This was published 1 year ago
Hotel room prices in Europe have skyrocketed. Here's how to find a bargain
Warsaw in Poland offers the cheapest overnight stay of the European capitals, averaging about $110 a night, only a 3 per cent rise since 2019.Credit: iStock
Australians travelling to Europe this European summer might find they have "sticker shock" when it comes to booking hotels.
I've heard from friends, searching for hotels after a three-year absence, that hotel prices are unexpectedly high, due to several factors, primarily demand, as travellers rush to visit perennial favourite cities such Rome and Paris, and as business travel and events take off again.
A soft Australian dollar doesn't help, either.
Most hoteliers I speak to are thrilled that bookings have responded so strongly. Many of them used the pandemic to renovate, repair or rebuild, so they need to recoup those losses as well as those from closure or low occupancy.
Great for them; not so good for us.
Everyone, it seems, is looking for a wonderful, inexpensive hotel that has loads of character, the sort of hotel for which Europe is renowned, which range from the grand to the frankly funky. I've stayed in a hotel room in Milan that was so small I had to turn the shower head so that the water didn't hit the bed and an old chateau hotel in France that came with its own ghost.
Both were more memorable for different reasons than dozens of generic, luxurious hotels with much higher price tags.
Finding a charming, small, cheapish hotel that's under the radar is one of the great pleasures of travel for me. Often, they are independently owned, family-run businesses and depend on word-on-mouth.
The problem now is that charming, cheap hotels are no longer so cheap, in the major capitals at least. Some of them have had luxury makeovers and others have put up their prices because of inflationary pressures in Europe such as power costs.
I did a quick search of some of the small hotels in Paris I often recommend, looking at prices for a Thursday in May this year. A stalwart like the boho Saint Andre des Arts in Paris' Latin Quarter, usually affordable, has inflated in price to be around €400 (about $630) for one night. Similarly, Le Senat, a moderately-priced and modest hotel near the Luxembourg Gardens, will set you back €305 ($480.)
Forget about the Amalfi Coast. It's stratospheric. But do you want to go there anyway, with all its traffic gridlock in high season? If ever there was a year to stray from the path well-beaten or to travel off-peak, it's this one.
Ljubljana sounds nice, as do dozens of small cities dripping in history, culture and culinary highlights.
According to hospitality data platform OTA, looking at prices at the end of 2022, Warsaw in Poland offers the cheapest overnight stay of the European capitals, averaging about $110 a night, only a 3 per cent rise since 2019.
Tallinn, the capital of Estonia, has seen a drop in hotel room tariffs over the past three years. Beautiful Prague is also cheaper.
Budapest, a marvellous city, is still holding its relatively low prices. This might be the year for me to go back to another of my favourite cities, Bucharest, which is still criminally under-explored. The grand old baroque five-star hotel, Capsa, which is still mostly original, and has the best cake shop next door, is currently less than $100 a night, a little more in high season.
If Italy is your passion, swap the Amalfi coast for Sicily, where hotels and bed-and-breakfasts on the amazing island of Ortigia in Sicily are still very affordable – and you get a wonderful Sicilian breakfast included, too. Just stay away from Taormina, which is having a White Lotus-inspired boom.
Hotels in Madrid are also good value, which is surprising for such an elegant city. Berlin, too.
But steer clear of Edinburgh, Europe's most expensive city for hotels, where the average room is £320 ($570) in August at Festival time. Reykjavik won't make you happy (prices have gone up 60 per cent since 2019), but prices have gone down slightly in Copenhagen, Helsinki, and Stockholm.
Hotels aren't the only places we can lay or heads while we travel, of course. We can choose Airbnbs, hostels and homestays. We can avoid hotels altogether for a few nights and take overnight sleepers on trains, or a long, slow river cruise, where we can travel through many countries and sleep on the ship each night.
But there are a lot of conveniences and security in staying in a hotel.
And sometimes, you just want to go to Rome, you know? (Despite the 55 per cent increase in hotel tariffs.)
In which case, you only live once. Enjoy it.
Instagram: @bymrsamos
Sign up for the Traveller Deals newsletter
Get exclusive travel deals delivered straight to your inbox. Sign up now.