COVID-19 has been hitting extremely hard, and my boyfriend and I had to cancel many, many plans the past 1 week. It was quite a downer because we really looked forward to these trips, and many were already paid for.

To make up for the lost trips and cancelled plans, my boyfriend decided to book a spontaneous staycation for the both of us. We had been eyeing a particular hotel at Resorts World Sentosa for awhile now, and immediately jumped on the opportunity to book it. Originally costing over $1000/night, we managed to book the deluxe sea-view room at $700 for 2 nights! (Will definitely update on the staycay in the next few weeks!)

After doing so much research and trying to find ways to get a better deal for luxurious hotel rooms, I found out 8 hacks that can save you a lot money if you're intending to book a staycation, and want to get them at the cheapest price possible!

1. Book a mystery luxurious hotel room from $100/night with Hotwire

My boyfriend was scrolling through YouTube when he came across this YouTuber talking about Hotwire, a booking website that sells off unsold travel inventory at discounted prices. There are two main "deals" that Hotwire offers - their "opaque inventory" which is unsold flights, hotels and rental cars at discounted prices, as well as their "Hot Rates" where you're offered a few luxurious hotels but are unable to know which hotels these actually are until payment is made.

However, there are some blogs who claim that it is possible to find out the identity of these hotels before booking them! Check out this review here.

2. "Room assigned on arrival" option

This is similar to the first hack, but instead of not being able to choose the hotel, this time you're not able to choose the room that you stay in. This is a great option if you already have a favourite hotel, but don't really care which room you get.

The "Room assigned on arrival" options are available on many booking sites, but I mainly use Agoda. To find out which hotels have this option, you can do a quick Google search.

It really depends on your luck though, you could be paying $156/night for a standard room or a fabulous suite with a private jacuzzi and balcony, but even if you don't hit the jackpot you're still guaranteed a pretty decent room.

3. Go directly to Google to compare booking site prices

Instead of looking at hotel prices one by one through individual booking websites, just type the name of the hotel you want to stay at or "Hotels Singapore" and Google will show you the availability of hotels and the lowest price offered at each respective booking website.

Here, you can see the lowest prices for Orchard Rendezvous Hotel across the different booking websites such as Agoda, Booking.com, TripAdvisor, Trivago, and many more.

You and even click on the "Reviews" tab and look through the hotel reviews from the different booking websites.

4. Use a VPN when checking hotel prices (THIS IS LEGAL!)

You know how Grab prices always surge like crazy when multiple people are booking from the same place? It's the same when you're searching for hotel prices.

Similar to Grab, hotels offer different prices depending on where you're located. A VPN (virtual private network) helps to change your location by hiding your IP address. For more information about VPNs and how they work, check out this link!

Here is a comparison between the searches I made from Singapore and France (using a VPN) for a room at Marina Bay Sands. In this case, the prices searched from Singapore are cheaper. Sometimes, countries want to cater to locals first, so it may be more expensive if you're searching from a foreign country.

Sometimes, the prices are lower if you search from lower-income countries. However, I don't have a premium VPN subscription so I'm limited to VPN networks from the U.S. and France. Regardless, this still proves that hotel prices differ according to location!

Alternatively, you can try clearing your search history as well.

5. Watch out for cheaper booking days

According to research done by booking site Kayak, hotel prices tend to peak from Mondays to Wednesdays, and drop towards the weekend. Rooms are also cheaper on Fridays and Saturdays. However, Sunday nights are usually cheaper than Fridays, so it's more worth it to book a stay from Saturday night-Monday, instead of Friday night-Sunday.

6. Book last minute

This doesn't apply for all hotels, but some offer major discounts for last minute check-ins. In the picture below, you can see that a normal night at The Fullerton Hotel costs $460. But if I book a room for tonight, it's only $230!

7. Take advantage of non-travel but saving apps such as FavePay and ShopBack

I remember thinking I got a super good deal when booking a room through Agoda, only to find out that there was a much cheaper offer on FavePay! Apps like FavePay and ShopBack aren't exactly travel or hotel websites, but they do help you save quite a bit.

FavePay does have occasional travel and hotel deals, though the choices are limited. A lot of these deals are also inclusive of transport fees (e.g ferry tickets) if you're traveling to places like Bintan or Batam. ShopBack's offers are less straightforward and come in the form of cashback. Still, that's better than nothing!

8. Whip out your credit cards and use those exclusive credit card deals!

Some credit cards offer special hotel discounts too! For example, The Citi Prestige Card offers a free fourth night when you book a hotel for 3 days through the Citi concierge. HSBC also offers amazing discounts at hotels such as The Fullerton Hotel, Sofitel Singapore, and Swissotel.

9. Stay at 5 different concept hotels for 5 different days!

Instead of staying at the same luxury hotel for 5 days, why not take this chance to stay at 5 different hotels that are cheaper, or more unique? If you're adventurous enough, here are some cool hotels to check out with the total prices adding up to 1 night at a luxury hotel!

1-night price

W Hotel Sentosa: ~$360-$4,860

5-nights price
The Pod: ~$52-$100

Hotel 1887: ~$140-$220

S Inn Chinatown: ~38.25-$210.56

XY Hotel Bugis: ~$180-$310

Hotel G: $78-$180

With some practice and research, it's very easy to save money when booking a hotel room in Singapore. With these hacks, I'm sure that I'll still be having eventful weekends with bae without having to going overseas!

Love this post? Feel free to share and comment below or check out my staycation at Le Apple Boutique KLCC Hotel here.