Jan, thanks for the info on the gift certificates - too cool! As for eBay, do a little research and use common sense and you will have an enjoyable experience. Also as stated above, you can make a little extra spending money - I paid for my 1-week trip to San Francisco by selling stuff I wasn't using anymore on eBay!

Jen, I too have done well selling "like new" items around my home and garage that weren't needed. Try to not charge more than actual shipping cost (and the cost of a box if necessary). One of my pet peeves is sellers who try to make a big profit on handling and shipping charges (buyer pays for this). I also buy lots and lots of ebay items. As long as you have a credit card, or can go to the bank and get a cashier's check (some sellers allow personal checks as well with extra time for it to clear) you can go crazy shopping! Signing up for paypal.com is also a very good idea since this takes a couple of days. You'll enjoy it and will be able to find anything you've ever dreamed of in your life! I recently bought sold out tickets to Hairspray in NYC as a gift for my in-laws. They're going to be so jazzed!

Too bad there aren't more gift certificates for restaurants in California.

Jan:
Thanks for the tip! I'm not a big E-Bay fan, but decided to give this a try since I didn't have a lot to lose. Ended up getting 4 certificates at $1.50 to $3 apiece. Tried to pick places that wouldn't be far from where we'll be siteseeing. Here are the 4 I got: Rive Gauche, Frere Jacques, Barolo and Bouterin. Anyone have opinions on these restaurants? Each certificate is worth $25 and there will only be 2 of us, so I'm hoping it will turn out to be a good deal.

I don't see how you can lose! At those prices even if the food was just "ok", or even if you just had sandwiches, you have fed yourself in NYC for $1-$3 a shot!

Sorry, but I would consider that a loss. I travel to enjoy myself and experience wonderful things. If my only goal was to fill up my body with crap for cheap, then it would be a winning situation, but that is not the case. I'd feel cheated that my trip had't given me the opportunity to enjoy some of New York's finest -- much of the very reason to travel. If I only was interested in saving money regardless of what I was getting in return, they I'd much rather stay at home.

Another way to save money is to complain. Complain about the food, they'll comp it, complain about the hotel, they'll comp it, complain about the subways, well, just complain and see what happens.

Complaining doesn't work anymore, sorry. So many people used "whiner's" strategy that now, even when the complaint is completely justified, you are s.out of luck.

Yes, the gift certificates are a pretty good offer. I've tried for restaurants in my area and then some in the area where I'm visiting. You can learn pretty quickly what type of foods they serve. So far, so good, no complaints. And yes, the restaurants are getting more out of it cause most of us will go back again and probably again too!!!

Erin, you'll be just fine! I travel a lot and I do exactly what you did - find the restaurants in the areas we will visit and secure a few gift certificates. None of our meals were "crap" and it saved us some money to see more theater and splurge on a few "destination" restaurants. Plus, before you bid you can do a little on-line research to see reviews, menus, locations etc. I think these are a great way to go.

Good find Erin! You'll be just fine at these restaurants. I've been checking for So.California but not as good of choices as here in NY.

I'm always bummed because there are virtually none of these deals in Southern California. I'd love to find deals like that for the Palm Springs area!

Thanks for your feedback. All the restaurants I chose are listed in Zagat's and have decent reviews, so I'm looking forward to giving this a try. We'll be visiting 5 days so will have a chance to try other popular NYC spots as well. Rose, you're right, I just decided to get theater tickets for one more night. Yes, NYC seems to offer by far the most restaurants and the lowest bid prices for this certificate concept. Hopefully it will expand in other cities.

Great way to impress your date: Take her to a restaurant that neither of you had heard of before and whip out a gift certificate that you bought on Ebay for $3.00.

x ([email protected]): well maybe you would do that, but incase you didn't read the posts here, we are talking about saving money while traveling.

I can't figure out whether this is the strangest thread I've ever read or the funniest.

First, I wanted to thank you all for this information. It came in great for some Christmas gifts! I just wanted to let any newcomers (or maybe not-so-new) to this know that they should never bid more than $12 for a $25 gift certificate. You can get them any time for $12.50 plus $.50 handling fee on restaurant.com. I felt like an idiot when I found this out after "winning" one for $13—plus the $1 fee. It's still a great deal, but why pay more than you have to?

Hi Pearce, don't feel bad - I did the same thing! But, once I got the hang of bidding & buying I "won" some certificates for under $10, and purchased others from restaurant.com. There were some restaurants in my hometown, plus I bought got some for NYC to use on our trip. Not bad!

I only paid $7 on ebay for my $25 certificate...Score!