When to book airlines?

[PETE FROM NYC]

DW and I are driving down in Sept, but the other 4 in our group are flying, hopefully on Southwest from LI's McArthur.
When should they start to book their flights?

[brivers222]

last year I booked a great price about 4 months before... both for Airline and Rental Car.... only to watch the price fall for both as my dates got closer.

In fact my Airlines dropped so much that I even cancelled and rebooked my flight...with the $150 fee charged still saved $40 on the ticket...

I am holding off this year and from what i am noticing (depending on dates of the year your are going) they appear to be at the lowest about 1month to 3weeks out from your trip. Granted you must also watch the seats because a low price isnt good if you can't sit on it haha.

[CuteAsMinnie]

SW does not charge for changing flight reservations. :mickey: Flight prices change daily and fluctuate often. I'd start now. You should be able to get a feel as to how low the prices will go with a little patience and research.

:cool:

[GAN]

The best time to buy is when they're low -the hard part is figuring when that will be. The only way is to constantly watch fare prices or use "Airfare Watchdog" to send alerts. The good news is with Southwest they can book now and if the fares go down they will issue a credit toward another flight(must be used within one-year, or something like that). It looks like SWA just lowered some fares from the Northeast so now is better than it was a week or two ago.

[Mickey'sIrishPAl]

Definitely book now. I have never paid less than $1100 for airfare but I just went on SWA website and found airfare from PIT to MCO, non-stop and round trip, for $846.00 (2 adults and 2 kids ages 10 and 4). Plus, we have always flown Continental Airlines and had to pay for 3 bags as we combined our kid's clothes into one bag. ($150 round trip). SWA is free for first 2 bags.

Give it a try and good luck!!