It’s Vegas Baby!

The following is a guest post from W at Off-Road Finance that I was excited to receive since he had left so many good tips on Ellen’s post, Vegas on a Budget. Thank you for the inside perspective, W!

Long before I achieved blogsphere celebrity (yeah, right) teaching people how to trade over at Off-Road Finance, I was a semi-pro gambler.  When most people walk into a casino and see a never-ending party fueled by poor financial decisions.  I see an office where I can make money off other people’s poor financial decisions.  And I used to spend a lot of time at the office, especially the Vegas casinos.  I still vacation there a couple of times a year.  There’s something really vital and alive about Las Vegas – I’ve heard it describes as the quintessential American city, both good and bad, and there’s some truth to that.

Crystal asked me to do a guest post on Las Vegas tips.  There are a lot of things you can do to make your Vegas vacation much better and cheaper than it otherwise would be.  Here are some of my favorites collected over my years in Sin City.

Accommodations

There’s three parts to getting good, cheap accommodations in Vegas: where, when and how.

Where

Las Vegas has more hotel rooms than anywhere else on earth.  The quality of the rooms and service varies radically.  Since reviewing every hotel is out of the question, here’s a list of the major ones split up by price point.  Hotels in green, I would go out of my way to patronize at a given price point.  Hotels in red, I would go out of my way to avoid.  Black means I have no opinion or no information.

• Low roller: Stratosphere, Riviera, Circus Circus, Imperial Palace, Bill’s Gambling Hall, Bally’s (South tower), Hooters, Luxor, Excaliber, Tropicana, Monte Carlo, Flamingo,  everything downtown except the Golden Nugget.
• Mid roller: The Venitian(suites), Treasure Island, The Mirage, The Rio (suites), The Palms, Bally’s (North tower), MGM Grand, Planet Hollywood, Mandalay Bay/THEhotel, Paris, Golden Nugget
• High Roller: Wynn/Encore, Caesars Palace, Bellagio, Vdara, Mandarin Oriental, Cosmopolitan, MGM Grand Signature (condo/suite), Aria, Pallazo

When

Hotel prices vary radically by the day.  A random Tuesday night could easily be 1/10th the price of  a major boxing or MMA fight night.  Luckily the hotels are very transparent about this – their websites all have pricing calendars.  Fridays and Saturdays are more expensive than the rest of the week (often 2x), so if you’re flexible you can save a lot.  Airfare is also cheaper if you avoid flying in Friday or out Sunday.

How

There’s two things you can do beyond just finding a good hotel price online to cut down your costs or get a better room:

• Sign up for MGM-Mirage Spam: the MGM-Mirage corporation, which owns about 1/3 of the casinos in Vegas, has a mailing list where they spam out hotel offers – usually about 20% off cheap-night rates.  You can sign up here and then just filter it all to a separate folder in your email or even a totally separate gmail account.  When you want to go to Vegas, take a peak and see what deals the spam fairy has brought you.
• The check-in tip:  the checkin staff at most hotels is very amenable to tips/bribes if they have unused high end rooms. You can find out what hasn’t been sold ahead of time via any hotel website. But just buy the cheapest possible room online and head to checkin. Here’s how you do it: at checkin when they ask for your CC and driver’s license, give them a card-folded-money-card ‘sandwich’. Then ask: “Do you have any complimentary upgrades available? Perhaps a <room type you want> ?”.I usually do $40 at a mid roller joint if I want a suite, and $100 at a high roller joint.  I’ve never failed to get at least some kind of upgrade.  The Wynn and Bally’s seem to be the best for this trick – you can get a Bally’s south tower room for dirt cheap online and turn it into a north tower suite pretty consistently.

Transportation

Transportation in Vegas can be a pain – it’s crowded, and there’s no good universal public transportation.  Here are some options with upsides and downsides.

