No reason to keep checking. Set Google & hopper alerts to tell you if the price changes.

Anonymous wrote:I work in the travel industry. Prices are definitely higher, for Europe especially, than 2 to 3 years ago. People have the travel bug and they want to do it now that we’re post Covid.

There is such a thing as revenue management, so companies are trying to increase prices where they can, and they know when demand is high. Summer and spring break are peak times for travel.

You can use Google flight tracker to help you a little bit, but you do have to put up with emails.

Agree with previous post to be flexible on your dates of travel and also take connecting flights if that is an option for you. You may have to monitor prices periodically, but realize that the week around Easter is peak time for everyone, so that’s not going to get super low. Same with Christmas and Thanksgiving.

Always book direct, but be flexible about Independent hotels and other non chains in Europe.

Thanks for the insight and advice. Very helpful…especially about booking direct.

I work in the travel industry. Prices are definitely higher, for Europe especially, than 2 to 3 years ago. People have the travel bug and they want to do it now that we’re post Covid.

There is such a thing as revenue management, so companies are trying to increase prices where they can, and they know when demand is high. Summer and spring break are peak times for travel.

You can use Google flight tracker to help you a little bit, but you do have to put up with emails.

Agree with previous post to be flexible on your dates of travel and also take connecting flights if that is an option for you. You may have to monitor prices periodically, but realize that the week around Easter is peak time for everyone, so that’s not going to get super low. Same with Christmas and Thanksgiving.

Always book direct, but be flexible about Independent hotels and other non chains in Europe.

Anonymous wrote:It seems almost whimsical to me. Last winter, for our group of three going to London in October, we got one ticket via Delta Skymiles (which seemed high to me at 72k miles), one ticket at $850, and another a couple weeks later at $600.

This was for round trip travel from a smaller regional airport.

Earlier this fall, I scored super cheap one way award tickets at 19k miles to Paris in early July 2025. Still looking for decent return tickets, but I expect to find something for 30-40k miles.

I think the key is to be obsessive about checking and flexible about itineraries (but a 10-hour layover wouldn’t appeal to me, either!).

Agree with this.

The way we do it is have a list of a few international destinations we are interested in and then I check prices once or twice a week for a few months. I look for several times -- April, June, August, Thanksgiving. If I see a good price I grab it and we go. If prices stay high, we travel domestic that year and set the extra money away for foreign travel the next year.

We have been able to get flights to Denmark, Spain, and Mexico City for really good prices in the last few years (MC tickets we booked for about 30k Southwest point each, we got Denmark and Spain for around $600 per person).

Being flexible and open minded is key to getting deals. Right now our list includes Ireland, Paris, and Argentina. We also want to do Tokyo but we're waiting until kids are little older and I'm actually putting money into an account for that because I've just accepted that trip is going to be $$$.

Yeah - it's all $$$.

We used to take kids to lux places for $1000/night. Those rooms are now $1600-2k/night so we don't do them anymore

Everyone uses cc points to fly now so the airlines have a new system these days and fares are $$$. They assume you will use points so if you don't, good luck!

I think as the world gets more complicated, pricing and avail do as well. It's just not a function of expense it's an algorithm of who and how many, where and what's the threshold. It's just not about pricing a trip but more about how to achieve max ROI for businesses.

I think a lot of it is quite simply luck and agree you just keep checking. We travel frequently for holidays and some tix are crazy $$ other times I get lucky. Remember, everyone else is trying to score a deal possibly at similar travel times if kids l

Anonymous wrote:I waited too long for Spring Break plane tickets and gave up on that, so started to look for plane tickets (Europe, Costa Rica - as two examples) for late June or mid July -- the ticket prices are just as high for the summer as for April, unless one is willing to do something like a 10 hour layover.

Are ticket prices just permanently higher now to go outside the US?

For peak travel times? Yes.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems almost whimsical to me. Last winter, for our group of three going to London in October, we got one ticket via Delta Skymiles (which seemed high to me at 72k miles), one ticket at $850, and another a couple weeks later at $600.

This was for round trip travel from a smaller regional airport.

Earlier this fall, I scored super cheap one way award tickets at 19k miles to Paris in early July 2025. Still looking for decent return tickets, but I expect to find something for 30-40k miles.

I think the key is to be obsessive about checking and flexible about itineraries (but a 10-hour layover wouldn’t appeal to me, either!).

If you paid yourself $25 an hour for all the time you spend checking, how would you earn?

Less than $25.

Checking on airline ticket prices literally takes under a minute each time. Plug in your itinerary, check prices. Easy peasy.

Can also set Google Flights alerts very quickly.

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It seems almost whimsical to me. Last winter, for our group of three going to London in October, we got one ticket via Delta Skymiles (which seemed high to me at 72k miles), one ticket at $850, and another a couple weeks later at $600.

This was for round trip travel from a smaller regional airport.

Earlier this fall, I scored super cheap one way award tickets at 19k miles to Paris in early July 2025. Still looking for decent return tickets, but I expect to find something for 30-40k miles.

I think the key is to be obsessive about checking and flexible about itineraries (but a 10-hour layover wouldn’t appeal to me, either!).

If you paid yourself $25 an hour for all the time you spend checking, how would you earn?

Less than $25.

Checking on airline ticket prices literally takes under a minute each time. Plug in your itinerary, check prices. Easy peasy.

Anonymous wrote:It seems almost whimsical to me. Last winter, for our group of three going to London in October, we got one ticket via Delta Skymiles (which seemed high to me at 72k miles), one ticket at $850, and another a couple weeks later at $600.

This was for round trip travel from a smaller regional airport.

Earlier this fall, I scored super cheap one way award tickets at 19k miles to Paris in early July 2025. Still looking for decent return tickets, but I expect to find something for 30-40k miles.

I think the key is to be obsessive about checking and flexible about itineraries (but a 10-hour layover wouldn’t appeal to me, either!).

If you paid yourself $25 an hour for all the time you spend checking, how would you earn?

It seems almost whimsical to me. Last winter, for our group of three going to London in October, we got one ticket via Delta Skymiles (which seemed high to me at 72k miles), one ticket at $850, and another a couple weeks later at $600.

This was for round trip travel from a smaller regional airport.

Earlier this fall, I scored super cheap one way award tickets at 19k miles to Paris in early July 2025. Still looking for decent return tickets, but I expect to find something for 30-40k miles.

I think the key is to be obsessive about checking and flexible about itineraries (but a 10-hour layover wouldn’t appeal to me, either!).

If you go the middle of August it's much cheaper to Europe. Can get regular economy to say London or Paris on United/BA for example, for around $1k/person

I waited too long for Spring Break plane tickets and gave up on that, so started to look for plane tickets (Europe, Costa Rica - as two examples) for late June or mid July -- the ticket prices are just as high for the summer as for April, unless one is willing to do something like a 10 hour layover.

Are ticket prices just permanently higher now to go outside the US?