In the last 2 years, we stayed at a LOT of hotels and we quickly learned how to get the most bang for our buck, and let’s be honest, we didn’t have much buck to play with. You can learn all about how much we spent in this blog post here - our budget. We digress! this post is all about what to look for that hotels want you to miss! Do you really think they ‘forgot’ to post a picture of the bathroom? but they have a zillion pictures of the pool AND it’s super affordable? there is always more than meets the eye and this blog post will help you uncover it.

But first, let’s get on the same page

We do have to make a few assumptions before we start, and these are:

• You have selected the general area you want to stay at. We feel that location is the most important bit that adds to the experience. Especially if you are walking around, this can save you so much time; and time is money. Refer to your guidebook or blogs for the area you are visiting to help you determine were to stay. Only change your location if you really can’t find anything in your price point after you’ve followed our tips.

• You know what your non-negotiable amenities are - is there something that you absolute must-have? Like a gym? Or a pool if you have kids?

• You have filtered all properties, in your desired location, by ‘guest rating’ - min 7 on a scale of 10 and 3.5 on a scale of 5. Why? because guest ratings don’t lie.

Let’s dive in!

Now that you have your first list of filtered hotels, let’s apply one more filter, and that’s price - set the max price and filter again. Remember, our goal is to find the most inexpensive aka cheap! accommodation in the area you want to be in. If you get nothing with the last filter, then you’ve gone too cheap for the area you want to visit. Keep upping the max price until you see at least 5 properties. If the max price is too high when you finally see properties, then you must select a different location before you can start.

Now that you have a list of properties with good reviews (b/c you filtered by reviews, remember?) and in your desired location. Let’s look at what you should be looking for:

• Bathroom - are there pictures of the bathroom? do they show most of the bathroom? if the pictures are bad or very few that you can’t really tell what the bathroom would look like, then the bathroom is probably bad - it’ll be either small, dark, moldy, or a whole host of other reasons why they didn’t bother to photograph it. Pass on that property.

• Wet-bathroom - when the whole bathroom gets wet when you shower. This type of bathroom is not bad for everyone, it’s a personal preference. We don’t really like it when the toilet seat gets wet, but if you don’t mind, then this won’t be a problem.

• Shared bathroom - sometimes there are no pictures b/c there is no bathroom in the room. Again, this is a matter of preference, but if you are expecting a private bathroom, and it’s a shared one, it’s not a very pleasant surprise.

• Windows - does the room have a window? Not all rooms have windows - yes, we know… whaaaa?!! Does the window face the ‘outside’? sometimes the ‘windows’ will be facing an inside hallway and that’s almost as bad as no window. Lastly, does the window have an OK view? You don’t want to be facing a dumpster or a sketchy alley.

• Reviews - this is when you dive into the things the hotel won’t tell you. Just run a search for a lot of these.

  • Number of reviews - we tend to give more weight to properties that have more reviews because we feel that if many guests are complaining about something in particular (like slow wifi) it’s probably true. In hotels with few reviews it’s hard to tell if the guest was disgruntled or if they did have a valid complaint.

  • Cleanliness - what are guests saying about the overall cleanliness of the hotel and the individual rooms? there is always a few nay sayers, but are overall guests happy?

  • Bed comfort -what are guest saying about the comfort of the mattresses? even if the furniture is a little old looking, are the mattresses bad?

  • Bed bugs - because you already filtered the hotels with bad reviews, you generally don’t get ones that have any mention of bed bugs, but you should always check. Any mention of bed bugs and that’s a goner.

  • WiFi - is it free? if it is, is it available in all the property? or just the common areas? The hotel will sometimes say they have WiFi everywhere, but the guest reviews are the ones that confirm if that’s true and if it’s fast; just search the reviews for WiFi.

• In Room hidden fees - not everything in the room is a obviously expensive as the minibar, there are other hidden fees that you can avoid:

  • A/C - sometimes cheap hotels charge extra for the a/c. They’ll give you the remote control after you’ve agreed to pay. In some places it can be as little as $5/day but if you consider that maybe the room cost just $40/day, then $5 is more than 10% that you are paying extra. Maybe you could’ve booked another room for the same price but that included a/c.

  • In room safe - we didn’t have to pay for this but in some places they charge you to use the safe. It’s not unreasonable, it’s just good to know so you can choose whether you want to pay this fee or not.

• Hotel hidden fees - hotels offer a lot of amenities, but they are not always free of charge. These are the ones we got burned with and you can hopefully avoid:

  • Parking - if you don’t need a car, and the hotel charges for parking, this fee can quickly add up, especially if you are staying a few days. Lots of hotels offer free parking, or discounted rates. Before booking, make sure that you know how much this will cost if you need it.

  • Towel service - hotels with lots of pool or beach use sometimes offer a towel service, per towel, per day (this is not your room towel, it’s for the pool or the beach). Knowing this in advance gives you the option to bring your own towel (like a fast drying microfiber towel) if you like OR pay when you get there and not be surprised.

  • Taxes - there is no avoiding taxes but some hotel online search engines show the price with the final tax and others don’t. If you found the same room in 2 search engines, make sure you are comparing apples to apples. A good example of this is Agoda vs Booking - Agoda generally showed me the final price of a hotel, while Booking didn’t show the final price until the final page of the booking process.

  • Resort fees - some places, like Las Vegas, have resort fees. We are not sure what these are for, but they can add up to a lot. You can sometimes avoid this fee by staying a little off the beaten path. Yes, this means changing your ideal location - just something to consider.

  • Tourist fee - some cities in Europe are starting to charge a daily tourist tax because they are just flooded with tourist. We don’t know if this is to discourage so many tourists or if it’s to improve infrastructures; we hope it’s the latter. Regardless, you also can’t avoid this fee, but you can choose to stay less days at that destination and more days in a city that doesn’t charge that fee.

That’s it! We know it feels like you are looking for a lot! but trust us that it’s worth it. We’ve stayed in some super cute locations for very affordable prices because we bothered to look more closely at each hotel. Like this one right here, in Udaipur; this little hotel had a rooftop terrace where you could watch the sunset and the lake; it was awesome!

We hope you find this blog post useful. If you have any questions, or suggestions of your own, please leave them in the comments below!

Happy cheap hotel hunting!