DEAL: Costco Travel Is Having A Pretty Solid Travel Sale-Including A Big Discount For Hawaii

I’m a pretty big Costco fan, but I’ve only used their travel division to book a few cruises over the years.  Still, I’ve heard good things about the deals.  An e-mail popped up this morning about some travel deals Costco had.  I’ve got a million things going on but I was in the mood for a bit of research, so I took a few minutes out of my morning to dig into one of these deals.  Since I’ve still never been to Hawaii and I love a good Ritz-Carlton, I chose the Ritz-Carlton Kapalua deal currently being featured.  For those following along, you can find these travel deals on the Costco Travel site.  There are only 6 days worth of deals and today is the second day.

Half-Priced Suites at Ritz-Carlton, Kapalua

Keep in mind that Hawaii isn’t cheap, nor are most Ritz-Carlton hotels.  The Costco deal is for roughly $1800-$1900 per person, based on double occupancy for many dates between now and the end of August, 2021.  The deal comes with:

• $750 resort credit per room, per stay
• $150 resort credit per additional day (if you book more than 5 days)
• Daily breakfast for two
• Waived resort fees
• $100 Aloha VIP Tours credit
• Five-day Avis full-size car rental

When I first read this, I though the $150 resort fee credit per day was on top of the $750.  But, I don’t think that’s the case.  Still, $150 per day when breakfast is already included is a pretty solid deal, and better than what Marriott offers on their own website ($500 credit versus $750 and no free breakfast).

This is also for an ocean-view 2 room suite, 900 square feet.  Essentially, the Costco Travel rate is getting you the suite upgrade for free along with more resort credit, waived resort fees, free breakfast and a rental car.  Oh, and you’ll spend abut $2,000 less than that regular room price.

When I priced the same packages on the Marriott website, this class of suite was consistently over $10,000 for a 5-night stay.  Even a standard room came up in the $5,600-$6,500 range.  The Costco package prices out at roughly $3,700 for two people in a suite.

There are other deals coming up as part of this sale.  I haven’t dug into any of them but you can see an overview on the future deals as well as details on the first two days worth of deals.

The Final Two Pennies

If you’re looking for a review of the property, a friend of mine stayed there a couple of year ago.  There are other ways to get discounts at properties like this, such as through the AMEX Fine Hotels & Resorts program. I haven’t checked all the various sources. This just struck me as a good deal that I wanted to pass on.  You can obviously use Marriott Bonvoy points for stays at the property, but I mostly found ridiculous co-pays and options that cost lots of points.

Before I get back to the craziness of my day, there are a few other key points to consider.  First, airfare isn’t included.  I would expect airfare to be pretty cheap over the next 6 months.  There’s obvious COVID-19 issues, whether you feel safe traveling or not.  And, there are potential testing/quarantine issues to get to Hawaii.  The Costco package has the same cancellation policy as booking through Marriott, which is essentially a 21-day cancellation policy.  So, there’s some risk you may not be able to go if you book this.  For all those reasons, and the uncertainty of vaccines at the moment, I’m a pass for now.  But, it does seem like a pretty solid deal.

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