Pay the Rent strategy on The Price is Right

I just learned about a new game on The Price is Right. In the premiere of the 39th season, the show introduced a game called “Pay the Rent.”

The game is easiest to learn if you watch the clip (after the break).

Once you learn the rules, I challenge you to try to solve it…I’ve linked to a couple videos that explain some of the strategy.

Youtube video: Pay the Rent on Price is Right

My reactions

Two thoughts on strategy

William Spaniel offers many game theory videos.

In the following vid, he goes through the rules of “Pay the Rent” and explains his approach to the strategy.

Game Theory 101: “Pay the Rent” on The Price Is Right

He basically shows how it is very difficult to solve the game. He suggests you are better off trying for $10,000 instead of the grand prize because it is very difficult to arrange the items.

How hard is it exactly?

Someone actually went through the math to figure it out.

This following video is a bunch of text that goes through the math. I found it interesting, but be warned it is just text and math.

Pay the Rent Analysis – The Hardest Pricing Game Yet

The author concludes, for the prizes and prices given, there were 180 combinations. And of those, there was just one–just 1–way to get the grand prize. Yikes, that’s a hard game.

The author also showed the game is hard to win even if the prices are a little bit more palatable. Here’s a calculation where there are just 11 winning price combinations.

In summary, “Pay the Rent” just seems like a much harder game than others they have. Let’s just say that if I ever get on the Price is Right, I hope that I get to play Plinko or the Clock Game.