<\/a>My first trip to Las Vegas<\/strong> was about 15 years ago.\u00a0 Back then, the Vegas strip was a lot less congested and hotel rooms, food, and gambling were cheap.\u00a0 I remember $5 game tables, $10 buffets, and $1.99 early morning steak and egg breakfasts.\u00a0 Weekend packages to Vegas were plentiful and affordable.\u00a0 Gone are those days.<\/p>\n

In today’s Vegas, weekends are most expensive with decent rooms costing 2 -3 times the weekday rate.\u00a0 Buffets are $25+, blackjack tables have $15-20 minimums, and there’s no such thing as a cheap breakfast special.\u00a0\u00a0 Vegas can be a real budget buster unless you know where to find the deals.\u00a0 Here are my top 3 tips for saving money and living large in Vegas:<\/p>\n

1.\u00a0 Hotel Rooms:\u00a0 Book early for the best rates and try several bookings sites, as prices can significantly differ.\u00a0 My favorite sites are Hotels.com, Kayak, Orbitz and Venere.\u00a0 Try the actual hotel websites too.\u00a0 Sometimes they offer specials and extra perks for bookings on their own websites. \u00a0Lastly, air\/hotel packages may provide the best deal.\u00a0 Try Southwest or Delta airlines for package deals.<\/p>\n

2.\u00a0 Entertainment\/Food:\u00a0 Tix4Tonight<\/b><\/a> is the best source for discounts on shows, restaurants, buffets, tours, and other attractions.\u00a0 With multiple locations along the strip, they offer same or next day discounted tickets, often for as much as half off.\u00a0 Their offerings vary by day, so if you’re flexible you can find some great deals on top shows and restaurants.\u00a0 Go early for the best selection. I’ve used them several times for shows and buffets, and can attest to the huge savings.<\/p>\n

3.\u00a0 Nightlife:\u00a0 Expect long lines and expensive cover charges at Vegas nightclubs, unless you have an inside connection.\u00a0 One of the best club promoters in the game is Chris Hornak of FreeVegasClubPasses.com<\/b><\/a>. Even better — his services are free. He can get you VIP entry into all the top Vegas nightclubs for free (ladies) or at reduced cover (sorry, guys). You’ll avoid all the long lines and the ladies will even get a free drink or two. I can personally vouch for him. During a recent trip, our group of 10 ladies got free entry into all of the hot clubs, with free drinks. We skipped the long lines and were ushered right thru the door.\u00a0 We easily saved more than $1,000 over the weekend and lots of wear and tear on our feet. I can’t recommend him enough.<\/p>\n

Do you have some tips or secrets for saving money in Vegas?\u00a0 Please share them in the comments.<\/p>\n

Visiting Las Vegas?<\/b> Find Deals, Compare Rates, and Read Hotel Reviews on TripAdvisor<\/a><\/p>\nShare This <\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

My first trip to Las Vegas was about 15 years ago.\u00a0 Back then, the Vegas strip was a lot less congested and hotel rooms, food, and gambling were cheap.\u00a0 I remember $5 game tables, $10 buffets, and $1.99 early morning steak and egg breakfasts.\u00a0 Weekend packages to Vegas were plentiful and affordable.\u00a0 Gone are those … [Read more…]<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"sfsi_plus_gutenberg_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_show_text_before_share":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_type":"","sfsi_plus_gutenberg_icon_alignemt":"","sfsi_plus_gutenburg_max_per_row":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[88,83,85,84,138,137,80,89,82,91,90,86,136,87,81,139],"class_list":{"0":"entry","1":"post","2":"publish","3":"author-thetravelsista","4":"post-264","6":"format-standard","7":"category-north-america","8":"post_tag-attractions","9":"post_tag-discounts","10":"post_tag-entertainment","11":"post_tag-food","12":"post_tag-free-entry","13":"post_tag-freevegasclubpasses","14":"post_tag-las-vegas","15":"post_tag-nightclubs","16":"post_tag-party","17":"post_tag-party-promoter","18":"post_tag-shows","19":"post_tag-tickets","20":"post_tag-tix4tonight","21":"post_tag-tours","22":"post_tag-vegas","23":"post_tag-vip"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=264"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1636,"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/264\/revisions\/1636"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=264"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=264"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/thetravelsista.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=264"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}