5 Essential Tips for Booking Long-Term Travel Accommodation
Day 13 today of our travel vlog.
Our preparation before we head off for 12 months to Southeast Asia. Today
we have five amazing tips for you guys, based on our experience previously and our
thoughts moving forward of booking accommodation. So shall we get started? Yeah, there’s five
tips. The fifth tip is excellent ’cause it’s about saving money. Yes. So stick around for that
one. Stick around for that one. I would anyway. Don’t forget to subscribe. We love
chatting with you guys daily. So yes. So number one, we’ve written them
down so we don’t forget them. Yeah. Mix short-term and long-term stays.
Yes. Why do we feel that’s number one tip? I think that probably stems back from our
previous trips where we’ve booked accommodation for a certain amount of time and we’ve turned
up there and been, let’s say, disappointed. Yeah. It’s like, have you ever turned up anywhere you’ve booked? It looks rosy on the brochures or on the app or the internet and you turn up
and you go, “Oh my God, what have we done?” Yeah. And actually, these pictures are not the
same as the ones that I saw online. So we’ve had that happen to us, sadly. So that was a lesson.
Yes. A big lesson. Yeah. So I think when that happened to us, we
had to change our mindsets in the sense of, okay, we know we’re going to be in an area for
a set amount of time, but let’s just book one or two nights to start with when you arrive
and to give you time to check out the area. And I think particularly for this next trip—the
big trip we’re doing for 12 months—I think we’ve agreed that a good process for us will be
to book a hotel for the first few days. Yeah. I think it’s really important you
get this tip because it’s a massive thing. We turn up to some places and it’s magical.
We turn up to other places—it’s horrendous. Yes. And well, we booked a villa
once for 3 weeks and it wasn’t great. No. No, it wasn’t. But you’re
stuck then because you’ve booked it for 3 weeks. I mean, you’ve already paid.
Yeah. So there’s nothing you can do about it. Yeah. So to try and avoid that, I think we’ve
taken the stance now that we will be booking probably a hotel-type accommodation
where you don’t have to think too much about anything. You’ve got all the
facilities you need for those few days. And then what we’re planning on doing
is actually going to some local agents, aren’t we, in each area.
Yeah. Yeah. But I think, well, there’s a couple of reasons why I think it’s the
way to go. One is to get the lay of the land. So you turn up, you’re in a nice hotel anyway. Okay,
that’s cool. So you’re going to be looked after. It’s secure. You know, as a rule of thumb from
the stuff you read online that it’s a nice area, that kind of thing. But you don’t know
until you hit the ground. You don’t know. So if you just book a hotel when you first arrive
in an area, you can say, “Well, we’re not staying here.” You might not like the district.
Yeah. You might not like the district it’s in. It might not be the right vibe for you.
So I think that’s a really good tip. And then to move forward from there, especially if you’re
going to be doing slow travel the same as us. Yeah. Slow travel. You’re going to be
spending quite a bit of time in an area. So I think it’s going to be important for us to
actually go and view places—i.e. through an agent, for instance—because for our longer stays
we’re planning on having certain facilities that we want to have as a couple.
So I think that’s important. The number one tip is to mix your
accommodation between short and long term. Yeah. We would definitely recommend
you arrive in an area on short. Yes. And it’s probably easier—a
hotel—than anything else. And then you go looking to see what area
you want to be in and everything else, and then get local recommendations.
So that’s the basis of it, because you don’t know where the restaurants are.
You don’t know where the good areas are. You don’t know where the beaches are. You
don’t know any of this stuff in a brochure. So tip number two—how would you go
for the long accommodation, Deb? Tip number two is about platforms. How do
you actually do the bookings? And being the main person in this partnership
who does all of the booking, I can tell you that I use a variety of
platforms and I would recommend that. I wouldn’t just stick to one. There’s so many
out there now. You’ve got Booking.com, Airbnb, even local Facebook groups is a good source.
You know, ones that usually expats are part of. If you join them once you get to an
area, that’s really good because again, there could be recommendations on there.
