Air fare is making me cry.

[Juliegirl1]

Don't feel bad - SW from Houston to MCO is over $1300 for two tickets in June!!! I keep watching other airlines but they are all steadily rising. Not sure if I should book or just keep watching. I know the fares are a little higher since it will be summer but I thought I might get lucky since my trip is so early in the summer.

 

[YenSid1222]

Out of Dallas WN is seldom becoming the cheapest now that their hedged fuel is gone. None the less, air travel is about 3 times cheaper than it was in the 1970s and WDW park tickets are about 8 times more expensive.

Still even better is to use AAdvantage miles. It is so ridiculously easy to earn them if you live in the DFW area that you will have free trips all the time. I even earn miles every month paying my electric bill. Since I have to pay it anyway, I might as well chose to earn 2 miles/$ and take care of my travel to and from WDW. Just sayin'...

 

[EveDallas]

I'm in the same boat, but we're not leaving until July. We usually don't pay over $250 and I just checked and the cheapest I found was 329. We may drive, which I would rather not do since it's so far from DFW, but it's an option. I'm hoping that Southwest drops their rates when it get closer to the date, but if not, we'll just drive.

Same here. I'm going the second week of June with my son and two nieces. Right now flights are hovering around 270 per person. If I can't get airfare under 1000 for all of us, then we will be driving.

 

[disfan07]

We flew to MCO from LAX back in december 2 weeks before christmas and before schools were even out for break and we paid $1400 for 3 of us. That was the cheapst we could find.
Our entire package for 5 people at Disney was only $3000. It's not the Disney prices that will be keeping us from going back for a while. Disney is actually not that expensive when you break it down. It is the airfare prices. We dont even get the option of driving.

 

[YenSid1222]

Yet airfare is so much cheaper still today than it ever was before. The facts are that prices have been artificially low for a very long time. That is the reason the airline industry is in the state it is now. I am totally fine with airlines finally charging what it actually costs to transport someone a long distance in a very short amount of time (compared to ground transportation). It was a nice run, but it is time we all faced the facts that we are going to have to start to pay for the ability to get somewhere as fast as air travel.

It may mean the return of the family car vacation that went away when artificially cheap fares came about...but I dont think that is a bad thing either.

 

[S'sMom]

I was able to get our tickets on AirTran for $94 going to MCO and $72 coming back. I learned last year that the best rates come around the last week of the year and sure enough it was. I did pay for my seats (so a bit of extra cost, but worth it). so this makes two years in a row that we got awesome rates for June. We wont be leaving until the 14th, so not quite your dates.

The costs are really getting much higher, but in my experience when we have waited until about March the cost were good about two year ago. But nowadays it changes so much.

Like a pp poster expressed Southwest is doing well with the costs, and signing up the airline emails should help too. I wish you the best of luck. We Dallas residents have to stick together.

 

[Jeffandjen]

We're going beginning of april. The airfare for that week is crazy either there aren't enough seats or the price is outrageous. Now if we were to go anytime before or after that week we could get fares as low as $59 each way. The whole things a scam. Unfortunately looks like we're driving

 

[MichelleVW]

DH is going to be on a business trip in LA in two weeks and we booked a weekend flight for me to join him for only $250 roundtrip! Still working on airfare for July, but was thrilled to get the deal to LA! Disneyland here I come!!!

 

[StrwLady]

I'm not getting your trip dates or something. Are you talking DFW airport? I am getting $267 total for 4th to 14th or $292 3rd (early evening - figured needed to wait until school was out that day) to the 14th. Is it just that you are worried/concerned because direct flights are more expensive at this point or are you shopping for indirects too?

IDK - with airfare the way they are - if you can get a r/t ticket in the same range as in the past but with a layover - it might be the best we can hope for this summer with fuel prices.

What airlines are you finding those rates on? I have been checking all over and I don't see that. American does have a 6:50am flight out of Dallas that is cheap but I can't fly that early. The return all are $190

 

[brymolmom]

What airlines are you finding those rates on? I have been checking all over and I don't see that. American does have a 6:50am flight out of Dallas that is cheap but I can't fly that early. The return all are $190

A bit higher than last time I posted - but using EXPEDIA I get $292 for 6/4 - 6/14 DFW to/from MCO for 2 people - total $586. One stop each way in Atlanta. This one is on Airtran.

 

[YenSid1222]

Just make sure that you go to the airline's own websites. American for one does not have fares listed on Orbitz nor Expedia nor some others. Same with Southwest.

 

[StrwLady]

I check tons of sites and I am set up with several email notifications of price changes. Normally in the end American is the best option.

I just checked Bing.com fare predictor the last couple of days the predictor said they were 68% confident that the fares would rise. Earlier today it was down to 61% confident. Now it is showing 86% confident that fares will fall. I have seen them to be pretty accurate. So for now I will hold out. I will continue to wait but as soon as I see something around $250 to $300 with fees I will jump on it.

Thanks for all the replies. It has helped me stay calm

 

[YenSid1222]

I check tons of sites and I am set up with several email notifications of price changes. Normally in the end American is the best option.

