How do people afford nat'l championship tix?

am i missing something here? i quickly look around today for tickets to pasadena and the cheapest endzone nosebleed tickets i can find are going for $740. and remember these are pretty horrible seats. anything even close to what you would call a good seat are around 1800.

not to toot my own horn, but i do pretty well financially. but there's no way in hell i'm going to pay nearly 4k for tickets for me and the wife to see this game. the rose bowl seats nearly 100k people so does that mean nearly all these people will pay these insane prices?

i mean how do people do it?

 

Longhorn Foundation.

 

I paid 1200.00 for my ticket for the 2005 NC and it was worth every penny!!!

 

If you arent super rich it is about getting lucky. I was fortunate enough in 05 to have my father know someone who coached JC ball in California. He was good friends with my dad and contacted SC about getting two tickets for face value for him through their Athletic department. Since SC recruited JC players from his college they were happy to oblige so I got two seats for face (which that year was 175 I think). But for that set of circumstances no way I get to go as scalpers were asking for 1200-1500 and that was for the cheap seats. I met a good friend in the parking lot before the game he had 800 bucks in his pocket to get a scalped ticket and later told me he watched the game in the lot with several hundred other Texas fans who couldnt get in because they were priced out of the market.

Your best option if you dont luck into seats is fellow Horn fans who may have extra seats and arent looking to cash in though that usually means close friends.

I expect if Texas does make it that you will see 50,000 plus Texas fans in Pasadena.

 

last time we had a hell of a game-watching party on the golf course. If you cannot afford a ticket, I highly recommend doing that.

 

I thought my corner end zone seats weren't going to be that great in 2005. Then Vince scored the game winner in that corner.
Just get in the stadium.

 

Anyone know what the LHF cutoff was in '05? Any guesses on this year?

 

If you got to go to the coming out party for Vince Young against Michigan in the January 1, 2005 Rose Bowl....THAT was the best ticket prices for the game you go to see that night! Nobody had a clue...

 

No doubt. I had 2 extras for that game (bought via Michigan b/c I didn't think I could get via LHF) and sold them for $20 bucks outside the Rose Bowl 30 minutes before kickoff. A year later, $2000 doesn't get you in... I lucked out in '05, and I'm hoping my LHF donation level is high enough to secure 4 tickets, 2 for me and 2 for a lucky friend who gets 2 at face value.

Disclaimer - still 1 game at a time (but I plan ahead)

 

LuckyDog, you looking for any new friends?

...and I know what you mean about Michigan 2005...I had an extra for that game and about an hour before the game a kid selling programs "jokingly" offered me a free program in exchange for a ticket. I laughed it off at the time only to realize an hour later that was the best deal I could have found. I think I ended up selling that extra for a whopping $5.

 

I paid $800 for end zone nose bleed seats for '06 Rose Bowl and it was the end opposite Vince's heroics.
A post on here after the game related one's story of offering $1,000 outside the stadium and being ignored.
Another post told of jumping the fence. Is your wife athletic?
Then there's the 'ol $100 handshake.

 

I got into both Rose Bowls- first one via Michigan, second one was tough. All the scalpers wanted 2,200 minimum- so while leaving to give up we found one, last ditch way for $400 each which worked for apparently an estimated 2,000 other Longhorn fans according to an article I read. At the risk of exposing it further I'm keeping it hush on the msg board.

In short- the second chance tickets are all $2,000. The first chance tix are $200. FInd a way to get the first chance tickets or just instead plan a nice tv watching party instead. Do not rely on luck- that'll leave you on the golf course or at a low grade bar in Pasadena.

 

It is all about luck. I was looking on Craigslist and a post came up for two tickets for (I think) $1,400 for the pair. I replied instantly and in ten minutes the guy and I were on the phone. He was a grad student who had some how ended up with 4 tickets. I had to come to Austin that week on business and we met in front of Littlefield Fountain. My Mom baked him a loaf of bread as well. We were a section over from the band and about 10 rows up for the band.

And I had the same experience at the Michigan game as everyone else. When we were walking past the Rose Bowl House there was a guy with probably 200 tickets. It was like "dude, just face it, you got $4,000 worth of book marks". Good times......

 

Does anyone remember the donation cutoff for the 2006 Rose Bowl (Nat'l Champ game)? I'm scared shitless I won't be able to get into this one. My father died suddenly in the early morning hours of December 30th (the morning him and I were scheduled to fly out together for that game). I can't miss this one, and he wouldn't want me to.

 

I believe the donation cutoff for the 2006 Rose Bowl was something like $600 to $800 or in that neighborhood...

 

My friends and I needed four seats to the USC Rose Bowl and my $150 annual donation to the LHF wasn't going to cut it.

A friend's dad had an extra pair that he said I could have for "whatever I thought was fair". I met on the morning of the game in Old Town Pasadena and forked over $1,500 cash. He didn't want to take it all, but I insisted. About 45 minutes before kickoff we picked up another pair outside the stadium for $2,700.