And even the hotel that you’re staying in—ask the staff. Ask them for – the actual
local people who live there, for alternative platforms or ways of booking – local restaurants.
Yeah. So it’s, I think, the main thing is not sticking to one form of booking because you
could come a cropper if you’re just relying on one way to book your accommodation.
Not only that—we have found with Airbnb, for example, that we’ve turned up
and it hasn’t been what we expected. Yeah. But the same could happen on Booking.com or
the other platforms. So we’re not picking on one platform. When I say Airbnb, I don’t
mean the company—I mean the process. We go for long-stay accommodation. And
the long-stay accommodation isn’t what is being sold online. Or like your daughter—the
worst thing in the world—you can be scammed. Yes. And you can actually turn up at accommodation
and it a) not even exist, or b) nobody turns up to let you in. And that happened recently
to my daughter. So—and it was for a very special occasion—and it was, it’s so upsetting
when that happens for everybody involved. Yeah. So you have to be very, very careful
and really have your wits about you. And again, just a personal tip from me
here: I would never book any accommodation that hasn’t got any reviews at all.
It’s just too much of a risk for me. So yeah, that’s just my tip. Why tip
one is so important—for that reason. So you can go and look at the area. You can
actually ask for the address of somewhere before you go and you can go and check it out.
Yeah. Before you book it. Yeah if you’ve got the time. Yes. And that’s the important
thing for us with doing long travel. We will have the time to do that.
Whereas quite often with our other trips, you don’t have the time and you’re moving
from city to the coast and then back to another city. So you are relying fully
on online processing at that point. But if you’re planning on longer
travel like us, then you will have the time to go and check these places out.
I mean, Debbie is exceptional at it. As we’re driving along—especially on our long trips in
Europe where we spent a couple of months on the road—she’ll be in the passenger seat on her
phone going through the platforms and that. And we’ve stayed in some amazing places.
Don’t get me wrong—these platforms are good. Yes. But now and again, they’re not. And it’s
only because they can only do what they’re fed. And we’ve turned up to places and Debbie looks at me and she goes, “Oh, he’s not going to be happy.” And we’ve turned up and it can be horrendous.
But it can look horrendous on the outside—you go inside and it’s amazing.
So you do have to keep an open mind. These are just tips. It doesn’t mean that we’re
right or wrong. These are tips that we’ve come across and we’ve definitely experienced, I’d say.
Yeah. And it’s our way forward now for planning our trip.
So yes. So that’s tip number two. Now on to tip number
three, which is prioritising your essentials. So what really matters to you, yeah, when
you’re at that destination? And for us, like we just said, we’re happy to book a hotel for
a short period. But then we want certain things. We want cooking facilities. We want
to be able to wash our clothes. And, you know, washing the clothes
is a massive thing for me. I mean, I’ve spent many hours in laundrettes—last time we did a couple of two-month trips—and it was the laundry. When you go away for a week or
fortnight, you take enough clothes, you don’t worry about it. But you’ve
got to carry a lot of clothes otherwise. And it’s finding the laundry facilities,
especially if you’re staying in hotels. We stayed in a lot of hotels and to
be honest, it wasn’t for us, was it? Well, the laundry costs in the hotels
are astronomical. So it doesn’t make sense to use the hotel laundry service.
So we did find ourselves going to local launderettes. But the launderette
might be a mile away or more. And yeah, I mean, that wasn’t a fun
part of my days, shall we say—when I had to sit in there and work it out.
It’s all in a foreign language—working out the money and what you put in.
