How to get the Best Hotels at the Cheapest Rates in the Disneyland Area

Posted on Feb 06, 2011 by Legal Monkey

Not everyone can be so fortunate as to live a short distance from their favorite theme park. For my daughter and I, living in Arizona and still making it out to the Disneyland Resort on a regular basis seemed nearly impossible for quite some time. Then a good friend of mine gave me a few tips and probably the most valuable was how to get a decent to nice hotel room without spending a fortune. While the instructions below are specific to getting hotels around Disneyland, you can pretty much use this guide to get hotels at great rates anywhere you want.

Everyone’s heard of Priceline.com and their ‘Name Your Own Price’ option. I’ve used it successfully
many times over after hearing about it from a close friend of mine who has been a Disneyland Annual
Pass holder for over 20 years. Every time I use it I get either the Marriott Anaheim Suites (and yes you
get a 2 room suite), the Crowne Plaza, the Hilton at the Anaheim Convention Center, or the Doubletree.
There is 1 catch with these hotels – a resort fee between $10 and $15 per day.
 
Now here’s a step-by-step on how to use the Priceline feature so you don’t mess up.
 
1. Go to Priceline.com. On the main page click ‘Hotel’
2. Scroll down to where it says ‘Name Your Own Price for Hotels’
3. In the ‘City’ bar enter ‘Disneyland’
4. Select your check in and check out dates and how many rooms you want
5. Click ‘Bid Now’
6. It will open a new screen that says ‘Please Help Us With a Little More Information’
7. Under ‘Select a City’ choose ‘Disney Land – Anaheim, California, United States’
8. Click ‘Next’
9. Now you’re at a screen that says ‘Step 1: Choose Where You Want To Stay’
10. Select option 5 ‘Disneyland – Anaheim’. This area is the Good Neighbor Hotel Area of the
 
Disneyland Resort
 
11. Scroll down and you will see ‘Step 2: Choose the Star Level for your hotel’
12. Select ‘3 ½ Star – Upscale Plus’
13. Now comes ‘Step 3: Name Your Own Price’
14. Here’s the trick. Just enter ‘50’. That’s it – 50 bucks a night is all I ever pay for top notch hotels
 
Disneyland.
15. Now scroll down and enter your First and Last name and click ‘Next’
16. The next screen shows a review of your request. It shows how much you ‘bid’ per night plus the
taxes and fees (roughly $13 a day) and a total for your stay. It gives you the option of buying
Cancellation Insurance for $5 per night of your stay in case you can’t make it or need to leave
during your stay. Keep in mind, once you book a hotel room this way, IT IS NON-REFUNDABLE
and the dates can’t be changed. There are some other terms and conditions to review.
17. If you are sure you can make these dates and want to book a room, initial in the box and
click ‘Next’
18. The next screen is the billing screen. Enter your billing information as it appears on your credit
card statement. Enter and re-enter your email address and then Uncheck the box underneath
your email address that says ‘Yes Send me updates’. I recommend this because we all hate
 
spam email.
19. Now enter your credit card info. Don’t worry, the info is safe (we are talking about Priceline and
not some hack site). Your card is not charged, authorized, or placed on hold. The only way the
card gets charged is if your bid is accepted.
 
***** Ok now here’s where everybody freaks out. “What if my bid isn’t accepted? I thought you
said I could get a room for $50 a night?” I never said you would be guaranteed a room at $50 a night
I just said I’ve never paid more than $50 a night. My friend that uses this option about 6 times a
year has never paid more than $60 a night and that was in July of 2005 DURING the 50th Anniversary
week. Depending on the time of year and what is going on, the acceptable pricing fluctuates a
little.*****
 
20. You DO NOT have to register with Priceline or create an account that is OPTIONAL.
21. Now is the moment of truth. If you click ‘Buy My Hotel Room Now’ and your bid is accepted,
 
your card is immediately charged and your room is booked. It states both HERE and ON THE
PAGE – PLEASE REMEMBER, ONCE YOU CLICK “Buy My Hotel Room” YOUR REQUEST CANNOT
BE CHANGED, CANCELLED, OR TRANSFERRED AND REFUNDS ARE NOT ALLOWED. Don’t say you
weren’t informed in advance.
22. If you click to buy the room, Priceline will take you to a wait screen while it ‘processes’ your
request.
23. If your bid is successful, you will see a screen congratulating you on a successful bid and it will
have the details of which hotel you will be staying at – Name, etc. Congratulations to you on
saving some serious money and getting to stay at a really nice hotel. I hope you enjoy it.
24. If your bid is NOT successful you have 2 options:
a. Option 1 – Wait 24 to 48 hours (I believe it’s only 24 but I haven’t had a bid fail in a
while so I’ve forgotten) and use the same email address and credit card to bid again.
b. Option 2 – Use a DIFFERENT email address AND a different credit card and bid again
right now.
If your bid has failed (and sometimes they do) increase it by $5 a night. So a $50 bid becomes
25.
$55.
 
There you guys go. That’s the best tip I can give on how to save money and get a good room at a good
hotel. At the time I wrote this, my last stay was at the Marriott Suites from December 18th to December
21st 2009. I paid $45 a night plus fees. No joke.
 
If you are worried about what hotels you might get at the Star Rating you’ve chosen, simply open
another browser tab or window and bring up the regular Priceline hotel screen. It will show you the star
ratings and the regular pricing of the hotels in the area you are looking at. Just compare the area against
itself to see what your options might be. Now if you want to get a sneak peak at what kind of pricing
you might be able to get, go over to Hotwire.com and pull up their pricing. Hotwire doesn’t allow you
to view the specific hotels the way Priceline does, but rather it cuts right to the chase and shows you
the star rating (and yes it is different than Priceline’s), the area, and the bottom line price Hotwire can
sell the room for. I’ve used this a couple different ways. First, if I am too lazy to go through the bidding
process on Priceline, I’ll just go to Hotwire and get the room. It saves me from my bid being rejected
and then having to either adjust my criteria or wait 24 hours to bid again. The second way I use it is as a
guide to roughly what prices will be accepted for my Priceline bids.
 
The last thing to be aware of is that if you have the ability to drive to the park and you are willing to not
only drive but pay the parking fee, you can stay further away from your destination and probably save
more money. But bottom line is, you don’t have to put a huge dent in your trip budget to stay at a fairly
nice hotel. I mean really, you’re just going to sleep, change, and shower there for the most part. So why
pay a hundred bucks or more per night? Save some of that money for souvenirs and fun stuff!

Comments

MommaBird (not verified)Thu, 02/17/2011 - 6:09pm

the best advise ever

This is the only way that I get hotel rooms now. It works perfect! We have gotten amazing rooms for $50.00 within a block from Disneyland!

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