Haven't booked your Thanksgiving flight? Better do it now

Haven’t booked your flight home for Thanksgiving yet? Every day you delay will cost you money. 

Chief data scientist Patrick Surry of airfare prediction app Hopper said domestic round-trip tickets around the Thanksgiving holiday weekend are averaging $312, 46 percent more than the typical $214 fare. And tickets are only getting more expensive, rising approximately $4 a day, which will rise to $6 a day in the last 10 days before Thanksgiving.

“What we tend to see is prices start off pretty high anyway, and they rise pretty gradually until three weeks ahead of Thanksgiving,” he said. “Now is the last chance to get reasonably priced Thanksgiving flights.”

The good news? Prices are down from last year by roughly 8 percent. Surry offered some tips for people who still want a good deal:

Be flexible about your dates. Even for a holiday weekend, you can save if you have a little wiggle room for timing. “The cheapest day to travel is Thanksgiving itself, because it’s not very popular,” Surry said. “Traveling on the Monday of Thanksgiving week and coming back on Black Friday -- those are cheaper options.”

Go big city over small town if you can. Unlike the rest of the year, flights to smaller cities are more expensive than those to big ones. “An interesting thing about Thanksgiving is it’s kind of a reverse commute -- a lot of people are leaving big cities and going back to smaller places,” he explained. “So if you have the opportunity to choose, you might think of doing it in a big city and take a break in New York, Chicago or San Francisco. You’ll often get a cheaper flight because fewer people are trying to fly that direction.”

Book your December holiday flights now. Oops -- Surry recommended booking that December flight by Halloween. “We say people should book Christmas before they book Thanksgiving,” he said. “What we find is prices tend to drift upmore steadily.”

But if you’re a procrastinator and don’t have a rigid schedule, there may be a silver lining.

“There are a lot of sales that start Cyber Monday, the week after Thanksgiving,” Surry said. “So if you’re willing to take chances on when and where you’re going, you can often score a great deal.” You can also use apps like Hopper for advice on if you should buy today or hold.