Here is the shortest version: I pay for my own rooms, I pay for my
own meals, and then I tell you what I actually think. That is the entire
business model. It should not be a differentiator. In travel media, it
is.

Who pays

Me. I’ve spent my career in finance, which mostly means twenty-plus
years of telling people the truth about their money whether they wanted
to hear it or not. Turns out you cannot switch that off on vacation. So
I pointed it at hotels.

That matters because most travel content you read was subsidized by
the property being reviewed, and you were never told. The glossy
magazines accept complimentary stays. The points blogs earn a commission
when you sign up for a credit card. None of that makes those writers
dishonest, but you should know how the sausage is funded, and mostly,
you do not. Here, you always will.

So here is my rule on free rooms, because I will not pretend they
never happen. Most of the time I pay, and you will see the rate I paid.
Sometimes a hotel comps the room. When that happens, it says so at the
very top of the review, in plain English, before you read a single
opinion. And then I review it exactly like any other: same rubric, same
standards, the same willingness to tell you it was not worth it. A free
room buys a disclosure line. It does not buy a kind word. If a hotel
hosts me and earns a mediocre score, it gets a mediocre score. That is
the whole arrangement. That is not cynicism. That is just paying
attention.

How I earn, since it is not from hotels comping
me

Some links on this site are affiliate links, meaning if you book a
tour or a hotel through them, I earn a commission at no extra cost to
you. I also work as a travel advisor, so if you want the hotel I
reviewed, I can often book it for you with perks attached (breakfast,
upgrade priority, property credit) at the same rate you would pay
booking direct. And I sell a few things I made, like city food maps.
Every one of those is disclosed where it appears. What is never for sale
is the verdict.

How I review

Every hotel gets the same treatment: a real stay, usually two nights
minimum, booked under my own name at rates you can see in the review. I
score against a 100-point rubric (explained here: /scorecard/) covering
the room, the food, the service, the location, and whether the math
works. I note the date of the stay, because hotels change and reviews
should expire like milk, not wine. I photograph the room before my
luggage detonates in it. I keep the folio. If the $38 breakfast shows up
in my verdict, the receipt exists.

I also do something most hotel reviewers do not: I leave the hotel.
Every hotel review comes paired with where to eat nearby, researched the
same way, on foot and on my own card. A great hotel in a food desert is
a nice room with a problem. You deserve to know which one you are
booking.

What I get wrong

Plenty, probably. I have one wife, one stomach, and one set of
preferences, all disclosed as they become relevant. When I change my
mind or a hotel changes, I update the review and say so. There is a
corrections policy because every publication should have one, even a
publication that is mostly one guy narrating breakfast: if I got a fact
wrong, email me, and I will fix it and note the fix.

Questions about any of this: use the contact page. I answer.

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