Coastal Suites Resort — Hotel in Benzonia Township

Hoping this honest reviews helps anyone interested in booking with Coastal Suites.

We try to support small, local businesses as much as possible, which is why we chose Coastal Suites vs. a larger chain that was cheaper in price.

Coming in from Seattle, we booked this for a wedding we were attending nearby for one of my boyfriend's best friends. Unfortunately, we came down with Covid and immediately tried to get in touch with this hotel to cancel our reservation. Their line rang endlessly and instead of being able to leave a voicemail, the call ended with a continuous busy signal after regular dial tones. I must have called at least 20 times when we were within the 7 day cancellation policy. I eventually got through to their voicemail and left a total of 2-3 voicemails, in which I stated the issue with their line and not being able to get through to a person or leave a VM, at the very least. Those also went unanswered. By the time the crew got back to me, we were conveniently outside the 7 days to cancel for a full refund.

I then asked to get in touch with the manager, as no one seemed empathetic, understanding, or helpful in dealing with this already painful situation. I spoke with Cari, the general manager, over text, as she wouldn't call me…She coldly offered me a 50% refund as a best case scenario, ignoring all the steps I took to cancel and get 100% of the reservation back. She then said 100% would only be possible if they filled the room, which didn't seem fair at all. I then asked to speak with the owner.

The next day, I received an email from Anna, one of the owners. She also avoided the phone call I requested and blamed meetings…I, too, am in meetings most of the day, but there is always 5 minutes that can be found, especially given all I had gone through up to this point. She also pressured me into cancelling the reservation so they could try to re-rent the room, but I wasn't comfortable potentially losing 50% of this reservation if they didn't rebook it (they had 2 other rooms that were cheaper available so the odds didn't seem good). I gave her full context of what happened up to this point, and she disregarded all of it, referring back to the cancellation policy. I did explain that I would be involving my credit card company to dispute the full charge as well as write an honest review, since we tried cancelling many times within the cancellation policy. Instead of doing the right thing, she stated "Please note, threatening to harm our business with a false review disqualifies you from receiving a full refund regardless of whether it gets booked, so I do not recommend taking that action." Following these communications, I received 2 more calls from the staff "returning my calls" from weeks prior…each time I re-explained what happened and pleaded for them to do the right thing.

At this point, we've been fully credited by our credit card company and I'm summarizing what happened to us in detail so you are fully aware with who you are booking with. Rest assured nothing written here is falsified and I'm only highlighting the "customer service" behind this company. I have full receipts of everything, in case anyone from this company tries to say anything to the contrary.

As painful as it was to have to cancel this very important trip, the owners of this location did nothing to sympathize with our situation, let alone take ownership for their flawed phone system and their overall lack of organization/customer service, and all over $200 (total reservation was $400). Please don't book with this company, as our friends were very happy booking elsewhere for...

We stayed in Unit 2- two bedrooms suite with kitchenette as a family of 4. For 7 nights. Two adults and two kids (10 & 6). We always vacation in northern Michigan every summer and very familiar with the rustic style of hotels/motels up here.

Pros: *Location, we loved being close to Beulah, Frankfort, Sleeping bear *Two bedrooms with doors so we could separate *Kids loved the breakfast room and felt comfortable going to get breakfast on their own *Fridge was newer and nice to have. *Quick response from owners- if we had complaints or requests they responded quickly. We needed more towels at one point and trash pulled and they were very responsive. The beds were small but no one felt they were uncomfortable. We all slept very good.

Cons: *Smelled. Room smelled very musty. There was a dehumidifier in the room that we had to empty 1-2 times per day. *Loud. There was 3 A/C units in the suite- one in each room and one in the main living space. With the 3 A/Cs and the dehumidifier it was loud- if you like white noise machines, you will love it. *Small. Very, very tight in the bedrooms/kitchen/bathroom. not a place to hang out. It’s a place to sleep while you’re at the beach. It’s not a comfortable place to lounge and relax. *Power- a couple outlets didn’t work or we found our electronics wouldn’t charge fully. *Wifi- with kids and ourselves, we struggled to get WiFi for tablets/phones. We did complain and they checked the WiFi and said it was working outside of our room and asked other guests if they could access it. It might have been just our room, but we could only access it if we stood outside. We bought a WiFi extender and that was the only way we could get WiFi in our room- we are very tech savvy and would try every day at different times and the WiFi IN the room was inaccessible. *Didnt have outlets on each side of the bed. If you have a cpap machine you’ll need to be picky about where you’re sleeping.

Overall it was fine. If you go into it knowing it’s not fancy, it’s a place to sleep and have shelter it’s fine. We do wish there was a broom to sweep out sand we tracked back. The linoleum floors were nice. We did feel the pictures were misleading and thought it would be nicer than it was. It was fine but while we are used to the rustic motels of northern Michigan we realize we like to take lots of beach breaks and relax in our accommodations and didn’t think this place was very comfortable. Only one person could fit in the bathroom at one time and with kids we are used to a little more space/multi tasking. Kids were brushing their teeth in the kitchen while an adult showered. It was difficult when a kid was showering and an adult was trying to check on them, just very tight space. We loved the location but would look elsewhere before...

Due to extremely high costs of hotels in surrounding areas, we decided to choose Coastal Suites based on the reviews and pictures. I’m giving 1 star based on quality of room, our experience, and overall service.

We received an email the morning of checkin, which gave us the option of early checkin at noon rather than 4pm (great!). We did not arrive until later that evening; however, upon entering the room, there was a strong smell of ammonia. If the policy didn’t mention “no pets allowed”, I would have assumed there was dog/cat urine in the room. This immediately gave me cause for pause since the office was closed. Decided to turn the AC on to help air out, but still was unsure about the odors we were inhaling. Sheets appeared clean, comforter not so much. Floors had not been cleaned nor had the window in the shower area. Visible dirt and cobwebs located around the room. Pictures show visible black mold in shower and huge cobweb (you can’t see the spiders in the pic but they are there). Taking a shower was not the best experience considering we were eye to eye with spiders.. the upside is the water definitely got hot.

Would recommend keeping bathroom door open while showering given that there is no ventilation in the room (don’t think I located any ventilation throughout the entire room). Granted, given the location we were in, let me mention that the spiders were NOT the issue. Again, it was the lack of cleanliness and precarious odor.

Contacted the front desk first thing in the morning regarding the smell, all other rooms were sold out so we could not change rooms and the one we were offered had huge hole in drywall in the bathroom. We decided to just keep the room and someone was kind enough to spray the room. Unfortunately the odor returned later than night and barely slept due to the smell. Someone also came to clean the bathroom windows since it was apparent it hadn’t been touched in quite some time.

Spotted the manager in the car the next morning, who greeted us and thanked us for our stay. My only suggestion is to pay better attention to details/cleaning because this was really not okay. The second star is for the beautiful views of the water (do keep in mind these are private properties so you can’t get too close). Overall, we...