Banana Bungalow Hollywood Hotel & Hostel — Hotel in Los Angeles

Stayed here for 4 days as two female travellers and felt safe and like the staff was attentive. Some of the negative reviews here seem to not understand what a hostel is and/or have culture shock. Hostels don't provide the same level of service as other hotels and that's why they are considered budget accommodation. Don't expect daily housekeeping. Photocopying the credit card is normal in the states and even at restaurants they take your card to run it, there is no "machine" that they bring to the table. It isn't some giant scam like some people seem to think it is. When it comes to the homelessness outside, yes it is unpleasant to see but it is also LA and one needs to research not only the city but neighbourhood they are staying in. I come from a city with a very large homeless population so it was very familiar to me. What I liked about the hostel is that it is locked and you can only get in with a code, this made me feel safer. We stayed in a budget private room (no kitchen) and it was clean and they have amenities other hostels don't. For example breakfast and they even provide soap and shampoo. The room had a mini fridge and microwave, which a lot of hostels don't. The staff was very friendly and seemed actively engaged in trying to make the stay nice for guests.

This hostel is walking distance from the metro station Hollywood/Vine which is very handy because you can take the Flyaway from LAX to Union Station, get on the B line and go straight there. There is also bus 217 which stops right out front and happens to be a very useful route for seeing things (ex goes straight to The Grove). If you want to be near the Chinese Theatre, Dunkin' Donuts, CVS, Trader Joes and yummy mexican food this is a good location. Again, this area of Hollywood is known for not being the nicest part of town, do your research. But still as two female travellers we didn't feel unsafe. Late at night we took an Uber because we have common sense in a large city.

Some things we did notice were that there were no quite hours and sometimes that was a bummer but also, oh well, it's a hostel. Would have been nice though to have some at least from like 11 pm. For some reason we were really cold in our room, I think it's because the building is all concrete blocks. We went to the office and got more blankets after the first night and were fine for the rest of the time. In the office they have a side room where you can grab extra things like blankets and towels, that was great. Another thing was in our room the wifi was really weak and kept disconnecting to the point we couldn't use it. That was probably the biggest bummer, but apparently that's an issue with the room we specifically had? Another thing is that there were really loud motorcycles that revved so hard they shook the room all the days we stayed there. Might have been in the main courtyard and I wish there was some rule to stop people from doing that, cause that was disruptive.

Basically, if you have realistic expectations for a hostel and the area then you will be satisfied. It's safe and clean, with friendly staff. But please do fix...

I just moved to LA at the beginning or March and had to book this place last minute for the month. The two gentlemen that checked me in were amazing. One helped me with my bags to my room and the other one was more than patient with me after along day of travel (I was just tired). The rest of the staff was pretty friendly and easy to talk to, but there were two certain employees who were rude every day. Not just to me, but to everyone.

ALSO WHEN YOU CHECK IN OR BEFORE YOU BOOK YOUR STAY - MAKE SURE YOU HAVE PROOF OF TRAVEL

If you are in a dorm room or a private room - there really isn't any privacy when it comes to the staff. There were times through the night or day where they would just walk in the rooms. No knocking - nothing. There were times someone would walk in in the middle of the night shining flashlights around the room. A few times it was right into my face.

Housekeeping didn't seem to do much cleaning in the rooms. Once a week they would come and change the shower curtains and take out the bathroom trash. Everyday they would take out the dorm trash, but that was it. I was there for 20 days and there was only one time they swept and mopped the room.

The kitchen was very large, had a drink and snack vending machine, serval refrigerators, 3 stoves/ovens, 2 huge sinks, and plenty of space to prepare your food. However, only one of the stoves/ovens worked, trash was always over flowing, sinks were always dirty, and there wasn't the best selections of kitchen utensils/stuff to cook with. So having to share one stove top or oven while 3-4 people wanted to cook at the same time was a bit difficult.

They served "Breakfast" in the mornings. Which was tiny grab and go muffins, oatmeal, and coffee. The coffee was an all day thing which was nice. Only thing that sucked was that it was a "Once its gone - it's gone". If you weren't up and there as soon as the breakfast was out - you had 1/15 chance of getting some food.

The rooms were spacious enough. They did have lockers in them, but you had to purchase your own lock for it. Beds were not comfortable and the sheets would constantly come off the bed by the tiniest move. The blankets they gave you were like the ones you buy for your couch. Most of the rooms surrounded he courtyard area so you can hear everything and every conversation that happened through out the day or night.

My favorite thing about this place was the location. It was right where everything it is at and it was easy to get where you needed to. Along with meeting so many great people from all over the world. Last, but. not least every Wednesday and Friday night, a man named Kiki would come and do happy hour with us. On Friday he would make hotdogs and veggie burgers. All for free! Kiki is so nice and is so fun to be around and is always the life of the party.

Overall i give this...

The place was decorated well with a good sense of make a place look nice, nice colors, nice breakfast. Had a parking for an extra charge which was fine but if you park in front of someone else you had to give the car keys to reception at they move it which was not very pleasant to hear as personally had a rental vehicle and cannot risk others to drive it so it was a bit tricky situation but overall I would say it's an OK choice. The room size was fine and you could cook if you had time. Very clean, good job to the cleaners.It was good you could walk to the shops . I'm not that happy to pay that much money for this. On Friday night people were playing basketball until 01:00 am in the morning, we had to sleep because we were leaving early in the Morning and we couldn't because of the noise. People were making so much noise like they were inside the room, very unhappy with the fact there were no set times of when to keep the quiet times as not all are going for parties. I would say if you are planning of having a lot of noise around and party as well you can go in that place. You could get the hairdryer if you give the ID which is weird, most places the have the hairdryer attached to the wall so it could be a better solution rather than have to give personal ID with risk. Also they are taking a credit card in case of a damage of the room, they photo copy it and when you leave no body Check right you go if you have done something and the printed information stay with the hotel, it felt weird but the biggest was the noise and the carpet was proper dirty and my socks turn up black from white, obviously is not about cleaning it and hoover it but is about maintaining it and use a machine to clean it properly so you can have your shoes off. Not rules really apply in this place so it felt a bad choice and expensive.  I wouldn't go back to stay unfortunately unless there are some set up rules regarding the quit times. It didn't felt very safe to be honest, from.the main street people are waiting and it was a guy talking to someone from inside and went with us inside while we were entering the hotel and start looking the cars and go around the hotel and then left very quickly he was talking to someone but really don't know who stay in this...