Flexible date searches: finding your holiday cottage by the dates that suit you

Flexible date searches: finding your holiday cottage by the dates that suit you

Frustrated!!! That’s exactly how we felt trying to find a suitable holiday cottage before we set up HolidayCottageCompare.com.

Frustrated that, amongst other things, other web sites require you to know exactly when you want to travel before they will return any holiday cottages for your search.

And if the week you select doesn’t return your perfect cottage, then you have to start the whole search again using a different week.

And don’t get us started on having to do the whole thing again if you decide to change your chosen location. Oh it drove us mad!

So we decided to do something about it. We put the holiday maker at the heart of our design process and made sure our date selection is as flexible as it could possibly be:

Find your holiday cottage with exact dates

If you know exactly when you want to travel then the ‘Exact dates’ box is for you!

You might only want to see holiday cottages available on a precise date e.g. Friday 15^th April 2016.

Or you might want to select your start date but have it flexible by one (or up to seven) days.  Flexibility can be helpful, as many properties have start days of either a Friday or Saturday.

This box lets you choose how long you fancy staying as well as letting you select a minimum and maximum budget, if this is important to you.

Find your holiday cottage with flexible dates

Want to look for holiday cottages over a longer period? E.g. the school holidays?

The ‘Flexible dates’ box lets you select any dates, from the next calendar day up to 18 months in advance, which is great for looking ahead to school holidays in the summer or half term (especially as school holiday dates vary from county to county).

As with the ‘Exact dates’ box, the ‘Flexible dates’ box also lets you choose how many nights you would like to stay, as well as allowing you to select a minimum and maximum budget.

Find your holiday cottage with no dates

Don’t mind when you travel? Perhaps budget is more important and you’re pretty flexible about when you can get away? No problem. Simply select ‘I don’t mind when’ and we’ll show you all the cottages within your chosen location.

But what if you’ve chosen one of the above options, hit ‘Search’ and then changed your mind? No problem! The ‘edit’ or ‘reset’ options allow you to change your dates in an flash. Easy.

So there you have it. Searching for a holiday cottage as flexible as you could wish for.

Read more helpful tips on finding your perfect holiday cottage.