<div class="block">Sarah Dandashy, travel expert and author, joined Cheddar News to share a few cost-saving tips for summer vacation and breaks down the pros and cons of various stays, including hotels, hostels and summer rentals. </div>

Wake Up With Cheddar

Best Summer Vacation Lodging Options

Summer is here, vacation time for many families around the country. So all season long wake up is bringing you the best advice on getting great value for your dollar between hotels, vacation rentals, hostels. There have never been more choices about where to stay here to give us advice about the best accommodation for every budget. We're joined by travel expert and author Sarah Dahi. Welcome Sarah. Thanks for having me. Everyone's familiar with hotels. Yes, talk to me about the pros and cons here. Ok. So here's the thing, hotels, if you go ahead and sign up for our loyalty and rewards programs, this is really great that you can take advantage of, of cashing in on some of those, some of those points. Now there's also this notion of it's consistent, you know what you're going to get at this particular hotel brand, this particular style of hotel. Um but it does lack a little bit of independence. So it all ends up being, it all depends on where you're staying and sort of the experience that you want to have. But in general, it seems to be pretty consistent uh product. So that's why a lot of people stay in hotels. We have to talk about vacation rent. How do they compare? So, vacation rentals are really interesting. Again, if people want to do more of like the local experience and they, or if they're staying for longer periods, vacation rentals are great for that. Another thing is thinking about how are you traveling? Maybe you're traveling with a family of five or six or multigenerational travel. So you've got grandparents and grandkids by the time you might pay for hotel rooms at, at your favorite hotel, it might end up being way more expensive than if you did maybe something like a luxury villa rental somewhere. So you can really use vacation rentals to your advantage. Are there downsides to vacation rentals? I always say read the fine print. Yes, always. I know. Uh, because there are a lot of extra fees. So, you know, if you're looking at vacation rentals only a way to save a couple of bucks, that isn't always the case. Um, I mean, it's, you have to keep in mind there are cleaning fees. Um, when do the cleaning fees take in effect? Is it after, you know, a couple of days? Is it every night? Um, or there are also chores as well. There, this has been a new thing that's been going on with vacation rentals. They want you to take out the trash, do different things and, you know, that might not always be a part of what somebody wants to do on their vacation. There is a new category of hybrid hostels. I know, you know, a lot about that. Those aren't like normal accommodations that we used to tell me more. No. So we're seeing this interesting trend with hotels and I think after the past couple of years where people are craving community, so that's what everybody associates hostels with is that you really get this wonderful sense of community, but they want something a little bit more elevated. So we are seeing this sort of um minimal in the rooms uh experience, but then a lot of stuff going on in the communal about the bathroom down the hall. Yeah. So yes, they're not necessarily bathroom down the hall. But again, it's, it's totally, again, it's minimizing everything and we're also even seeing a bit of this like retro experience as well too. So in different destinations, uh people are having fun sort of with this motel theme and redoing them. So it feels a little bit um you know, more, more low key, but it has this fun vibe. I have less than a minute. Sarah, what kind of travelers are these new hotels and motels aspiring to? What's the demographic? You know, I think it's, it's a combination of a lot of things, digital nomads, we've seen a lot of digital nomads getting out there and traveling also people that are really seeking community, you know, they're not necessarily going maybe just for the hotel and the bed experience, which is wonderful and you can do that, but they're, they're going to find and meet other like minded individuals and have the hotel experience be an experience in and of itself. So uh it's really cool to see that. Hotels are really having a lot of fun with what they're creating, right? Travel expert, Sara Nada. Thank you so much. Cheers. Cheers for that. Right.