Traverse Bay Inn — Hotel in East Bay Township

Excellent stay - Highly Recommend

Bit of a long review, but want to share experience and encourage others to stay here.

We’re a family of 5; 3 kids are college age and it tough finding affordable places with room for all. We booked a room through the website, which described room with 4 beds (2 Queens and 2 Doubles) and had pictures of fairly nice sized rooms. When we arrived, the unit provided had 1 Queen and 2 Doubles. We contacted office and they said there is no room with 4 beds; they had recently changed website managers and there must have been some mistake. In a rare moment of TRUE CUSTOMER SERVICE, we were provided a second room, free of charge, for entire stay. Thank you for stepping up and making our stay a good one!

Our units were very clean. In addition to family trips, I’ve done a lot of business travel. The cleanliness of the units was excellent. We were offered housekeeping during stay and declined it.

It wouldn’t be appropriate to say luxury, but the units were well kept and functional. Towels and bedding were nice. The beds were comfortable. The other furniture could use a bit of upgrading. The units were quiet and well heated. Large closets! Water was hot and plentiful. Our units had a small kitchen area with full sized refrigerator, stove, sink, real coffee maker, and other kitchen items - didn’t cook a meal, but used space for snacks and light breakfasts. In all honesty, the more casual feel made the stay more relaxing.

We were visiting family and friends in the area for 3 nights and didn’t spend great lengths of time in the rooms; other than an hour or so before and after a full night’s sleep. For families staying longer, who may spend longer family time in the room, there could be a couple minor issues;

-There was a small sofa for 2 adults (not a sleeper sofa) and two dining chairs in the unit. It would have been tough for all 5 of us to sit in one of the units. (Maybe a folding chair or two tucked in the unit’s closet?)

-There aren’t enough towel hooks. There was one towel hook in each unit. I complain about lack of towel hooks in almost every hotel we stay. While hotels suggest we can save the planet by simply reusing towels, most don’t have enough hooks/whatever to hang used towels. (Again, the closets in the units were larger and might be an ideal spot for more towel hooks.)

-One unit had carpet, the other that industrial vinyl. The carpeted unit seemed cozier, quieter with less stuff (sidewalks had deicer) tracked in. This seems really minor and I sure if we requested housekeeping the vinyl floor would have been cleaned spotless. But, for a longer stay, the carpet was nicer and could be a more inviting spot for sitting for extended TV watching.

Overall, I highly recommend the Traverse Bay Inn. I’ve had the good fortune to space in some “fancy” places - and this place (especially the staff) hits all the right marks for a family. The accommodations are basic, but functional with good space for a family to stretch out. (Except for number of beds, the 5 of us would have been good, space wise, in one unit). The staff is friendly and excellent. The price for our entire 3 night stay was what other places in the area were asking for 1 night. This was our second stay and now will be our go-to place for...

The 'gentleman' that owns this place is down right rude and a liar. My husband and I were moving up to Traverse City from 4 hours south and needed a place to stay while we waited for our apartments to open. We had called well in advance to this establishment to make sure they would be open for us to check in when we got there (around 5:45pm). He said they would be open and that was that. We got up here a little earlier than our expected arrival and went to rent our room and the office was locked up and lights were out! Before 6pm! We tried calling to see if there was a mix up but got no answer. Disappointed and confused we went over to points north (highly recommend) and stayed the night as my husband worked the next morning. The next day we called the inn again around noon to make our reservation and upon inquiry about them being closed early the night before the owner called us liars and then demanded a credit card on file for renting the room. We explained to him we would be paying with a debit card and would like to put that on file as our form of payment and he flat out said no, it has to be a credit card regardless of how we were paying. My husband questioned him and the owner started yelling at him... yelling... he gave no viable reason as to why we could not give him the card number we were going to be paying with (a Mastercard). Then we tried to be accomodating and offered to drive over to the inn on our lunch and make the reservation IN PERSON with the card we would be paying with and he said he wouldn't even rent a room out to us. Mind you the inn was not full either. There were 2 cars in the parking lot the 2 days we were trying to stay here. At this point my husband just hung up the phone. That is no way to conduct business or speak to potential customers. If i could give this place zero...

Stayed here from Monday-Saturday. I am very lenient when rating so my 3 star review could easily be a 2 or even 1 star for more picky/detailed people.

We chose Traverse Bay Inn mainly because of price and they fact that they have two bedroom suites. I have 4 young children so bedrooms were a must. To start out, the rooms and property are decent upon arrival. Yes, the rooms are outdated. The pool is small but clean and fun for the kiddos. The biggest turn off for us was how filthy the carpet was as well as the random ants that were crawling around on the counter. Now, I’m not afraid of ants, lol, but c’mon, they shouldn’t be present inside the rooms. My kids are 6,4,2 and 8 months and they wanted to play on the floor with their toys, but we CONSTANTLY had to remind them to stand up and play on their beds. Just walking around in the rooms barefoot gave us black feet in a matter of minutes. We decided to wear flip flops the remainder of the stay. Our kids on the other hand still walked barefoot at times so we had to clean their feet 2-3 times per day.

I understand that their prices are pretty low, but there’re absolutely ZERO reasons why they should have their carpet cleaned or replaced.

The cleaning crew was decent at best also. Each day there were random crumbs left behind and a day or two our beds weren’t even made (no biggie). We more than likely won’t stay here again. We’d rather pay an extra 50-75/night for a...