Hawaii Money Saving Tips

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Visiting Hawaii can be expensive, but there are a number of things you can do to save money.

Frequent Traveler Programs: Signing up for a frequent traveler program through a hotel or airline can result in significant savings. Hotels like the Sheraton send special savings to people who have signed up with their program. One year, I received 5 nights at the Maui Sheraton for $799. This was a large savings off the regular rates. Also, if you fly often, you can earn free or reduced airfare.

Price Negotiation: Sometimes it is possible to request a lower price when making hotel reservations, especially at smaller or less popular hotels. When you receive a price quote, you can ask about available specials. Once I received a lower rate after explaining that I was going to call a few other hotels to check their prices.



Timeshare Presentations: Many resorts, hotels, and condos sell timeshares in their properties and they offer specials to entice you to attend a sales presentation. The specials include free or reduced accomodations and discounted activities. You can go to the web sites for major hotel chains with locations in Hawaii and fill out a form expressing an interest in a timeshare. By doing so, they may send a special deal to you that's available if you agree to sit through a timeshare presentation. Once you arrive in Hawaii, there are timeshare vendors offering activity savings.
The ultimate goal of a timeshare presentation is for a sale to occur. Therefore, sitting through one can be somewhat painful for those of us who do not intend to purchase one. Sometimes they are high pressure and usually last around two hours. You need to place a value on your time and determine whether spending time listening to a sales pitch is worth the extra savings.

Airfare Discounts: Saving money on airfare for your trip to Hawaii requires regular price checking. It's typically less expensive to depart during mid-week, like on a Wednesday. I've seen some of the lowest prices to Hawaii during February so I usually start checking prices during January and February. Hawaiian Airlines often has sales on flights from some west coast cities and you can receive regular sale information by signing up for their frequent flier program.
Flights between the Hawaiian islands are relatively inexpensive. Go! operated by Mesa Airlines regularly offers discounted flights. Also, Hawaiian Airlines periodically offers discounts off the inter-island flights.

Off Season Travel: The best rates for Hawaii are during it's off season which runs from mid April through mid June and September through mid December. The lowest rates for accomodations are available during the off season months.

A3H Gold Card: The gold card is a discount card offering savings off some Hawaii activities. It costs $30 and can be used for up to four people. It doesn't offer a discount off every activity so you should review the discounted activities before purchasing. I used it the first time I went to Hawaii and was able to get a substantial savings off the Road to Hana tour on Maui, but I decided not to buy the card during my last trip to Hawaii because I couldn't get a deal on the activities I selected.

Vacation Property Rental: You can often save money on accomodations by renting a condo, private home or timeshare. They are often less expensive than many Hawaii hotels, especially if you are traveling with a large family or group. By going to the VRBO website, you can search for Hawaiian condos and homes available for rent. You can also read reviews by prior guests and check availability. For timeshare rentals, I like the site Redweek.com. You can search available timeshares and contact the owner directly in order to rent one.

Food: It's no secret that food in Hawaii is expensive compared to the mainland. If you rent a condo, home or timeshare, you can save money by cooking your own food. You can buy bulk food with good prices at Costco. There's a Costco located on Oahu, Maui, and the Big Island. The Safeway grocery store has a discount card that you can sign up for in order to get extra savings there. Some Hawaiian restaurants sell plate lunches which relatively cheap. For dinner, you can save money by eating a late "lunch" instead.

Coupons: The Hawaii version of the Entertainment Book has good discounts, but I didn't really get much use out of it when I purchased one. A lot depends on whether it contains the restaurants, activities, etc. that interest you. Near the baggage claim areas in Hawaii, there are many brochures with coupons. For me, searching through the brochures for coupons that I would actually use ultimately wasn't worth my time, but they are a way to potentially save money.