Northumberland Stays

How we started

After a ten year search for the right property, we purchased our first holiday let in 2013 and were lucky enough to secure a cottage on Holy Island. The house was more of a second home for use to visit as a family, but to be able to afford such a luxury and to support the local island economy, we decided to welcome visitors to our home.

Hedgehope Cottage was already a holiday let when we bought it and we did take over a few bookings, but the island really does sell itself so before long we were inundated with requests and had to block out time so we could visit! We also had to factor in remedial work and time to make improvements, as we wanted to give our guests the best experience possible and show that we were reinvesting in the property to keep to the high standards we set ourselves.

Over time, we invested not only in the cottage itself, but in the systems and logistics to manage it. Did you know that there are 72 bits of legislation that apply to UK holiday cottages – more in Scotland and Wales – yet the industry remains unregulated and unlicenced, leading to a huge disparity in pricing and customer experience – not to mention safety! We set our own standards – clean, comfortable, compliant, affordable and fair. That is what you get when you stay at a Northumberland Stays property.

In 2021 we found another gorgeous property in Milfield and The Old Workshop – again an existing holiday let – became part of our portfolio. With two properties to manage, it somehow became more than double the work, with changing legislation and government policy. However, we made our plan and stuck to it and before long the bookings were coming at a steady pace – until just before Christmas 2022 disaster struck when our plumbing gave up and flooded the entire property following a big freeze/thaw event.

The subsequent clear up and total rebuild took over a year to complete, but we like to look on the positive side and were pleased to be able to alter the internal layout to accommodate the second bathroom that had been so longed for by our guests. We are proud of our refurbished house with its new furnishings and feedback from our guests this year would seem to validate our efforts.

The Team

Our family are all hugely invested in making our business a success – here’s a bit about each of them…

The Boss – Sam manages the day to day bookings, enquiries and issues and is the first point of contact our guests have for any questions before their stay, or mishaps during their stay.

The Wordsmith – Daisy is queen of saying things to make you want to buy it – she handles our social media and creates content for the websites, designs artwork and logos and makes sure she gets the perks of staying in the cottages whenever she can.

The Treasurer – Lucy is a whizz with the accounts and keeps us all in check when we think it is a good idea to buy a new TV or sofa – it’s ok though, as she makes sure we have enough pocket money to make your stay comfortable and pays the bills on time.

The Labourer – Nick gets to do all the little niggly jobs when he comes away to try to enjoy some downtime. He PAT tests anything with a plug and takes his chainsaw and full toolkit on holiday with him. He now thinks this is a perfectly normal way of packing for a holiday – but he does get time off for good behaviour to either yomp in the Cheviots or visit one of the many hostelries in the area.

We have assembled a great team around us – we live 220 miles away, so can’t be on-hand to welcome our guests and deal with minor issues – but our local team are amazing and react quickly to ensure our guests have a brilliant stay with us.

Shirley and Colin are our super housekeeping team. They clean the cottages until they shine, make sure there are clean towels and bedding, make minor repairs and report more major issues. They test the fire alarms to make sure we are compliant and they put the cottages back to rights and deal with whatever the guests have left. 

Gary is our all round go-to when we need help. Shower doesn’t work – Gary! House is flooding and the water needs to be turned off – Gary! Roof tile blew off in the wind – Gary! New lino needs putting in the bathroom in the short window we have between guests – Gary! 

How We Work

We try to ensure our terms and conditions are fair and our properties are clean, comfortable, compliant and affordable. Communication and managing expectations are key to us and as such we try to take direct bookings wherever possible rather than rely on the big online travel agents, who relieve you of more money than necessary in order to contribute to the huge commission they would charge us and make communication almost impossible prior to your stay. We use proper booking software and offer the ability to use your credit card to pay so you can have confidence in our brand that until now you had probably never heard of.

Whilst we try really hard to keep the properties up to scratch, sometimes things go wrong. We try to react to this in a timely manner and in a way that has least impact on your stay.

All we ask is that our guests treat our house and our team with respect and the many repeat visitors we have would seem to indicate that we are getting things right. Oh – and insurance – please get yourself some travel insurance! Businesses like ours lost huge amounts of income during Covid and we really can’t afford to refund bookings due to personal issues and illnesses – always happy to provide paperwork so you can claim off your insurance though. 

After you have stayed with us, you will be sent a link to leave us some feedback – all our reviews are published on the website and this helps future guests decide whether or not a holiday with Northumberland Stays is for them or not.

We look forward to welcoming you to one of our properties in the near future …