What a hotel week really costs a crew of six

Compare a hotel week for a crew of six against a crew house and the obvious numbers line up roughly. That is where most comparisons stop, and it is where the real cost is hiding. A crew does not just sleep in a hotel — it eats, parks, launders, and travels back and forth from the rooms to the site and the rooms to the food.

The costs that never make the spreadsheet

• Evening meals. Six people eating out six nights a week adds up fast. A house with a kitchen turns that into a supermarket shop.
• Parking. Hotel parking is rarely free, and a crew of six in two vans is paying for two spaces a night. A crew house with a driveway removes it entirely.
• Laundry. Wet gear and high-vis need washing weekly. Hotels charge per load and it is a pain to do. A house has a machine.
• Breakfast. The included "continental" that is not really breakfast, and the alternative is another spend.
• The productivity cost. A crew split across three buildings on different floors does not travel, eat or brief together. That friction is real even if it never hits an invoice.

The rough arithmetic

Take a mid-range UK regional hotel at roughly £80-£110 a night for a contractor rate. Six people, five nights: £2,400 to £3,300 in room rate alone. Add a conservative £35 a head a day for food and incidentals — £1,050 — plus parking and laundry, and a hotel week for six lands around £3,600 to £4,500.

A crew house for six, all bills and Wi-Fi included, weekly cleaning and linen, typically lands well under half that — and the crew lives together, cooks together and leaves for site together. The numbers are approximate and regional, but the shape is the same everywhere: once you add the costs that surround the room rate, the house wins by a distance.

Why this is the wrong comparison anyway

The real comparison is not hotel versus house. It is house versus the alternative of not housing the crew properly at all — the turnover, the sickness from damp kit, the crews that leave at the first chance. The accommodation is not a cost centre on a construction project; it is the thing that keeps the crew on site and turning up. Cheap accommodation that fails in week two costs more than good accommodation that works for the whole programme.