• Cabs: Vegas cabs are expensive (especially from the airport to hotel – see long hauling below).  But they do serve a purpose and can become economical when you have 4-5 people and take a van-cab.  BTW, don’t drink and drive.
• Shuttle Buses:  there are airport to hotel shuttle busses, but check their route before you pay.  If your hotel is first on the list, it’s just like taking a taxi for half price.  If it’s last, you’ll spend an hour being driven around the back side of strip hotels.  Some of the casinos also have shuttles to other casinos owned by the same company.
• Limos/car service:  pricey.  Again more economical if you have lots of people.
• The monorail: the Las Vegas monorail covers the east side of the strip.  If your hotel and the majority of your destinations are on that side, it can be a good play.  But if you’re staying going to places on the west side it’s a long walk from the monorail to your destination.
• The “Deuce”:  This is the bus that runs up and down the strip.  It’s cheap, but it’s never there when you want it.
• Rental car: People talk about avoiding rental cars to save money, but the rest of Vegas transportation is so lame that I frequently find it’s better to just get a car.  It can easily  be cheaper than patching together transportation out of taxis and shuttles.  One thing Vegas DOES have: parking.  Most of the strip hotels have the patented Steve Wynn one-ramp parking structure which is a marvel to behold compared to a typical parking garage.  Unless it’s super busy I’ve never had had trouble with parking.  Generally speaking rental cars are much cheaper through places like hotels.com than they are from the rental agency directly.
• Walking: I walk a lot in Vegas, and it’s fun just because the sights are so outlandish and there’s no open container law (ie. you can drink and walk).  Just be aware that it’s a long ways up and down the strip – one block there is like 5 blocks anywhere else.  One caveat: if you take kids to Vegas (bad idea), they’ll be exposed to a lot of near-porn on billboards and from pamphleteers walking up and down the strip.

Food

There’s tons of eateries in Vegas, but a lot of them have the same problem: they’re Vegas priced.  It’s all to easy to screw up and end up paying $9.75 for a sandwich (and not a good one).  If you’re OK with that, just use Urban Spoon and pray.  But if you want to eat decent food for prices like you’re used to, try these joints:

• Ellis Island Cafe: slightly upgraded diner food at loss leader prices one block off the strip inside the Ellis Island casino.  They’re very busy at dinner time, but not so bad at breakfast.  A good place to grab a bite and plan the day’s campaign.
• Bally’s Sandwich shop: decent subs at non-Vegas prices.  Some sandwiches are huge and could serve as a meal for two.
• Sportsbook Food Counter @ MGM Grand: the lox bagel here is my personal Vegas morning ritual if I’m staying at the MGM.  Also has things like hotdogs at real world prices.
• Nine Fine Irishmen @ New York New York: tasty Irish food at reasonable prices in a fun setting – arguably the only reason to go in the otherwise ‘meh’ New York New York.
• Snacks @ Bellagio: Vegas priced bar food – what’s to love?  Well, a red chip tip will get the poker room brush to give you a $10 comp here.  Which turns overpriced into McDonald’s priced.  A good move if your’re playing poker  at Bellagio.
• Shibuya @ MGM Grand: Sushi’s expensive everywhere, but it’s no more expensive here than it normally is outside of Vegas.  And I like the ambiance.  Try the dragon roll.
• Brand @ Monte Carlo: A mid roller steak joint with some cool side dishes.  If you want Wagyu beef from cows that have been fed a diet of specially blessed beer, go pay $300 at Prime.  If you want a steak a little better than most people can cook at home with sides and drinks for less than $50/person, this works.

Entertainment

• Shows: Vegas has a ton of shows for various tastes – magic, music, acrobatics/circus, comedy, adult.  Tickets are somewhat pricey, but you can often get 1/2 price show tickets after noon on the day of the show through a firm called Tix4Tonight that has booths all over the place.  Availability varies.  On the flip side, if there’s one show you really must see, plan your vacation around what nights it’s open (all shows are dark some nights of the week) and buy your tickets ahead of time by calling the casino box office.  You’ll pay full price, but you won’t miss out either.
• Animals: The MGM Grand has lions.  The Mirage has white tigers, panthers and dolphins.  Mandalay Bay has sharks.  The MGM lions are free and very cool if you catch them when they’re active.  The other two cost money, but it could be well spent if you like that sort of thing.
• Free/Cheep Music Venues: In addition to national acts, Vegas is home to a lot of the best musicians you’ve never heard of.  They play covers and originals gigs at numerous small venues up and down the strip.  For the price of a beer you can hear some seriously talented folks do their thing.
• Natural & Man-Made Wonders: both red rocks canyon and Hoover dam are well worth seeing.  Despite numerous firms offering tours, I would not go to the Grand Canyon from Vegas – it’s cool, but takes a long time and is better as a separate trip or leg of your trip.

