At the beginning of 20^th century, the hotel business became of one of the fastest growing businesses. It was due to the fact that in large cities and towns population was rapidly growing. In order to run the hotel business, business owners had to purchase a special license.  Jews understood the demand and they started constructing and converting existing buildings into hotels and furnished rooms for rent. In large towns there were special requirements for hotels: along central streets hotels could only be built from brick, which made the construction process very expensive. In order to increase the profitability and get a better return on investment, the first floor of buildings remained for shops and restaurants.  

The rooms were heated by stoves, hot water was delivered to the rooms in buckets by hotel workers. Candles were used in those hotels where there was no electricity.  Those who couldn’t afford to stay at hotels could rent a furnished room.  Hotel room rate could have been anywhere from 3 to 10 rubles, and furnished rooms’ rate was between 50 kop to 1.5 rub.