Money well spent, including the extra to take in New Years Eve in San Francisco and the Texas-49's game on New Years Day at Candlestick Park before heading down to Pasadena.

If the the Horns are there on January 7th, I'll be there too, NO MATTER what the secondary market commands.

Very few of us have unlimited resources. I don't. That means we all do a certain amount of cost/benefit calculus before we spend our hard earned money on anything.

How do you afford to blow $4k on a Rose Bowl trip? It's simple, you look at all your discretionary expenses and decide which ones you are willing to do without until the recoup the $4k. Priorities, man. Priorities.

One more thing though... You think a $4k trip to the USC Rose Bowl was expensive? Imagine if we had lost.

Bernard

 

My Brother in Law simply buys (or tries to) tickets to almost every major sporting event every year. He gets most of them for face value since he has been buying them for so long. He picks the ones he wants to go to and sells the rest. He usually breaks even.

Last year he had Final 4, BCS Championship Game, Rose, Fiesta, Orange bowln ticks, USC/UCLA season tickets. He as recently been adding more season tickets for teams with wait list as well. About the only thing he doesn't get is Super Bowl.

It did cost him some up front $ but as I said he breaks even most years and gets to go to a lot of great events.

 

I plan on getting mine through the LHF like I did in 05 and 06 (and pretty much every bowl UT has been to). Don't care what they cost. I will be there.

 

This is the time where the 'idiots' that donate to the LHF have their laugh. Ppl always say it makes more sense to just buy scalped tickets - and I agree it appears to be the case most of the time. However, there is always a decent chance of our making an MNC game. This year is obviously a strong possibility, last year was as well. 05 was our MNC year and in 01 we basically had a play in game to the MNC (of course we lost). Even in 06, had Colt not been hurt we had a stong chance of making the game. The point is that in 5 years this decade, we stood a strong chance of making the game. Tickets for this game will always be too expensive for me to afford 4 on the secondary market - the airfare and hotel are bad enough. But at face value, I can buy all 4. LHF lets me do that.

The minimum donation for the 05 game was $750 (I think). Let's round up to $800 for fun. That means if you donated $800 for the entire decade, you have spent $8,000. You got seats to 10 TX/OU games (even before the expansion) and you got into two MNC games at face value. All in all, it probably evens out - and you never, ever have to deal with the headache of scrounging up a ticket for any UT home game, bowl game or RRS.

 

And 80% of your donation is tax deductible. Thank you, Uncle Sam.

 

Just get a new credit card and finance the **** out of it!!!

j/k.

Would you drop $4k on a vacation for yourself and the significant other?

Same deal.

Start a "vacation fund". Put a few bucks in every month, then use it for a vacation, or a national championship, whichever is more appropriate for the time.

 

If you had faith in your team, you went to firstdibz.com before the season started.

The right to buy tix for UT was ~$100. Now it's ~$500.
Assuming no upset, that ~$100 + 7% transaction fee will allow you a ~$300 ticket.

Just over $400 for an endzone ticket would be a steal.

Of course, if the Horns had lost to anyone you would have been out ~$100.

 

There were tickets available for face value at the UT team hotel the day before the game. I wouldn't want to rely on that though, and a lot of the tickets were singles

 

If you end up with a Texas-Bama MNC game those tickets are only going up.

Bama has a rabid fan base and they are coming in from the cold after a long spell.

And well, we're Texas.

You dont have to pay that kind of money but 50,000 Texas fans will.

 

As far as the "affordability" factor is concerned, it's all about how bad someone wants the tickets. Like LAktownhorn, I do pretty well financially, yet it still amazes me how many people whom I know make less money than me drive nice BMWs, have $700k houses, take awesome trips, etc. It really all comes down to two things: (1) priorities, and (2) debt. As far as priorities are concerned, even a guy pulling down $40k per year can probably scrounge up $1200 from savings and the like. Maybe he's been putting money away for a while. Maybe he's a season ticket holder and can get first crack. Bottom line is, if a person wants to go to the game that bad, they'll probably find a way to pay $1000+ for a ticket.

Second, there's a double-edged sword called the credit card. You can use it on eBay, and for better or for worse, it can get someone of modest means into the stadium. They may end up paying 500% interest on the purchase over time, but it sure can get them in.

 

Cutoff for MNC Rose Bowl was $600.

 

Had a friend who let two tickets to Vince's coming out party go unused - I later told him I would have driven all the way from Dallas to the Rose Bowl and slept by the side of the road for the privilege of using those two unused tickets.

 

I was privileged enough to drive big bertha out to Pasadena for the nc game. I got a free ticket, room, and got paid to do it. Talk about lucky!!!!!! I am kind of hoping they didn't lose my number and want me to do it again this year!!!!!!!!

 

If you have 2 season tickets, can you order 4 for the championship game?

 

anyone used firstdibz?

how does it work, do you get your money back if TX doesn't go??