One-time payment B&B website: buy your site outright

Q: What does the £1,999 one-time payment actually include?

The full build: design and copy written for your property, your rooms and photos, your booking engine embedded (freetobook, eviivo, or Stripe card payments), hosting and domain set up, up to 8 pages, 2 rounds of revisions and a 3-month warranty. Commission on your bookings is 0%, forever.

Last updated: October 2026

A one-time payment B&B website means you pay for the build once and own the site. No monthly platform fee, no per-booking cut. directbook.uk hand-builds it for £1,999, once. The alternative is renting: Lodgify from $26 a month or a builder like Wix from £9 a month, where stopping payment means losing the website. This page is for owners who are done with subscriptions.

The two ways to pay for a website

Renting (subscription). You pay monthly or yearly for software or a builder plan. The site lives on their platform, and if you stop paying, the site goes with it. Examples: Lodgify, Wix, Squarespace. The appeal is low upfront cost and everything bundled. The catch is the payments never stop.

Buying outright (one-time). You pay once for the build and the site is yours. Examples: a web agency build, or a done-for-you one-time service like directbook.uk. The appeal is ownership and a known total cost. The catch is the upfront payment.

Neither model is a trick. They suit different owners, which is what the rest of this page is about.

Subscription vs outright, side by side

Route	What you pay	Five-year total	Who builds it	Do you own it?
Lodgify Starter, billed annually	$26/month	$1,560 (about £1,230)	You do, from templates	No
Wix Light, billed annually	£9/month	£540, plus VAT	You do, from templates	No
General web agency	£2,500 to £25,000+ once	Build fee plus hosting and maintenance plans	They do	Yes
directbook.uk	£1,999 once	£1,999, plus optional care plan	We do, by hand	Yes

Lodgify prices from its public pricing page (annual billing; monthly billing is higher). Wix Light at £9/month on annual billing, VAT added on top. Currency conversions are approximate. Checked October 2026.

The five-year maths

Wix Light: £9 x 60 months = £540, plus VAT, plus domain renewal after the free first year. You build and maintain the site yourself.
Lodgify Starter, annual billing: $26 x 60 months = $1,560 (roughly £1,230). You build and maintain the site yourself, from templates.
General agency: £2,500 to £25,000+ once (2026 UK pricing guides), then hosting and maintenance plans on top, year after year.
directbook.uk: £1,999 once. A person hand-builds the site for you, with 2 revision rounds and a 3-month warranty included.

The subscription routes look cheaper until you multiply. The agency route looks premium until you add the maintenance plans. The one-time specialist build sits in the middle: more than renting, far less than an agency, and the total is known on day one.

After you pay once, what still costs money?

This is the honest part, because "no monthly fee" deserves a precise definition. After the one-time £1,999 build, here is every cost that can still exist, and who it goes to:

Hosting: £0, ongoing. Hosting is included in the build. You never receive a hosting bill from us.
Domain: around £10 to 15 a year. Your .co.uk is registered in your name and you renew it directly with the registrar, or the care plan covers the renewal for you.
Changes and updates: fixes are covered by the 3-month warranty. After that, the optional care plan at £499 per year covers small changes, or one-off changes are £100 per hour, always quoted before any work starts.
Booking engine: freetobook's booking engine is free. If you use its channel manager, that costs £1.50 per channel booking, minimum £9 a month, capped at £99 a month, plus a one-off £49 connection fee per channel, paid to freetobook. eviivo bills at its own current rates.
Card payments: if guests pay by card through your own Stripe account, UK cards cost about 1.5% + 20p per payment, paid to Stripe.

So "no monthly fee" means no platform rent, ever. The only recurring money leaves your pocket to third parties you chose yourself (the domain registrar, Stripe, and freetobook if you use its channels), plus our own optional subscriptions if you take them: the care plan (£499/year) or the AI phone add-on (£149/month). Compare that with the full cost breakdown across every route in our B&B website cost guide.

Who outright purchase suits

You are done with subscriptions. You want to own the asset, not rent it, and you like knowing the total cost on day one.
You want it built for you. Templates and DIY builders are not how you want to spend your evenings. A person builds this one, from your photos and details.
You already take bookings every week. If OTA commission already annoys you, a 0%-commission site you own pays for itself with the first bookings that move direct.
You are settled, not experimenting. The B&B is an ongoing business and the website is long-term infrastructure, not a trial.

Who it does not suit

Your time is free and you enjoy tinkering. Wix at £9 a month or Lodgify on subscription costs less cash if you genuinely like building it yourself.
You are still testing whether the B&B works. A low-commitment rental makes more sense while the business is an experiment.
You need a full property management system built in. Channel manager, PMS and automation under one roof is Lodgify territory; a one-time website works alongside your existing freetobook or eviivo account instead.
You redesign constantly and want unlimited edits bundled. One-time means the build is finished and owned; ongoing tinkering is what the care plan or hourly changes are for.

How this page differs from the cost guide

Our B&B website cost guide answers "how much does a B&B website cost" across every route, with the price of each option broken down. This page answers a narrower question: "how do I buy a website once and never pay a platform again." Read the cost guide to compare prices; read this page to decide on the purchase model.

Common questions

What does the £1,999 one-time payment actually include?

Design and copy written for your property, your rooms and photos, your booking engine embedded (freetobook, eviivo, or Stripe card payments), hosting and domain set up, up to 8 pages, 2 rounds of revisions and a 3-month warranty. Commission on your bookings is 0%, forever. A £9.90 hand-built demo comes first so you see your actual site before you commit, and the demo fee is credited toward the build.

Do I really own the website outright?

Yes. The domain is registered in your name and the site is yours to keep. There is no platform to keep paying: if you cancel the optional care plan, the website stays up exactly as it is.

What if I need changes in year two or three?

The optional care plan at £499 per year covers small changes, hosting upkeep and domain renewal. Without it, changes after the 3-month warranty are £100 per hour, always quoted before any work starts.

Is there really no monthly fee, ever?

There is no monthly platform fee from us, ever. The only recurring money is paid to third parties you choose (your domain renewal, Stripe card fees or freetobook channel fees), plus our own optional subscriptions if you take them: the care plan (£499/year) or the AI phone add-on (£149/month), all at those providers' published rates.

Own your website. Pay once.

Hand-built B&B website, £1,999 one-time, 0% commission. See your own property first with a £9.90 demo.

Try a £9.90 demo

Questions? Call +44 7727 811227 (24/7 AI) · WhatsApp (human) · hello@directbook.uk

Last checked: 14 October 2026. Figures: directbook.uk pricing and the providers' public pricing pages linked in our cost guide. Third-party rates (Lodgify, Wix, freetobook, Stripe, registrars) are set by those providers and can change; confirm current rates with them. General guidance only, not financial advice.