I mean, I’ve just been so lucky so far that I’ve had wonderful people in there who
have helped me. But that’s not always the case. So again, it’s about what’s important to you
to make your stay comfortable and to make it you enjoy it to the fullest. And for me,
a washing machine is definitely an essential, and the cooking facilities and location—you
know, do you want to be near a beach? Do you want to be in a quiet area? Do you want to be in
a lively area? What are the neighbours like? Yeah. So I think that’s really making a list of what
you’re looking for from that accommodation before you even start searching. Yeah. And
one of the things for me is the internet, for two reasons. One, because I trade. And
the other one, like… and to do this…. and like so many of us out there,
we’re just used to having Wi-Fi now. Obviously, you’ve got to make sure that you carry VPNs and ways that people can’t hack your Wi-Fi. So what is a VPN for anybody who doesn’t know what a VPN is? I mean, I’m not an IT specialist, but a VPN basically is a way of safeguarding
your connection to the Wi-Fi, so people can’t just hack straight into your Wi-Fi. Which makes
it impossible, to my knowledge, that they cannot get access to your phones or your computers—and
that’s where you’re holding your information. So security is really big. What else is
there? Well, for you, security. Like, we stayed in a villa and even
the patio doors had padlocks on, which made you feel better, didn’t
it? You like having lots of security. See, I come from just outside London
and it’s quite strange—when we moved to Devon everyone’s doors were wide
open and nobody locked their cars, nobody locked their doors. So it was quite a
shocker to me. So I think I’ve had security sort of bred in me. So I lock all the doors,
I lock all the windows—I’m one of them. So security is a big issue for
me, because I have been burgled whilst I was asleep in my bed. And I didn’t know
anything till I woke up—and laptops and vans and phones had gone in the middle of
the night. So I know it’s possible from living it. So security is a biggie
for me. And again, you don’t know about security until you look at the premises,
until you arrive. Yeah, until you arrive. So what is important? Is the area important for
security? Is the kitchen important for you so you can cook? Is the laundry facilities—even
if it doesn’t have laundry facilities, is it easy and accessible to a launderette?
Yes. If it is, are they easy to use, as Debbie said? After travelling around quite
a few countries, every country is different. Yeah. Languages. Not only the languages,
it’s the way they do business, the way machines are. Some are money, some are
cards. Yes. There’s lots of different things, isn’t there? Yes. So for me personally, I
would rather book an accommodation with a washing machine, because then I don’t have
to worry about any of those other things. Yeah. And then obviously, because
we’re travelling around—slow travel, as you say—we might not have a
car, so we want somewhere that’s local to public transport. Yes. So is it easy
to get to? Do you feel safe in that area, again? Yes. Me with my safety head on. Yeah.
Yeah. So I think that’s it for tip number three. So we’re now on to tip number four. Yes. Which
is where you are the expert rather than me, because I’m not a reader. I’ve got dyslexia, and
I’m just not a reader. So I prefer listening and listening to people than reading stuff. And Debbie is an excellent reader, so she reads reviews. So tip number four is always check the reviews, because we live in a modern world now
that reviews mean everything and they’re commonplace. Yes. So everybody would
expect you to be looking at the reviews. Now I will say, take the reviews with a little bit
of a pinch of salt. And I would always check the dates of the reviews. Because I don’t know about you guys, but whenever I’m reading reviews, they could be marvellous and wonderful, but they were from two years ago and nobody’s said anything since. Well, not only that—we’ve had companies
where people have turned around and said, “Give us enough money and we’ll do loads
of reviews for you.” Yes. So you have to really be aware. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, there are
organisations out there that will do—I don’t know how they do it—but you know, reviews for you for a fixed price. So you do always have to, you know, read between the lines, I suppose, and look for
a variety of reviews, you know, and real reviews. So for instance, if there’s a property and it’s
got five stars and all the reviews are five, five, five, I probably wouldn’t trust that.
