£12 to sleep in a hammock, £18 for a night in a hut and £11 to rent a half-completed tree house: New 'anti-luxury' holiday rental site offers primitive properties for students

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Had enough of extravagant holidays? Tired of five-star suites, three-hundred thread count sheets and room service?

Then why not stay in a hovel? Or, to be precise, a half-completed treehouse with no bathroom facilities for £11 ($19) a night.

The latest holiday accommodation craze comes courtesy of hovelstay.com, a website which specialises in ‘anti-luxury’ holiday rooms for travellers on a shoestring budget. 

Hawaiian Kine Healing Retreat: The 18' yurt, which costs £15 a night, is surrounded by a fenced courtyard and advertised as an 'extremely relaxing retreat for one or more persons.' 

Dome hideaway in South Carolina: This hobbit-esque hovel will set travellers back £45 a night and is registered as hurricane-proof on the website

But not every traveller can take advantage of the rock bottom rates as bookings are only accepted from those enrolled in college or university and have a valid student ID card. 

The recently launched website, based in Glendale California, was set up by three friends who wanted to offer college students inexpensive travel digs.

And the rather unusual approach seems to have taken off as, according to reports, the site has secured more than £700,000 ($1.2m) funding from investors in London and Dubai.

The £11 a night Half Completed Tree House in Los Angeles offers 'incredible views of the neighbouring yards.' There are no loo facilities though and would-be renters are advised to use the nearby Valerio Service station

The £15 a night yurt (left) comes with two camp bed. The website also offers the chance to hang out out in a covered patio in a Nicaraguan hammock for £12 a night

Guests can book to stay in Puka Hale - a tiny hut in a volcanic crater on the property of the Hedonisia Hawaii Sustainable Community and costs £18 a night

‘We really wanted to be the anti-luxury vacation rental site,’ Micheal Bolger, CEO and co-founder of hovelstay.com said.

‘Two of us who had years in the vacation rental business were always floored at how serious a lot of these vacation rental sites took their properties, describing the, as luxury when in fact they weren’t.’

All rooms listed on the site are priced at less than £60 ($99) and students can reserve them for a night, a week or a semester.

Hawaiian Kine Healing Retreat: The 18'' yurt boasts two hammocks and it's very own hut. All for £15 a night

Inside the £18 a night Puka Hale retreat which boasts two camp beds and is perfect for those travelling on a budget

A two-storey house in Quevedo city Ecuador is located in a 'safe neighbourhood' and cost £7 a night

The site offers three different groups of living quarters: Clean & Comfortable – ‘As close as staying in your own room when visiting home as you can get’; Good Enough – ‘Spring break(ish) accommodations, usually in a really good neighbourhood; and Survivor Hotels – ‘For the thrillseeker.’

‘So we decided on the approach of full disclosure – if it’s a dump, we would love to have it, and students are in on this kind of experience. It’s not just where you stay, it’s what happens when you stay there.

‘The same experience as when you backpack through Europe during a summer break – when you’re willing to sleep on a bale of hay inside of a barn in Germany to save money. That’s what we are selling. 

The lovely Sukah BaGalil property on the summit of Mount Canaan is located at the Jewish Institute of Medicine and surrounded by organic herb and botanical gardens. It will cost students £33 a night to stay there

The 3,000sq ft Playa Dominical Costa Rica Jungle Hovel was built from three shipping containers and is connected to a 90-acre nature reserve. A bargain at £3 a night

Each shipping container room of the Playa Dominical Costa Rica Jungle Hovel is furnished with two single beds and minimal storage space

‘But, to be on the safe side, we do have some cool luxury listings, too.

The primitive properties on the site range from a tiny two-bed hut in a volcanic crater in Hawaii at £18 ($30) a night, a Mermaid Cottage in Del Norte Colorado for £59 ($99) a night and a £12 ($20) a night hammock on someone’s back patio.

'Luxury listings' include the Aloha Love Bus £18 ($30), parked in Pahoa Hawaii, the £33 ($55) a night Sukah BaGalil Rosemary Hut on Mount Canaan and a palatial boat, docked in Miami at £30 ($50) a night.