There are a number of reasons why vacation rentals are overall the better and cheaper option and to demonstrate this I’ll be highlighting many of the pros and cons of vacation rentals vs hotels:
More bang for your buck
Unless you’re traveling solo, you’ll find that vacation rentals will be the cheaper option when going on vacation for a couple of weeks. One of the reasons a vacation rental works out cheaper than a hotel is because you get to cook your own food, which means you get to save a small fortune and avoid "horrible" hotel food.
No matter how you look at it, a two week stay at a hotel is "8 times out of 10" more expensive than a two-week stay in a vacation rental. Believe it or not, the convenience of hotel food is why you're paying top-dollar for a hotel stay.
Renting vs booking
Booking yourself into a hotel is certainly easier than renting a vacation home since all you have to do is pick up the phone and reserve a hotel room. In the other hand, vacation rentals aren't all that straight forward since you have to be pretty certain of it, otherwise you may end-up losing your deposit.
Most vacation rentals nowadays ask for 50% of the rent as a guarantee, and you cannot cancel 3 days in advance like you can with most hotel reservations.
In fact, if you want to cancel the vacation rental agreement, you need to give them at least 60 days written notice and pay a cancellation fee, which can be anything between $40 and $200. This is probably one of the very few disadvantages you'll find when comparing vacation rentals vs hotels.
Services and amenities
As we mentioned earlier, one of the reasons to stay in a hotel is because of the convenience of not having to cook and clean after yourself, although many vacation rentals do come with cook and maid service.
Hotels do provide 24-hour room service but besides that, hotel and vacation rentals amenities aren’t all that much different. If anything, vacation rentals have better amenities than hotels because they offer bigger spaces, a kitchen, a swimming pool, bikes, and even concierge service.
What type of vacation rental is best?
Once you’ve established that vacation rental is for you, you need to consider what types of vacation rentals is best for you. As mentioned above, vacation rental accommodations can come in the form of apartments, cottages, condos, cabins, B&B, beach houses, town houses and vacation homes.
What type of accommodation rental is best will, of course, depend on your needs, though the good news is that they mostly come fully furbished. Apartment (condo) rentals and B&B’s are great if you want a small but luxurious place to stay in a metropolitan area; while cabins, beach houses, vacation homes, and cottages are large properties ideal for families and groups of friends.
Either way, vacation rentals range from basic and luxury apartments to cozy farmhouses known also as dude or guest ranches. Dude ranches are definitely, one of the most underrated types of vacation rentals used in the United States but if you’re looking for an enjoyable vacation they’re the best!
Many guest ranches in the US such as the ones in Texas also offer an authentic cowboy lifestyle experience, which means you get to learn cowboy traditions such as rounding up the herd, branding and riding the cattle.
No matter what you do, make sure you go through an online rental agency or real estate broker when booking a vacation rental. It does cost more going through a realtor than booking directly with the owner but you’ll have more protection if anything doesn’t go according to plan.
Also, when booking online be sure that the online rental agency offers refunds if any of their listings turn out to be a scam. Online rental agencies such as “Flip Key”, “VRWD”, “Slow Europe” and “Home Away” are some trusted websites you can use to find vacation rentals.
In Closing
After outweighing the advantages and disadvantages vacation rentals vs hotels, one can only come to the conclusion that vacation rentals are a solid choice! The amenities of vacation rentals are pretty even with ones offered by hotels and the weekly rates actually work out to be more affordable than hotel rates.
The best thing though is that with a vacation rental you won’t have to worry about noisy vacationers, kids slamming doors and that kind of thing. Instead, you’ll have a house or apartment where you can enjoy a “homey” feeling all to yourself.
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