Stockton Inns — Hotel in Cape May

I have NEVER IN MY ENTIRE LIFE been treated so badly by a business. HORRIBLE HORRIBLE HORRIBLE. If I could give zero stars I would. We booked our room for two adults and two children. When we arrived, we were told by the front desk (very rudely from the beginning) that we only booked two adults and no children. We tried booking an alternate room for 4 but all they had was a two night minimum and we were only staying for one night. They made NO ATTEMPT to help us out or meet us halfway. So to placate the business we made alternate arrangements for our children (both under the age of 3!) to stay with a grandparent. We were annoyed, but we thought we'd be good. When we got off the beach later we brought the kids with us to change diapers and get them ready to stay with mom moms. A minute later we get a call from the front desk asking if you kids were in the room. What?...Yes, they're with us, we're getting ready for dinner. Well, apparently our two children cannot even step foot in this room. EVER. The front desk harassed us and the woman was again incredibly rude and did nothing to be helpful or offer alternate solutions. Then she hung up the phone on us. She made us so upset and uncomfortable that we left. We asked for our money back, we were in the room for about 15 minutes total, and of course they said no. They accused us of intending to have our kids stay the night which was ludicrous since we bent over backwards to make alternate plans. All we wanted was to have a nice little night in Cape May and the experience was completely ruined by this zero star...

1. I was between the Manor & the Inn & am glad we chose the Inn. We had a king room for 2 people. The room is big. Well laid out. Nice view of the ocean. The only drawback is that the wall AC is really loud. It is an older unit and every time the condenser kicked on during the night sounded like a jet taking off.

2. can’t beat this location. During the day it took like 4 minutes to get from the sand back to the room to resupply. Across the street is a great lobster roll place, and even better Asian bowl place, and a decent enough bagel place. I appreciated the chairs out in front of the room to sit outside. The pool is a nice alternative to the beach.

3. the front desk person when we checked in was all business. From the reviews, it is clear that people are not used to that. But those people need to realize policies exist often because of effect. I stayed at a similar style place in OCNJ. The pool was filled with non paying “guests” of motel clients. Random people showering. It is easy to see why the motel, especially so close to the beach, is on top of their non guests policies, otherwise people ALWAYS take advantage (give an inch and people take a mile). BTW: people are used to post covid world service; I actually liked that our room got cleaned while we were out. I wasn’t expecting fresh towels!! Who does that anymore!

In the end, we are already planning...

We knew what we were getting with a 2-star inn. We also knew we were paying a premium price as we booked for 4th of July weekend. While we will return to Cape May, we probably won't go back to Stockton Inn. Pros: Great location - across the street from the beach, close to the center of town. We never used the car once we arrived. The pool is very clean and well maintained, our kids loved it. Spacious room, Comfy bed. Mehs: Room is dated, no elevators, no microwave. Lock on the door seemed not the best - after a random middle of the night phone call to our room that freaked me out I began blocking the door with a piece of furniture (I'm sure i was overreacting). Cons: Inn has particular rules, including that there is no check in after 8pm, no exceptions. This didn't affect us, but I was just praying we didn't have any crazy unforeseen travel disruption. They do not provide extra towels - thankfully they warn you about this and so we brought pool towels from home. Upon check in our floor was sandy... not surprising given its a beach hotel, but you'd hope on check in the floor...