I'm not suggesting to book a handicapped hotel room. But there seems to be empirical evidence it can lower the cost of regular rooms.
Boarding Area blogger Summer Hull-under her pseudonym Mommy Points-recently made an interesting observation when she couldn't find award space at the Hyatt Regency Lost Pines Resort and Spa in Cedar Creek, Tx. for a room. But she did find a handicapped room for a good price. And before you freak, that's not what I'm advocating at all.
In addition to all the, uh, controversial comments that came out for the obvious reasons, commenter Nick observed this gem:
Tick the ADA box and award availability shows up at much lower rates. Regular room rates can drop as well.
This makes sorta makes sense. If a bunch of factors can alter flight price algorithms, why not hotel algorithms? While we weren't able to lower to replicate the tip, it doesn't mean it's not possible that it might work elsewhere.
Regarding actually booking the handicapped rooms, a few other people noted that they had used Hull's trick before but often had wrote a note to reservations to get changed to a normal room if possible (most of the time, the switch seemed to be granted). Hull noted that this was the strategy that she used.
Now, we don't need an ADA room and honestly don't prefer an ADA room but I vastly prefer it over no room at all. I did include in the comments section of the booking that we don't need the ADA room if they want to give it to someone who does need that room type but when certain Hyatt properties are going to get creative with how award rooms are displayed, sometimes you gotta take what you can get. To be clear, I don't love taking that room type when someone else might truly need it and will continue to follow-up with the hotel to try to switch us to a truly standard room if one becomes available.
Still, I've got a lot of personal issues before jumping on something like that - but if it lowers the price of regular rooms which I can book fairly, then no problem.
