Do you want to come back to PHL for some days before doing the Seattle trip? If so, then yes book PHL-Europe-PHL roundtrip (or open jaw). If not, then you could book PHL-Europe-SEA-PHL as an open jaw. Open-jaw = Multi-city. Most flight search websites have this option. Kayak, Mobissimo, Fly, and Cfares are very good.

Since you are a student (under 26?) also check student sites, strategies and links in our new user thread pinned @ top of this forum.

*published fares = “regular” and sale fares provided directly by airlines.
There are also “unpublished” fares = what consolidators and student ticket agencies can sometimes get for you. You need to check all types of sellers/sources (published, consolidator, and student) to find the best price.

A quick search of published* fares turned up Air Berlin from JFK with some high $700s total round trip fares on some July dates, staying ~ 2 weeks. JFK-TXL (Berlin) $795 total, for example, July 8-27 (a little more than 2 weeks in that case). Check out AirBerlin.com and the fare calendars to see best options.

Yes I am under 26. I would actually prefer a phl-eur-sea-phl but most of the multi citiy options I checked ended up being more expensive than if I bought the ticket separately (phl-sea-phl after ny-fra-ny). I checked some of the student sites you mentioned and they didn’t seem to have any good deals but I’ll keep checking (I registered with the Lufthansa student site also…crappy deals, most were 1200+).

Air Berlin definitely has the cheapest tickets I have seen so far. I checked and saw a $815 from JFK-TXL for those dates you mentioned (wow, that’s pretty cheap).

Even if really good deals do pop out…would you expect them to go any lower than $795? I would prefer Frankfurt but if Berlin saves me $120+, it’s worth going to Berlin initially.

$795 for transatlantic during peak season is very good. I would not expect anything cheaper. Could it happen? Yes, of course — there have been occasional fluke fares in recent summers, but $1000 is typically the starting point for summer transatlantic airfares. If fuel prices remain steady, then $795 would still be a good price; if fuel rises, then $795 gets better and better… but if you don’t pay your fare before additional fuel surcharges get added, then you’ll miss it.

What did consolidators turn up?

I’m not surprised that it’s cheaper to buy 2 separate tickets, US>EUR, and PHL>SEA. Cheaper still (probably) if you could do NYC>SEA, maybe even BWI>SEA roundtrip — because of Southwest.

Trust Don on this. That is an excellent price and I would jump on it.