 year in advance. </p>
<p>Agreed with the OP...when you need overnight accommodations, plan ahead.</p>
<p>For next year's freshman parents, you can even make multiple reservations at all the schools your child is considering and then cancel them when he/she decides.....we did this in April, and even then, we were shut out of certain places for October.....definitely pays to plan ahead.......</p>
<p>Absolutely concur with this advice. Even though S's school is in a city with lots of hotels, there were a handful we preferred location-wise (and had free parking!). I believe I learned about it on this forum, and also was advised to book MONTHS in advance if we wanted to stay there for Move-In weekend and Parents Weekend. </p>
<p>I really appreciated the advice....unless you do an online booking service requiring upfront payment, you can always cancel if your plans change.</p>
<p>I guess this early reservation applys to only colleges located in a small town. Otherwise, the best deal, I heard, is actually do the hotwire or priceline type of deal within one or two weeks before the event.</p>
<p>We did the admitted weekend at Stanford as such. We got a Sheraton less than 10 miles away for $69/N and a full size car for $17.99/D. Using FF mileages for tickets, we did the whole weekend for 4 under $600 total.</p>
<p>Dad II - nope - when D2 was a freshman/sophomore and I waited until August to make reservations in a city whose metro population area was over 700,000 and we ended up in some flea holes, far from campus. </p>
<p>There's a HUGE difference between an admitted parent's weekend, which is a much smaller group, than parent's weekend/move-in weekend. Also, if for some reason you cannot visit parent's weekend, and end up there on homecoming weekend, you'll usually find the same situation.</p>
<p>The Sheraton by D1's campus actually had a lottery every year for parent's weekend and graduation, and rooms usually ran $300+ a night. This lottery was usually held 10 months or so prior to the weekend.</p>
<p>Think about it, when you're there for parent's weekend, do you really want to spend hours of one short weekend driving back and forth to the campus? And then sleeping in a pit when you did get back to that place?</p>
<p>DadII, teriwtt speaks from experience. Although we didn't have these problems because we DID book really early, we spoke to many parents
(especially Move In weekend) who ended up schlepping a very long way back and forth to their not-that-great hotels.</p>
<p>Why not book a desirable place early and then, if you do find something wonderful closer to the timing, cancel it and let some lucky procrastinator have your room :)</p>
<p>
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Why not book a desirable place early and then, if you do find something wonderful closer to the timing, cancel it and let some lucky procrastinator have your room
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</p>
<p>And the caveat is that he has to advertise the upcoming cancellation on CC before he does it, so some poor CC procrastinator can coordinate the timing of their call to the hotel he cancels at and grab his room!</p>
<p>I will say, that I try to be a little picky about the hotels I stay at... for staying at certain hotels I get .5 credit toward my Southwest Airlines Rapid Rewards account. Two credits is the credit you get everytime you fly round trip somewhere, and it takes 16 credits for a free RT ticket. I've got one banked right now, and am close to a second one. I also use it for my rental cars, but I don't have book those so far out.</p>
<p>I decided not to go to parents weekend for that reason. My D didn't decide until very late which school she was accepting. By then, pretty much every room in the small town was already booked for the October parent weekend. I found one hotel with rooms - a Holiday Inn Express - whose normal rate is about $100 a night and was charging almost $250 a night for that weekend. Fortunately, my best friend's daughter is also getting married that weekend so I have another reason not to go, but gouging like that makes me want to boycott the hotels.</p>
<p>You're so right Teri. We made Parents Weekend reservations (for October) a few months ago. I heard that hotel rooms in the area fill up fast, and they can easily be cancelled, so why not? We have decided that only H is going to go to my S's Family Weekend. We've booked his airline ticket already, too.</p>
<p>Just be sure they allow cancellations, I know the hotel on son's campus requires a full deposit for certain times (move-in, family weekend etc.) and we would lose the deposit if we cancelled.</p>
<p>And flights back to school, too!
Just looked at airfare for sending D back to school in August with a return in Dec. Let's just say the airlines aren't expecting to be paying any less for fuel in December! Ouch!!!! That said, I think we do need to book it now and be done although hope springs eternal that there will be a better fare later...</p>
<p>Wow, yet another reason to be thankful that S goes to school near a good friends house. Free housing for parent's weekend, and a good excuse to visit old friends.</p>