For hotel owners and asset managers
Hotel Refurbishment Cost per Room in the UK: 2026 Figures and What Drives Them
Sviatoslav JerdetchiiCEO & Founder of Craftex. Updated , 6 min read
The short answer
A hotel refurbishment in the UK typically costs £1,650 to £2,100 per m² of floor in 2026 before FF&E, fees and VAT, so the cost per room depends on room size, scope and how the work is phased.
- Soft refurbishment (decor, carpets, furniture) costs a fraction of a full strip-out.
- Bathrooms and services drive the hard-refurbishment figure.
- The budget is complete only with FF&E, fees, VAT and the room-nights you lose.
A hotel refurbishment in the UK typically costs £1,650 to £2,100 per m² of floor in 2026, before FF&E, fees and VAT. Per room, that is about £57,750 to £73,500 for a 35 m² share of the building. The real figure depends on room size, scope and phasing.
This guide is for owners, asset managers and buyers who need a budget they can defend. It shows where the numbers come from and what sits outside them. Our hotel refurbishment contractors price each room type after a free walk-round. Have a room count and dates? Get a free room-by-room cost plan.
Hotel refurbishment cost per m² in 2026
The best published UK benchmark is Laxton's Building Price Book 2026. It gives hotel refurbishment at £1,650 to £2,100 per m² of gross floor area. That area is every storey, measured inside the external walls.
Read what the rate leaves out. Laxton's prices exclude contingencies, external works, furniture, fittings and equipment, professional fees and VAT. They are building cost only.
London usually runs about 9% higher than the national band. That puts the same work at roughly £1,800 to £2,290 per m² in the capital. Listed fabric, awkward access and out-of-hours working add to it.
Two other Laxton's rates frame the number. A new-build hotel runs £2,150 to £5,100 per m². A hotel kitchen with equipment runs £2,700 to £3,200 per m² of kitchen, so a large kitchen moves the average.
From per m² to hotel refurbishment cost per room
No UK source publishes a standard price per room, and we do not invent one. You can get a defensible figure by multiplying the band by the floor area each key really carries.
One key carries its bedroom and en-suite, plus a share of corridors, stairs, lifts, public areas and back of house. In a boutique hotel with generous public areas that share is large. In a compact city hotel it is small.
| Assumed floor area per key | Cost per room, £1,650 to £2,100 per m² | London, about 9% higher |
|---|---|---|
| 25 m² | £41,250 to £52,500 | £45,000 to £57,200 |
| 35 m² | £57,750 to £73,500 | £62,900 to £80,100 |
| 45 m² | £74,250 to £94,500 | £80,900 to £103,000 |
This is arithmetic, not a quote. The floor areas are our assumptions, chosen to show the spread. Your hotel has its own number, and it moves the result more than anything else on the page.
Scale it to the building. A 40-key hotel at 35 m² per key has about 1,400 m². At the same band that is roughly £2.31 million to £2.94 million before FF&E, fees and VAT. Our calculator on the hotel refurbishment contractors page uses three tiers inside the band, with a range of 15% either side.
Soft, hard and full hotel refurbishment
The scope you choose changes the cost more than the rate does. Most hotels do a mix, but each type sits at a different point in the band.
| Type | What it covers | How it is phased |
|---|---|---|
| Soft | Decoration, carpets, curtains, loose furniture, lighting | Room by room, often while the hotel trades |
| Hard | Bathrooms, fixed joinery, ceilings, flooring, services within rooms | Floors or wings out of service |
| Full | Layout changes, new rooms, new plant, public areas, facade | Often a full or long partial closure |
Soft work is the cheapest because it leaves the walls, bathrooms and services alone. A soft refresh costs far less per room than a strip-out, and the gap is the point of the exercise. We do not put a pound figure on each type: no UK source publishes one.
Hard refurbishment is where the cost climbs. Bathrooms need drainage, waterproofing, ventilation and tiling, and they disturb the rooms next door. Services in older hotels often need replacing too: hot water, air conditioning, electrics and data.