Best Bets

• Drinking the good stuff for free: find the sports/race book at any high roller joint, grab a racing form and a pencil, and sit down and make little cryptic notations on the racing form.  Pretty soon a cocktail waitress will offer you a drink, which frequently includes high end liquors.  Just ask what they’ve got in a given category – you may be amazed.  The giant TVs in the sportsbook will usually have sports (or SportsCenter) on, so you can relax, drink and watch the game for free.  Tip your waitress $2 in white chips on the first drink ($1 is standard), and you’ll get a stream of refills.
• Most useful accessory: 4G smartphone.  Vegas is a big place with lots of options.  Between map/navigation features, Urban Spoon and the ability to check show times/availability online, a smartphone will go a long ways to improving your visit.
• Low roller table games: $5 Craps at O’Shays.  Just go, find a really busy table, and bet “pass” – you’ll easily be able to consume more in free drinks than your expected gambling losses.  Craps etiquette: avoid betting “don’t pass” – you’re betting the other people at the table will lose money, and that can make people cranky.  You don’t want to spend your vacation with cranky drunk people, do you?
• High roller table games: Wynn/Encore.  If you want to get your James Bond on, this is the place.  They have notoriously hot waitresses too for the record.
• Poker room: Bellagio.  Nearly all the casinos have poker rooms, but Bellagio’s is the busiest and offers games with buyins ranging from $100 to $10,000 or so.  The room has action 24/7/365.
• Strip club: not really my thing, but the consensus favors the Spearmint Rhino

Avoid These Rookie Mistakes

• Getting “long hauled” by an airport cab.  When taking a cab from the airport to any strip hotel, ask your driver to take Paradise instead of the tunnel/highway.  You’ll save about $15 and get there faster too.
• Eating a fried Twinkie at Slots-o-Fun.  Enough said.
• Getting pick-pocketed while staring up at the “Freemont Street Experience“.  While you’re ogling the giant TV, professional pickpockets are coveting your wallet.  Take appropriate precautions.
• Getting run over by a taxi: the taxi drivers drive like idiots.  The pedestrians are drunk and completely disregard traffic signals.  So people get hit a lot.  Don’t be one of them.
• Staying at the El Cortez because it’s the cheapest room in town.  Gross is the only way to describe the place.
• Getting arrested for soliciting prostitution.  You may have heard prostitution is legal in Nevada, and it is.  But it’s illegal in Clark County, which contains all of the city of Las Vegas.  That pretty young thing at the Bellagio Baccarat bar may just be a LVPD vice officer.
• Playing the slots.  I don’t care if you want to lose money at the slots.  That’s a personal problem… But look at the slot players.  Are they having fun?  Nope.  They all look about like this guy: In other words, just passing time.  When you play the slots, odds you look (and feel) just like that too.  This is because slot machines work based on a psychological effect called partial reinforcement that keeps your attention without bothering to entertain you.  Facebook games frequently use the same psychology incidentally.  Make a no-slots pact at the start of your trip (substitute $5 craps above if you want some low stakes gambling), and you’ll have much more fun.

Vegas is one of the most bizarre and wonderful places on earth.  These tips should help you play your cards right and have a great time!

Crystal’s Comments:  This was an amazing post to read, especially since we are going back to Vegas this summer.  The only two things I disagree with in the whole post:

1)  If you want a super cheap hotel room that you don’t plan to be in much, the hotels on Fremont Street are fine.  We’ve stayed in the Four Queens and the Golden Nugget – the rooms were equivalentally “meh” but the Four Queens one was $19 for the night we were there and the Golden Nugget was $69…
2)  The fried oreos at Slots-of-Fun are delicious.  Period. 

And my tip for cheap bets would be the $5 Pai Gow at Fitzgerald’s all day (at least during the week) and the $3 Craps at Binion’s during the week days.  I completely agree that you need to keep your hands on your wallet when watching any of the sites…

What an interesting inside take – thanks!  Anybody else have some more tips to add?

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