Budget Beater: Play Early Or Play Late To Save More

Image: Approaching the 15th green at Riverbend Golf Course in Kent, WA.

Prime time golf rates are downright scary. When you think about that $40 round being a value, it gets a bit crazy. Of course, this is where you can use a bit of online time to save yourself a ton, and even more if you make you golfing hours a bit more flexible. For example, looking at some of the nicer courses that are available for public play in western Washington, by teeing off earlier or later, you can save yourself quite a bit of money. Willows Run Golf Course in Redmond, WA, has two courses available. The longer, and more challenging, Eagle’s Talon course features a weekend prime time rate of $60 for 18 holes. By changing up your round to an afternoon round and teeing off at 3:00, your rate drops to $36. That’s a 40% savings.

Other courses won’t have quite the discount that Willows offers, but even smaller courses like Snohomish Golf Course in Snohomish, WA, offers a $7 after 3:00 on the weekends. That’s still almost 20% off the regular rate of $38 for 18 holes. Some courses even feature early bird tee times, like Riverbend Golf Course in Kent, WA. If you tee off during prime time hours (7:00 AM to 11:59 AM) on the weekend, you’ll shell out $42 for 18 holes. The pre-7:00 AM rate is just $32. That’s almost 25% off the standard “prime time” pricing.

If you are a weekend warrior that makes it out once or twice a month, you could save $288 a year on 12 rounds a Willows Run by teeing off after 3 or about $100 playing afternoons at Snohomish. You could even save $120 by teeing off before 7:00 at Riverbend. That goes a long way to cutting that golf budget back to a manageable amount. Plus, if you go that early, you are back home before noon for a nice relaxing afternoon or if you go late, you can get some chores done before you head out for a relaxing evening round.