I'm traveling from Den Helder to Bruges and am wondering if I should or should not pre-buy my ticket. The ticket costs around $100 if I buy off of rail-europe. Any thoughts on this?

Checking your trip on NS HiSpeed website (Netherland Railway), a full price (refundable, changable) 2nd class ticket is only €47,60 one-way. With the current exchange rate, that comes out to around $70. Does the RailEurope price you quote include the mailing fee (which I believe is $18)?

I've never bought train tickets online from NS HiSpeed, but it looks like there's an option to print your ticket at home.

I'm sure the Netherlands experts can chime in on buying tickets online.

There is no reason IMO to buy such a ticket in advance - will cost more and these trains run about twice an hour to Antwerp where you change to hourly trains to Bruges

Reservations are not required nor needed IME but you can make them when buying your ticket if you like.

If wanting to buy the ticket before leaving and reservations, etc. then instead of RE with its $18 mailing fee i always advice using www.budgeteuropetravel.com as their mailing fee is $5 i believe for such an order and they also give personal attention. But if it were i, i would just go into Den Helder and buy the tickets to use on any train - you no doubt will have to change at Amsterdam Sloterdijk and Antwerp - easy changes from one platform to another. Expect it to take about 5-6 hours, including changes. If you were returning to Den Helder then i would look at the Benenlux railpass - but if that is your only Benelux rail travel then just do the point to point ticket. www.ns.nl for fares and schedules. Dutch trains can be quite crowded in second class at rush hours so first class may be worth the extra price to always have empty seats IME

There are no seat reservations on these trains or on any trains running within the Netherlands and Belgium (except for Thalys and some other international trains).

Yes the IC international trains Amsterdam/Sloterdijk to Antwerp were the ones i meant you can make reservations on TMK - not the Den Helder-Sloterdijk train or Antwerp-Bruges i think. and IC trains can be quite crowded in 2nd class IME

There are no seat reservations on the intercity trains from Amsterdam to Belgium. The only trains on this route with seat reservations are Thalys.

Geoff - a few years back there were indeed reservations - is this a new policy? I've learned not to doubt you and thanks for the correction.

I found the website Budget Travel much higher than I was quoted by AAA. Wonder why?

I've no idea about Budget Travel or AAA. The only place to buy tickets like this is from the Dutch railways: there is no need to buy from any agency.
The intercity trains from Amsterdam to Brussels are like any other intercity trains in the Netherlands or Belgium: they're faster than the stopping trains, but there are no seat reservations.

The discrepancy could be due to several factors - i'm sure prices are universal or within a few bucks of each other depending on who updates their sites the most (prices, pegged to the euro go up and down constantly - daily at times)

But it could be that OP is looking at a Saverpass on one site and a single pass on the other - thus there would be a discrepancy

or a youthpass price or a senior pass price

saverpass prices are at times given per saverpass on some sites and per person on others

but until jbartley explains further i or we do not know

Thanks for the posts on this. Due to me leaving in such a short timeframe I think that I'm just going to plan to buy while I'm there. We're staying with a friend who lives there so she should be able to advise me further on what to do. I appreciate your time!

You can have your friend do it in Holland all online i believe and i think get a tiny discount for doing so.

Again there will be NO problems just buying this ticket at the station, even just before the train.

mhyde has not responded to exactly what the conflicting pass prices were and i suspect it was a misunderstanding as i proposed above

but she says AAA was lower and my AAA charges a $35 handling per pass order - so should indeed, if all AAAs do this, be actually higher than nearly any other agent i know.

???