When should I purchase my plane tickets?

[Clairitek]

In September 2009 FF and I will be heading out to Rarotonga in the Cook Islands (part of New Zealand) for my cousin''s destination wedding. Currently the air tickets are just under $1200 a piece from LAX to Rarotonga (thankfully the accomodation isn''t expensive AT ALL).

Does anyone have any idea when would be the best time to purchase these tickets? Should we jump on them now or hope they do down another $100 a ticket or so? I doubt they will dip below $1000 each.

Are there any PS travel agents out there who know what the price should do in the next few months?

 

[TravelingGal]

Date: 9/30/2008 12:02:49 PM
Author:Clairitek
In September 2009 FF and I will be heading out to Rarotonga in the Cook Islands (part of New Zealand) for my cousin''s destination wedding. Currently the air tickets are just under $1200 a piece from LAX to Rarotonga (thankfully the accomodation isn''t expensive AT ALL).

Does anyone have any idea when would be the best time to purchase these tickets? Should we jump on them now or hope they do down another $100 a ticket or so? I doubt they will dip below $1000 each.

Are there any PS travel agents out there who know what the price should do in the next few months?

That is cheap. Get them now. The chances of it going up are higher than them going down. We paid $2800 per ticket to go to Oz this Christmas. TGuy''s parents paid $3300 AUD each to come here in July.

You''re talking about saving $200 vs it shooting up to $1500 or more per ticket, which it could easily do. With fuel prices what they are, it''s pretty rare for great deals to come up. I only WISH we could have spent 1200 a ticket...it''s costing us 6K to get our family to Oz!!

 

[Clairitek]

I had a feeling that someone would tell me this. I agree- prices will probably only go up from here. I wish that there were a few airlines that served Rarotonga directly but Air NZ is the only one so I can''t rely on any sort of competition to keep things stable. The only other option is to go "through" Auckland

How long ago did you get your Australia tickets? Was it in the last couple of months or 10 months ahead like I''m looking? Are you in the US?

 

[TravelingGal]

Date: 9/30/2008 3:10:27 PM
Author: Clairitek
I had a feeling that someone would tell me this. I agree- prices will probably only go up from here. I wish that there were a few airlines that served Rarotonga directly but Air NZ is the only one so I can''t rely on any sort of competition to keep things stable. The only other option is to go ''through'' Auckland

How long ago did you get your Australia tickets? Was it in the last couple of months or 10 months ahead like I''m looking? Are you in the US?

We got our tickets back in March and that is from LA to Adelaide.

Buy and don''t look back. When we bought the tickets for last Christmas, I waited an extra 3 weeks to buy (I was looking in April of 07). That move cost me $700 bucks.