A room booked for its low nightly rate frequently ends up costing more than a central one. The reason is that ground transport is charged per trip while the room is charged per night, and trips multiply.
Nightly rates and per-trip costs scale differently
Comparing a cheaper outlying room against a central one on rate alone ignores that the outlying room adds a fixed transport cost to every outing.
A group multiplies the transport side and not the room side, so the arithmetic reverses faster for four travelers than for one.
The comparison worth running is total cost per day including every expected movement, not the number displayed on the booking page.
Airport transfers are the largest single item
Ground transport from an airport is usually the most expensive short trip of a trip, because of distance, tolls, access fees and limited competition on the route.
It also happens at least twice, and the departure leg often falls at an hour when the cheap options are not running.
A room saving a modest amount per night can be erased by a single pair of airport rides, which is a common outcome on short stays.
Time has a cost even when it is not billed
An hour each way on a suburban bus is two hours a day removed from a trip that may only last three days.
Distance also suppresses the number of outings people make, because returning to the room in the middle of the day stops being practical.
That is a real reduction in what the trip delivers, even though it never shows up as a charge.
Transit access matters more than distance
A hotel far out on a frequent rail line can be cheaper and faster than one closer in with no service, since the constraint is connection quality rather than miles.
Frequency at the edges of the day is the variable that decides whether the line is usable, because early departures and late returns are when the schedule thins.
Checking the first and last service on the relevant line is a two-minute exercise that determines whether the saving survives the whole stay.
Where the outlying room genuinely wins
Long stays flip the arithmetic, because the nightly saving accumulates while transport costs are only incurred on days you travel.
Trips centered on something outside the city, such as a park, a conference or a family visit, may put the cheaper room closer to the actual destination.
Rooms with kitchen facilities and free parking shift it further, since both remove daily costs that a central location usually adds.