I would be looking for—because not everybody wants the same thing—you can’t please everybody, and that’s an impossibility, and that’s a natural thing. So I always look for the variety, whether it was ‘we
arrived late at night and the person wasn’t very welcoming’, and you want to see the bad as well don’t you? Yeah exactly—you
know—which I can see past that. You know, somebody’s tired, and it’s not a common
theme in the reviews. But, you know, again, if there is a common theme in the reviews like
the swimming pool was not fit for purpose or there were tiles missing or chipped or it was a danger/hazard, then obviously I would take note of that. And again, what’s great these days is people
can add their own pictures and their own videos to their reviews. So it’s quite handy
to—if somebody’s put a review of their room, for instance, their hotel room—just watch
it, you know. And yes, it does take time, but I think it’s worth it. I think it’s time well spent. I think it is, especially with the slow travel. Because what you’ve got to remember—freedom lifestyle is all about slow travel, and you’re staying—you’re looking for an apartment or a
villa or something that you’re going to stay in for a long period of time, be that a month,
two months, three months. As a rule of thumb, not usually much longer than that because
you’re carrying on travelling—slow travel, as the word suggests. You’re just
taking your time travelling around, and because of that reason, it’s really
important to really check it out. Because it’s such a pain, isn’t it? Packing, unpacking, from property to property, and
not being happy with where you are. Yes. Yeah. And another biggie I think that I look
out for is if people, lots of people within the reviews, are saying that the accommodation didn’t have a very nice smell, i.e. smokers had been in there. We are non-smokers, you know, and
I’m asthmatic, so I always look for that as well. Because we’ve turned up and had some places like
that that have been horrendous, and they’ve put us in another room or another apartment and it’s been
the same. So it’s the whole building. I think the whole building—everybody was smoking in their
apartments and it just—it filters through the air con, you see, when it’s one building like
that. So I don’t think—we just couldn’t escape it. And I particularly struggle with that.
It’s a very unpleasant experience for me. So that’s another thing that—I—what
we found was, if you’re not happy, just move on. Just go and find another
apartment. Because you’ve got to remember—you’ve got to be happy as you travel, as you know, so that’s a massive tip. Yeah. Because what comes with travelling is stress.
There is stress involved with travelling, you know, and there’s lots of organisation
and planning and booking, like we’ve already said. And because of the nature of how
we operate—we’re not that organised, to be fair—we don’t book three accommodations
in a row. No. We just book one, and then once we’re at that accommodation, we’ll start thinking
about the next one. So it’s always on your mind, and there’s always something to
do. So it can be quite stressful. So it’s important to, I think, have these tips
in your mind as a process, and hopefully you won’t come a cropper like we have a couple
of times—and we’ve heard of people coming a cropper. So that leads us on to the last tip, number five. Tip number five. And if you’re still with us, thanks for staying around. Yes.
And do subscribe to see more. So what’s tip number five then, Deb? Well, it’s written down there. Look,
it’s “negotiate for better rates.” Now, a lot of people, especially British
people, really struggle with bartering and negotiating. We get embarrassed. We don’t
really feel comfortable doing it, do we? No. But you should. You should. And especially
in other countries, because for them, quite often it’s the norm. Well, you think—if
you spent 25,000 a year on your travel, if you spent 50,000, 10% of that could be—if
you can save 10%, that’s a lot of money. And I think another good thing is, if you’re doing
a slow travel, we will be saying to the agents in situ, when we’re looking for our longer-term
place, “Well, will you give us a discount because we’re staying for X amount of weeks rather
than just the one?” And we’re hoping that they’ll be open to that. So it’s always worth
asking, is what I would say. Never be scared. And we’ll always put links below our videos on
anywhere that we stay and we recommend. Oh yeah, definitely. And that they’re open to negotiation.
Yes. We’ll keep you guys updated along the way. But it’s always easy to—I find it quite easy to
negotiate once you start. Once you get over that embarrassment and insecure feeling of doing it, it just becomes normal then, I think, and easier. And what you’ve got to remember is that asking for a discount is actually beneficial to the owner and the agent. And the reason it’s beneficial
is because there’s no voids. Basically, you’re going to stay there for a long time. So
they’re actually going to make more money from you because of the amount of times the place won’t be empty and the amount of times that it doesn’t need changing and everything else. So there’s a
lot of benefits for them to actually accept you at a slight discount—or a big discount, whatever you can get—for you to stay a long period of time. So don’t forget that you’re doing them a favour.
Yes. And I like to spin it on its head and think of it that way. If—what if it was my property?
What if it was my business? What would serve my business better—having the insecurity of not knowing if you’re going to get bookings at all, or just one or two over, say, an 8-week
period, or somebody comes along and says, “I’ll take the whole eight weeks.”
