Universal hotel for 1 night..

[mum2two]

We're going next Easter - 2 weeks in the school holidays. We want to do universal but know it will be packed so I've been looking at 1 night in a universal hotel to get the fastpasses. I've found a semi reasonable price of £263 on ebookers but they want payment now as it's only 1 night.

Before I go for this..
Is this a decent price as it feels extortionate?
Is there anywhere I can reserve the room without paying now as I would prefer to spread the payments as it's a lot to swallow especially as we will be booking flights in the next few weeks.
I'm wavering about whether it's really worth it so is there anyway we can do universal without fastpasses and without being miserable?

[Guest]

Which hotel? We were thinking of going to HRH this year and I believe I secured a room for about £220 per night for two people out of season. So your £263 for four people at Easter seems ok to me. Have you tried booking directly? I had to put down a deposit, which I subsequently lost as we changed our minds, I think it was less than one night though.

As to whether you should do it, absolutely. The FOLP made a huge difference we thought and we were not in school holidays. In fact I think one night is not really enough to do it without feeling very rushed.

[swiper]

I think you pay one night deposit. You might be able to book with travel republic for a £1 deposit... but not sure

[galaxyflorida]

How many people of you are going? Guessing as April is peak season if you were to book express passes separately it would be about $100 per person per day, and with one night in a universal hotel you'd get 2 days out of it, so it is worth it.

[howerd]

How many of you are travelling last time we had 1 night in royal Pacific for 4 adults which was around £260 (plus cash back of about £25-£30). It wasn't in school holiday though.

For us it was worth it, it meant we could get everything done in that time, with no stress. It did feel a lot of money though (on top of what we'd already paid).

It is certainly value when you look at the cost of an express pass and the early entry worked well for us.

[OrlandoLes]

Good price I reckon as we paid £254 for 1 night Easter Sunday 2015 (2A, 2C) & that was when exchange rate was 1.5ish?
Just be aware that at busy times they can shut the Express lines as this happened to us about 3pm on our second day trying to go on the Minions ride - not too much of an issue as we had more than got our monies worth over the 2 days.
RPR is our favourite as we stayed at HRH last year as well although that is a completely different debate
(PS: as a measure we did get HRH for £180 with BA.com but that was for late August last year)
Cheers, Les

[peagusus66]

go through quidco to for 11% cashback atm on ebookers ... i paid just over 300 for june this year, but am getting 40 odd back cashback

[mum2two]

Thanks everyone! There are 4 of us so hotel is definitely the cheapest option. Think I'll go ahead and book - just saw ba have got it slightly cheaper so I'll go with them.