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Often the cost of accommodation is the most expensive part of a holiday, so learning how to find reasonably priced hotels or hostels that aren’t crawling with cockroaches is one of the secrets of having happy travels without breaking the bank. Budget Travel recently released a new book titled Secret Hotels: Extraordinary Value in the World’s Most Stunning Destinations which aims to give you the tips on finding affordable accommodation in beautiful places.

The secret of Secret Hotels seems to lie in finding smaller hotels that are run by people who love the place where they’ve chosen to live and open a small hotel to make a living there. These kind of people are perhaps not in the habit of trying to get large amounts of money out of others, and don’t have the bargaining power of a big chain of hotels. The difficulty sometimes lies in finding these hotels, which are not always well-advertised or don’t naturally rise to the top on an internet search list. Perhaps that’s where Budget Travel’s book comes in, with tips on locating and booking these small but reasonable hotels.

But remember that this kind of travel does come with a risk; if you book into the Hilton or the Marriott you usually have an unofficial guarantee of quality. Reserving a room in a small, no-name hotel might come with the bonus of delightful hosts or a super-cheap price, but you can’t really be sure until you get there. Then again, isn’t that half the fun of travel?