Our hotel refurbishment guide explains the three types, the sample room and the fire and access rules in full. Use it to decide the scope, then come back here to price it.
What a per-room figure leaves out
A per-room figure is complete only when these lines sit beside it. Each is outside the Laxton's band.
- FF&E and OS&E: beds, seating, lighting, curtains, linen and crockery. Our guide to FF&E in hotels explains the split and how to budget it.
- Professional fees: design, cost consultant, building control and surveys. Name the line, then size it from the actual appointments.
- VAT: the standard rate is 20% on most goods and services, per gov.uk. Check your own position with your adviser.
- Kitchen: priced per m² of kitchen, not per m² of hotel, so a new kitchen needs its own line.
- Listed fabric: works that affect a listed building's character need listed building consent, interiors included. Consent adds time and specification cost.
- Contingency: older hotels hide earlier alterations. Our guide on how much contingency a construction project needs explains how to set it.
- Lost room-nights: every room off sale is revenue you do not collect. It belongs in the budget even though no contractor invoices it.
Tax can claw some of this back. Many FF&E items can qualify for relief, so read our guide to capital allowances and speak to your tax adviser before you buy.
Accessible rooms need their own line too. Approved Document M Volume 2 recommends one wheelchair-accessible bedroom for every 20 bedrooms, or part of 20. A 40-key hotel needs at least two, and they are rarely the cheapest rooms to fit out.
Craftex has completed a range of both small and large-scale projects on our commercial property with exceptional precision and quality. Dmitriy consistently delivers courteous, prompt service and has shown great flexibility in accommodating last-minute changes to plans and timelines. I highly recommend Craftex for their professionalism and outstanding workmanship.
How phasing changes the hotel refurbishment cost
Phasing moves cost between two columns: the build and the revenue. The three options trade one against the other. Our guide covers how each is run, so here is what each does to the budget.
| Option | Build cost | Revenue during works |
|---|---|---|
| Close fully | Lowest: shortest programme, no separation needed | None |
| Floor by floor or wing by wing | Higher: protection, separate access, restricted hours | Kept on open floors |
| Room by room | Highest per room for anything beyond soft work | Kept on all other rooms |
Closing fully is the cheapest build and the most expensive month. Phased work protects income but lengthens the programme, so the preliminaries run for longer and noisy work waits for agreed hours.
Compare the options as net cost: build cost plus lost revenue plus the cost of the review score if guests are disturbed. A longer, phased programme often wins on that sum for a hotel with strong occupancy.
Sloane Place in Chelsea is a 27-key boutique hotel in a five-storey Victorian building. We took part in that refurbishment, which ran for 28 weeks floor by floor next to a members' club that stayed open. Its Sloane Place case study records the phasing.
How to get a hotel refurbishment figure you can take to the board
A per-m² band gets you to the first meeting. A figure for a lender or a board needs the building behind it. Four steps turn the range into a number.
- Survey the fabric and services. Condition, hidden alterations, plant, fire strategy and heritage limits set the real scope.
- Build a sample room. One finished bedroom gives the true cost per room and the true time per room. Scale it to each room type.
- Price room by room. Standard, superior, suite and accessible rooms each carry their own number, with public areas and back of house priced from the plans.
- Fix the price before you sign. Agree the scope, phasing and dates in writing, so the figure survives to handover.
Compare any figure you hold against the sample room, not against a rule of thumb. Cost per room ranges widely in the table above for a reason: it follows the floor area, the scope and the phasing.
Use this list before the budget goes to the board. Send us the room count and get a free room-by-room cost plan. Already have a quote? Send it to us. We'll beat it. We take hotel works from £100,000.
- The floor area per key stated, with corridors and public areas shown
- Scope named for each room type: soft, hard or full
- A sample room priced and signed off before the main order
- FF&E and OS&E on their own lines, with a separate contingency
- Professional fees named and sized from real appointments
- VAT at 20% added, and tax relief raised with your adviser
- Listed building consent checked if the hotel is listed
- A separate line for the wheelchair-accessible bedrooms
- Phasing compared as build cost plus lost room-nights
- A fixed price and dates agreed in writing before you sign
