A month in a hotel: what to look at first

A room that is fine for three nights can be tiring for thirty. Look at the size in square metres or feet on the hotel page, and at the bed setup: two adults for a month usually want a king bed or two queens, and a chair you can sit in that is not the bed.

If you work from the room, a desk by a window matters more than the view. Ask for a quiet room in the booking comments; most hotels can honour it on a long stay.

Eating out three times a day for a month adds up quickly. A kitchenette, or at least a fridge and a microwave, lets you keep breakfast and some dinners at home. Hotels list these as facilities; suites and apartment hotels have them more often.

A guest laundry, or a washer in the room, matters more than you think on a stay of three weeks or longer.

Plans change more over a month than over a weekend. Every rate shows its terms before you pay: free cancellation until a date, or non-refundable. On a long stay the refundable rate is often the better choice, even when it costs a little more.

Some charges are collected by the hotel itself: city tax, resort fees, sometimes parking. They are shown as "Payable at the property" next to the total you pay us, so the whole cost of the stay is known before you book. Tax rules for long stays differ by place; our city pages give the rule and its source.

For a week you can live with a long commute; for a month you will not want to. Start from where you need to be every day, the office, the clinic or the campus, and pick the hotel within 15 to 20 minutes of it.