tl;dr – Marketplace websites that sell non-refundable hotel and flight reservations to other travelers. Legit?
Recently, I’ve seen a few advertisements for a website that allows travelers to sell their prepaid/pre-booked vacations to others if they can no longer go on the trip. The concept here isn’t new – a few of these marketplace sites have been around for a bit – but I’ve never really paid too much attention to them, nor bothered investigating their models. I don’t think I even know anyone who successfully purchased and completed a reservation using these sites. At any rate, I figured it was worthwhile to take a quick look at how these sites work.
There are really three main sites in the space: SpareFare, Roomer, and TransferTravel. Each seems to have its niche, but the core proposition is the same – someone has a reservation they want to offload, so they post it to the marketplace for a would-be buyer to bid on.
Generally, the mechanics work as follows: the buyer and seller agree on a price, and the transfer is made. The buyer sends in funds to the marketplace site, and at that point, the swapping of names on the actual reservation occurs. After the travel is completed, the website pays out the money to the seller, save for a cut the marketplace site keeps as a platform fee.
SpareFare’s site has a graphic that lays it all out:
As far as how the site’s offerings differ: Roomer only allows hotel reservations, TransferTravel seems to offer accommodations, flights, vacation packages, cruises, and ‘land travel’. SpareFare offers flights, hotels, holiday packages, and vouchers.
My Take
I love a deal, but I also really value flexibility when it comes to travel, particularly when it comes to my reservations – I’m the type of person who rarely reserves a pre-booked/non-refundable rate unless it’s imminent and I know I’m going. Thus, I’m very unlikely to want to take on someone else’s nonrefundable reservation. That said, perhaps the use case for these sites is just that – last-minute reservations.
That said, I’ve tried several searches on all of these sites, and inventory (predictably) is all over the place. Unlike say an eBay or a Craigslist or any other marketplace for primarily physical goods, timing is everything for these sites, so if you can’t find an itinerary of interests near your dates, you’re simply not a buyer. More than anything, it feels like these sites lack scale and are badly in need of a tipping point moment.
If you’ve used sites like these in the past, I’d love to hear about it in the comments!
