booking villas and flights midweek?

[grannyed]

We are looking to have a holiday in Orlando for 4 weeks around August 2010.

Regarding Virgin flights - is the price between midweek and weekend flights a good saving?

Also if we were to book midweek flights would we be able to find a villa that allowed us to arrive and depart mid-week. If not would the midweek saving cover this? We are 4 adults and 3 children.

Have also thought about staying in a hotel on the odd days and just spending 3 weeks in a villa - but this might be even more expensive.

I'm granny and have been nominated planner/final decision maker - but want to get it right...so many questions to consider!!

ANY comments/advice/criticisms welcome

 

[Pegasus928]

Booking this far out you shouldn't have any difficulties booking a villa midweek to midweek. We have done it a few times without any problems.
The only thing that might make it a little more difficult is the time your are going as I would expect it to be busier at this time of year, so the owners of the good villas could probably afford to be more selective about the dates they rent out.
The only thing you can do is find the one you want (make sure you have a shortlist of about 5 though as you need backups 'just in case') and drop the owner an enquiry.
Good Luck

 

[grannyed]

thanks for responding Pegasus.....

this far out we can't really book flights...intend to do so as soon as we can...and we can't really book a villa until we have the flights organised.....but we will start looking at villas, making a 'shortlist' and making tentative enquiries....good advice - thanks!

 

[loobylou44]

I agree with Pegasus, this early you should have no problem booking a villa midweek, you can also usually get a daily rate, which would help if you wanted to do 4 weeks plus a day or two, or 4 weeks minus a day or two,this would give you flexibility to get the absolute best price on your flights.

 

[Gingernut]

As soon as you know your dates start looking for villas and enquire if you can book. There are literally hundreds out there, but all are different and it depends what you are looking for and where etc. If they aren't booked and they have your dates, you should get the booking - irelevant of the day. Or at least that what I've always found. Some even offer a discount the longer you are there.

Your other alternative is to book for say 3 weeks and stay somewhere like International Drive for a week - maybe the first week. That way you can dump the car some of the time, go for a walk up and down there and go for a meal and noone has to drive and everyone can have a cocktail or two.

Happy planning

 

[StarWarsJez]

We've always gone mid-week and have never had a problem with booking Villa's

 

[UKDEB]

These days, very few owners will restrict booking potential by limiting themselves to Saturday to Saturday bookings. That's possibly less likely to be the case if you were to book through an agent or tour operator.

As for Virgin flights, you won't find any difference in price between weekdays and weekends. You could get lucky and find your dates fall into a price-drop bracket, but it won't be because it's a midweek date.

 

[JohnnySharp2]

Hiya again,

As others have said, your start day for villa booking for the majority of owner's should not matter.
I think in the past I have seen a few who have preferred a kind of 'saturday to saturday' option but these days that is very rare.

All villa owners will accomodate your needs whenever they can, we have stayed in many villas but never consider booking until our flights are sorted.
Most owners have to be flexible these days.

If you need any villa websites or help Granny you know where I am.

 

[grannyed]

thanks everyone.........I have made some enquiries for villas and have 2 saved in my favourites to contact again when we have flights organised.

I sent out about a dozen enquiries and only recd 3 back so am assuming that the others are either booked for that time or don't want to do the midweek bookings.

Still.... there seem to be hundreds of villas available so I am sure that I will find something......

our eldest grand-daughter leaves her junior school this year so wants to stay til the end of term to take part in all of the 'farewell' activities, but then needs to start her high school on day 1 in order to find her feet there. For a couple of other holidays we have pinched a bit of term time but feel that we shouldn't do that this year.....

I'm sure that i'll be back asking for more advice/help in the next 12 months...

 

[JohnnySharp2]

It is very unusual not to get any response, even if the dates are not available most owners out of courtesy would respond, after all you could possibly contact them again on future trips.

I think it's unlikely you would not get a response because of the midweek dates.

 

[grannyed]

Maybe I'm not giving them enough time and they will respond eventually.....after all there's plenty of time between now and next August!!

 

[Pegasus928]

The other thing to check is your spam folder. We have had it before where replies from villa owners have gone straight into our spam folder, and we would have missed them if we hadn't been expecting it to happen.

 

[grannyed]

Thanks Pegasus for reminding me! I have made that mistake before and could very well have done it again. I have so much 'spam' these days that I generally just 'select all' and 'delete'

I'll leave it a couple of weeks and send out more requests - with an apology if they've heard from me before.

I do have 2 in my favourites folder which look okay, but I'll try for a couple more just in case they go before we can confirm...

 

[loobylou44]

If you have a favourite villa it is worth asking the owner if they will provisionally hold it for you until the flights are released.We did this with the villa that we are staying in, 2nd jan this year we gave the owner the dates that we were aiming for (dec 2009), he held the villa for us, and as soon as we booked the flights (which we did last week of Jan) we confirmed the villa dates and paid the deposit, not all owners will do it but its worth asking.