New Year's Eve is probably the most crowded time of the year for Vegas so I started to check to see what hotel rates and availability is looking like.
Keep in mind this is as of July 1st. I checked for two adults, queen beds, arriving December 30th and departing on New Year's Day.
In year's past many casino hotels would not allow arrivals on December 31st and I suspect that will be the policy again this year.
Here's what I found and these prices for the two nights do not include "resort fees" which will vary. These are only the quoted room rates for the two nights:
Red Rock $490
Caesars $998
Paris $612
MGM Grand $610
Bellagio $1078
Wynn Wynn's website says no rooms are available for New Year's Eve at either the Wynn or Encore, though there are prices for December 30 and January 1, 2014.
Personally, I stopped going to Vegas for New Year's Eve several years ago. The hotels and restaurants are too crowded, the casinos are jammed, the table game limits are high, and hotel services at even the best hotels are often overwhelmed.
About 7 or 8 years ago housekeeping was so overwhelmed at the hotel we were staying at that we couldn't get housekeeping to clean up our room, change sheets, deliver towels, clean for two days.
About 12 or 13 years ago, the lines to get into restaurants were so long I found myself "dining" on candy bars to keep up my blood sugar.
I'm not even going to mention the headaches about getting to Vegas and leaving Vegas but I have plenty of stories to tell about 12 hour car drives to and from Vegas for New Year's and I can't imagine what the airports are like.