Yes, but for a discounted rate. I, as a business owner, I would definitely be saying yes to that. I would. I
would, because it makes sense. Not only that, to be honest, when you stay
somewhere for long—it’s like going to a restaurant every Friday or a restaurant every Saturday.
They get to know you. Yeah. They like you, you like them, that’s why you keep going back.
And guess what? Even if it’s not discounts, they’ll give you stuff for free. Yeah.
They’ll give you a free dessert. “Try this, try that.” It might be a drink, it might
be—and that’s the same with accommodation. Yeah. Yeah. Sometimes you’ll get it,
sometimes you won’t. Sometimes you’ll never see anyone at all. But as a rule of
thumb, they will be happy to keep you happy. Yes. And on that note, actually, I think you’ve
made a really good point there—that sometimes it’s self-serve. You know, actually, they give you
instructions and keypads to get into these places. I would always recommend trying to have a one-to-one conversation with the—you know, the business owner, the accommodation owner, whether that’s via WhatsApp, email, because that’s the time that you can negotiate. You can’t do it if
you don’t have—on the platform or anything else. Yeah. You can’t go through the platform and do
that kind of thing because it’s quite restricted. So I—and to be fair, nine times out of ten,
when we’ve booked accommodation that we have to check in ourselves, there’s
always a contact number or an email that you can use. And we’ve done it.
We’ve actually done that and we stayed in—we got discounts before. We stayed in
accommodation—we’re not happy with this, we’re not happy with that. “Oh well.” Yeah.
You get discounts if you find fault as well. And that’s another good thing:
don’t be embarrassed to say, “Look, this is not how you described it,” or,
“This is not meeting my expectations.” We’ve done that and got discounts. And we’ve
also stayed in accommodation for, say, two weeks and then decided—Cannes comes
to mind in particular—we loved Cannes, and we decided we wanted to stay another week. So we negotiated another week but a lower rate. And to be fair, I mean, if you’re a negotiator and
looking for deals all the time like me—the actual agent, the lady that was looking after the
property for a gentleman who owned a couple of these properties—said, “Oh yeah, he’d be
interested in selling.” So you never know where that journey is going to go, and you
might be able to make some money on the way, let alone discount. So there’s always
that. That’s the way my mind works. So never be afraid to talk
to people. And I think slow travel is all about talking to people, isn’t it? Oh, that’s what I’m looking forward to. I’m
so looking forward to making connections and meeting wonderful people. That’s
something I’m really looking forward to. So I think that’s it for today on that. If you’ve
got any tips that you would like to share with the community and ourselves, we’d love to hear from you. So please put something down in the comments if you’ve got anything like that, or email us.
We have an email if you would like to email us. And I think that’s it, isn’t
it? That’s bye for now from me, for definite. I can’t think
of anything else to say. Yeah. See you soon, guys. See you soon. Bye bye.
🌏 DAY 13 Travel VLOG | Great tips for you! 🌏
Email us: freedomlifestyle0316@gmail.com
In today’s travel video, we are sharing five amazing Southeast Asia travel tips for booking your accommodation. These affordable travel tips will help us save money and secure the best budget hotels for our 12-month adventure through Southeast Asia. We’ll cover everything from budget travel to securing cheap hotels near your must-see destinations.
Planning long-term travel? Booking your accommodation can make or break your experience. In this video, we’re sharing 5 tried-and-tested tips that have helped us navigate long stays across different countries without burning out—or breaking the bank!
These tips cover everything from choosing the right platform to avoiding scams and knowing when to negotiate. If you’re dreaming of a freedom lifestyle or just want to slow travel with less stress, these strategies will help you find the right place to call ‘home’—no matter where you are in the world.
📌 What you’ll learn:
✅ The best booking platforms for longer stays
✅ What amenities actually matter
✅ How to negotiate better deals
✅ Key red flags to watch for
✅ Communication tips with hosts
🎒 Whether you’re a digital nomad, retiree traveller, or just planning a year off—we’ve got you covered.
👇 Drop your own tips or questions in the comments. We love hearing from you!
🔔 Subscribe to follow our journey and get honest insights about travel, mindset, and living freely.
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Email us: freedomlifestyle0316@gmail.com.