I can't find the answers to these questions anywhere, so here goes.
Is it true that last year, all of the hotel rooms available through the Fanime housing website were booked in less than an hour? If that's true, then geez... How long has this been the case, all of the rooms booked so quickly?
Do they let you know in advance when housing will be available? I'd really rather not be left without a room this year...
I know that the Hilton and Marriott were booked up within five minutes. I think most of the other hotels (all the ones within a block of the convention center) were booked up within about three hours.
Yes, they let you know in advance. Sort of. Just keep checking these forums about once a week. I've found it's the best way to get info. Better than Facebook and Twitter, anyway. And the main website tends to be the least reliable since I guess it's the most difficult to update?
I doubt it's going to go up before the end of the year, simply because no one will be working on it during the holidays. So it'll probably go up some time in January. Maaaaaybe February? But hopefully January.
Thank you for the information! It's very helpful, even if the hotel situation looks pretty bleak. :P
I check the forums and main website at least once a day, so if there'll be advance notice at either of those places, I'll definitely see it. (I also have been checking Facebook and Twitter occasionally lately, but I know those are rarely updated.)
[EDIT: Also, thank you to the two three of you who answered below as well. ^_^]
Unfortunately yes it is true. And like kookiekwee said they at lest gave us a 4 day heads up.
Seem like the last 2 years it hads been a headache trying to book rooms with Fanime's discount rate.
Maybe next year Fanime would get a bigger hotel block. Seemed like there where lots of rooms available that was not in the Fanime group rate. But oh wells lest see how it goes this year.
Check the forums/Facebook/twitter sites for current updates.
As a footnote: they need to check their prices and links before going live (huge issue last year)
No doubt there were issues last year with booking mess ups. But hopefully things go smoother this year. Since booking is always a headache with thousands of people wanting a room, I always have two backup hotels in mind when housing goes live so if my first choice is gone, I'm not scrambling to decide which other one I'd want to stay at.
And if your staying with a group and are the one booking the room(I always am......) I check with everyone as soon as I know the date rooms will be available just to make sure everyone's on the same page with budgets and requests. I'm just overly cautious I think........