{"id":121705,"date":"2021-06-09T14:56:32","date_gmt":"2021-06-09T21:56:32","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/gambling-with-an-edge\/?p=121705"},"modified":"2021-06-09T14:56:36","modified_gmt":"2021-06-09T21:56:36","slug":"the-travellin-times-they-are-a-changin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/gambling-with-an-edge\/the-travellin-times-they-are-a-changin\/","title":{"rendered":"The (travellin\u2019) times, they are a changin\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The title of this post isn\u2019t really news. We have all been\nreading about changes in the airline, hotel, rental car and ride service\nindustries. I want to talk a little bit about how it affects my specialty,\ngetting to Las Vegas and still having a plus EV trip including all travel\nexpenses, while playing at low roller levels. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have been talking and writing about low cost travel to Las\nVegas since 2016. In the last 9 months, the cost for me to travel from Detroit\nto Las Vegas has increased. On my most recent trip, 5\/28 \u2013 6\/2\/21, I paid $351\nfor a rental car. This is the most I have paid for a rental car in Las Vegas in\nthe 35 years I have been doing this. And $351 was actually a very good rate.\nVehicles were going for about $600 for the same period. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Airline travel cost has gone up significantly, which makes\nusing frequent flier points even more important. 10 or 15 years ago, you could\nfind $150 round trip tickets to Las Vegas from Detroit. That same flight is\n$500 now. Add on baggage fees (unless you have an airline credit card or fly\nSouthwest) and it is easy to spend over $1000 for airfare for 2. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Another added cost is resort fees. A major reason resort fees\ncame to be is the hotels are taxed much less on fees than on room rates. If the\nroom is $150, the hotel pays more in taxes than if the room is $110 with a $40\nresort fee. Another benefit to the hotel is that they can advertise comped rooms,\nbut those rooms still have a resort fee. I have seen this at Tropicana and the\nM in Las Vegas. Also, some of the MyVegas offers are structured that way. A\nfree room for 3 nights at the M sounds good but adding in $120 or so for resort\nfees and it isn\u2019t such a great deal anymore.  We don\u2019t currently pay resort fees, but that\noption is getting more difficult to find. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Parking fees are coming back. We stayed at Bally\u2019s and my\nwife is Diamond so we could valet for free. If not, the rate was $36 a night.\nAt Cromwell, it was $40 a night. I don\u2019t know if hotel guests get free valet\nparking. So, a free room could still cost you $80 a night for parking and\nresort fees. Ouch.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I haven\u2019t seen much change in room offers in Las Vegas,\nwhich is a good sign. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Also, there are signs that the rental car prices may not be\nsustainable. When we picked up our car at 5:30 PM on Friday of Memorial Day\nweekend, there were very few people in the Rent A Car center and there were a\nton of cars in the lot at Hertz. Given that last minute prices were about $125\nper day, people must have made other arrangements, used a ride share or used\npublic transportation. I can\u2019t remember ever seeing that many cars in the lot. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Las Vegas has eliminated the ban on surge pricing for Uber\nand Lyft so hopefully that will encourage more people to return to those jobs.\nI saw that Turo (basically Air B and B for cars), is doing record business. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What does this all mean? \nCosts are way up and travel is more work. So far, casino offers are\nabout the same. Once my companion fare runs out at the end of the year, my\ntrips for 2022 will decline. For 2021, I will make 6 trips to Las Vegas. For\n2022, that number will probably be 2. And once I run out of frequent flier\nmiles, it will go to 1.  For the past\ndozen years, airfare has been free, hotels have been free, food has been mostly\nfree and rental cars have been reasonable. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My last trip, we had about $2000 in free play to pick up at\nvarious places. My rental car was $350, cost of gambling was about $500 or $600\nso the trip had EV of about $1000. If I have to pay more for a rental car and\nhave to start paying for flights, the EV would be $0 at best. And at that\npoint, I\u2019ll be finding another activity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I think rental car prices will get closer to normal in 2022.\nHopefully, there will be enough frequent flier opportunities to still make some\ntrips to Las Vegas. If not, it has been a lot of fun for the last 35 years. <\/p>\n\"Facebook\"<\/a>\"twitter\"<\/a>\"youtube\"<\/a>\"instagram\"<\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The title of this post isn\u2019t really news. We have all been reading about changes in the airline, hotel, rental car and ride service industries. I want to talk a little bit about how it affects my specialty, getting to Las Vegas and still having a plus EV trip including all travel expenses, while playing […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"spay_email":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"\nThe (travellin\u2019) times, they are a changin\u2019 - Gambling With An Edge<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.lasvegasadvisor.com\/gambling-with-an-edge\/the-travellin-times-they-are-a-changin\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The (travellin\u2019) times, they are a changin\u2019 - Gambling With An Edge\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The title of this post isn\u2019t really news. 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