I just checked Bing.com fare predictor the last couple of days the predictor said they were 68% confident that the fares would rise. Earlier today it was down to 61% confident. Now it is showing 86% confident that fares will fall. I have seen them to be pretty accurate. So for now I will hold out. I will continue to wait but as soon as I see something around $250 to $300 with fees I will jump on it.

Thanks for all the replies. It has helped me stay calm

You can also set up your AAdvantage account online at AA.com and request to be notified of fare sales between city pairs when you log in. I have any possible city I might travel to listed and I can see the sales immediately on the home page. That can be very helpful.

 

[StrwLady]

Well I jumped in head first and booked my air fare. It was higher than I was really hoping but I had been watching it and the outbound went up $5 a person (no biggie) and the return went up $75 a person (very biggie). I was able to get the dates and times (return an hour earlier than I had hoped) I wanted for approximately $1000 for the 3 of us.

Before I committed I did try every which way to get it cheaper. I could have shaved $200 off but this would have put us there 2 days past the current general public discount so we would have had 2 days at rack rate. So no real savings there. Southwest rates had jumped about $80 per person each way. Even tried a couple of other connecting flights and the small savings over nonstop on AA was not worth dealing with longer travel times.

I am glad to have this part over. Of course tomorrow the fares will drop drastically LOL. Isn't it always that way. But at least that is one stress off my back. Even though I do not have my resort booked yet (waiting on June AP rates) I feel like I can finally start planing.

Good Luck to all on finding the right fares for your trip

 

[3happydancers]

Well I jumped in head first and booked my air fare. It was higher than I was really hoping but I had been watching it and the outbound went up $5 a person (no biggie) and the return went up $75 a person (very biggie). I was able to get the dates and times (return an hour earlier than I had hoped) I wanted for approximately $1000 for the 3 of us.

Before I committed I did try every which way to get it cheaper. I could have shaved $200 off but this would have put us there 2 days past the current general public discount so we would have had 2 days at rack rate. So no real savings there. Southwest rates had jumped about $80 per person each way. Even tried a couple of other connecting flights and the small savings over nonstop on AA was not worth dealing with longer travel times.

I am glad to have this part over. Of course tomorrow the fares will drop drastically LOL. Isn't it always that way. But at least that is one stress off my back. Even though I do not have my resort booked yet (waiting on June AP rates) I feel like I can finally start planing.

Good Luck to all on finding the right fares for your trip

I know exactly what you mean. I purchased our tickets the day SWA opened for our dates. Departing was 129.00 and coming home was at 170.00. So we booked the 129.00 to leave but we did change our return date to avoid the 170.00 tickets and also got 129.00 to come home. Still, it was more than we wanted to pay. Well, good thing we did because now our flight departing is up to $249.00 and return flight is at 209.00. I am hoping that at some point prices will drop for our return so that we could go back to the original date we wanted to leave (we shaved 2 days off our vacation-not that big a deal since we will still have 12 days of vacation but you know, it is that mind set thing).

As a matter of fact, since yesterday, I have seen 2 price changes for our flights. Thats crazy!!!

 

[YenSid1222]

Honestly, I seldom find WN to be the best deal out of the DFW area when you consider the connection, Love Field (I hate it), extra flight time, no miles....I will pay a little more and have my nice easy direct flight on AA. Often times it is less. And a lot less stressful.

 

[bytheblood]

Just keep watching. We are flying out of DFW to MCO for $100 each for 5 tickets in December. We are still looking for the flight home. Let me give you a few suggestions that save us money each time....

1 - Dallas Love Field is usually a better deal
2 - Book each leg separately
3 - Consider using different airlines for each way. (example: American one way, Airtran the other)

 

[YenSid1222]

Just keep watching. We are flying out of DFW to MCO for $100 each for 5 tickets in December. We are still looking for the flight home. Let me give you a few suggestions that save us money each time....

1 - Dallas Love Field is usually a better deal
2 - Book each leg separately
3 - Consider using different airlines for each way. (example: American one way, Airtran the other)

I seldom find a better deal at DAL. Especially when you add the extra travel time required to stop on the way. My time is worth money. I also don't like WN's policies...but that is just my personal feelings. I know many people swear by them, I do not. Plus, my AA miles are letting me stay at Port Orleans Riverside this October for free. Rapid Rewards cant do that. So, in the end, it just doesn't make financial sense for me to fly WN. I encourage all of my friends who like to visit WDW more than once every 4 or 5 years to look at the benefits. For the once in that many years visitor, it is probably fine. And once WN has direct flights from DAL, then we will see if anything changes...

 

[LeslieG]

I can't believe how high airfare is for early June. I have the option to fly from four different airports, and have been watching it for weeks. I fly quite a bit, and I've never seen fares this high to Orlando.

 

[3happydancers]

I can't believe how high airfare is for early June. I have the option to fly from four different airports, and have been watching it for weeks. I fly quite a bit, and I've never seen fares this high to Orlando.

We are flying from Long Island and I am experiencing the same thing. We did manage to get flights for 129.00 each way but, we had to change our return date and cut our vacation a little short , and the 129.00 was still more than we have ever paid (which I still consider reasonable and can live with). But, now the same flights are up to 249.00/209.00.