What a hotel cabin costs
A hotel cabin from Koto costs from £80,000 to £110,000 per suite for the ready-made Haku, and from about £100,000 to £200,000 per key for a bespoke collection once site works and fees are counted. Here is where the money goes, what moves the number, and how to think about payback.
In short
A Haku suite is £100,000 on-grid or £110,000 off-grid for one, stepping down to £80,000 and £90,000 per suite at fifteen. Prices are zero-rated for VAT.
A bespoke Koto cabin is priced per project. Our published guide rate for the factory-built part is £2,500 to £3,500 per square metre, before groundworks, services and fees.
Site works add 15 to 40 per cent on top of the build, and professional fees and project management add about 20 per cent of the construction cost.
Three things move the number more than anything else: access for the crane, distance to services, and how many cabins you build at once.
Most owners we work with plan for the cabins to pay back inside five to seven years. The ROI calculator on the Haku page lets you test your own numbers.
Two ways to buy a cabin
The quickest route is Haku, a hotel suite for two on a wheeled chassis, built to BS 3632 and delivered finished: furniture, bedding, kitchen and bathroom in place, ready for a guest the same week. It is a fixed design at a published price, which is why it can be quoted on a single page.
The other route is a bespoke collection: cabins designed for your site, your brand and your guests, built off site by one of our partner factories and craned into place. Moor Hall’s seven garden suites and the twenty cabins at Fritton Lake were made this way. Bespoke work is quoted per project after a site visit, because the site decides so much of the cost.
What is in the price
For a Haku, the price includes the chassis, the structure, the full interior fit-out and a mains connection kit. Off-grid adds power, water and waste systems. The furniture and appliance packs, delivery and the groundworks are itemised separately in the proposal so you can see each line.
For a bespoke cabin, the build rate covers manufacture, transport and installation of the modules. It does not cover groundworks, utilities, landscaping or professional fees, which is why we show them as separate lines in the cost calculator and in every offer.
What moves the number
Access. A cabin arrives on a lorry and is lifted by crane. A flat site with a hard road costs least; a steep site, a narrow lane or a long carry needs a bigger crane, a second lift or a different route, and that is the single biggest swing in site cost.
Services. The distance from the cabin to power, water and drainage sets the trench. Off-grid systems remove the trench but add kit, which is why the off-grid Haku is £10,000 more.
Numbers. Factory cost falls with quantity. The Haku scale is published: £20,000 less per suite at fifteen than at one. Bespoke collections behave the same way, because the design cost is spread and the factory runs a batch.
Specification. A sauna, a hot tub, a terrace, a wood burner and a bigger window each add cost and each adds to the nightly rate. We help you choose the ones guests will pay for.
Planning route. Cabins delivered under the Caravan Act can avoid some of the groundworks a permanent building needs, which lowers site cost and shortens the programme.
A worked example
Six Haku suites on-grid on a straightforward estate site: about £540,000 for the suites at the six-unit price, plus delivery, groundworks and connections, which on a simple site are typically a fifth to a quarter again. At a £250 nightly rate and 60 per cent occupancy each suite earns around £55,000 a year before operating costs, so the collection pays itself back in roughly five years. Change the rate, the occupancy or the operating cost in the Haku ROI calculator and see your own number.
What the cabins earn
The cabins we design charge well because they are designed as rooms, not sheds: Moor Hall’s garden suites sit beside a three-Michelin-star restaurant, the Fritton Lake cabins have been letting since 2021, and the Haku suites at Denton Reserve took guests from the week they arrived. Finished interiors by Koto Living are part of that, and part of the price.
Questions we are asked
Is VAT charged on a hotel cabin? Haku is zero-rated for VAT as a caravan built to BS 3632. Bespoke cabins depend on the route; we advise on this early.
How long does it take? About 16 weeks in the factory for a bespoke cabin, with groundworks running in parallel, then a day of craning. Haku is delivered in weeks.
Can we start with one and add more? Yes. The Haku price scale rewards numbers, so it is worth planning the full collection even if you buy in phases.
Do you help with planning? Yes. We check the planning route at the first visit, including whether the Caravan Act applies.
Where do we start? Tell us about the site. See the hospitality work and Haku.