Online Poker Rooms That Allow Private Tournaments

Here's the short answer:
Poker Room.com - they allow regular players, not just VIP's, to set up any type of poker tournament that they want. Here are the different settings you can customize:

• Sit and Go or Scheduled Event - you choose
• The Game - not everything has to be holdem, although that is the most popular choice. They also offer Omaha and 7 Stud in both regular and hi/lo. And they will host a 5 Card Draw tournament as well.
• Limit Type - No Limit, Pot Limit, or Fixed Limit
• Buy-in - all of the private tourneys are real money events, with buy-ins ranginging from $5.50 on the low end to as much as $525 on the top
• Players per table - set this from 2 for heads-up games, to 5 for shorthanded action all tournament, to ten for full table poker throughout the tournament
• Min/Max entrants - set this from 2 to play even if no one shows up, to as much as 50 for a SnG and 300 for a scheduled tournament
• Blind Level Speed - players all start with 1,500 in chips, but you cna change the speed at which the blinds increase. That will change the pace of the play, ranging from turbo to normal to slow.
• Payouts - you can choose one of four presets. They are winner takes all, normal, steep and flat.
• Start Time - for the scheduled tournaments, you choose the start time. Sit and go's just start when they fill up.
• Password - you can password protect your game, or leave this field blank to make the tourney open to the public.

As you can see, Poker Room offers just about everything you can ask for when setting up a tournament. Plus, they have a no download version of the room, which is an added convenience.

Another place players can set up their own private poker tournament is on the rooms of the prima (or microgaming) poker network. Two of my more favorite rooms on that network are Dream Poker and Royal Vegas.

There aren't as many settings to choose from on the prima network, but there are certainly enough of them to shape the tournament to your liking. You can set up Sit and Go tournaments or Scheduled Events, and even Freerolls! There is a fee for setting up a freeroll, but it's still a great option to have for lots of different circumstances.

So there you go, the quick answers on "Where can I set up a private poker tournament online?".