Extended Stay America Suites- Raleigh - North Raleigh - Wake Towne Drive — Hotel in Raleigh

I am a travel worker and my company utilizes Extended Stay America. This has been by far the worst experience I have ever encounter with the company! If I could leave 0 stars, I would! To travel 11 hours and be disappointed immediately is unacceptable. The pictures online are extremely misleading and looks nothing like the actual furniture in the hotel rooms. A refund was requested after an immediate issue less than an hour of my stay and after seeing the actual room, but I was told they do not offer refunds. I feel forced to stay here in order to not lose out on over $1,000. Like any other stay, my plan was to extend my stay for the duration of my travel contract which is 13 weeks. I will absolute NOT be doing so and would like to leave now but again, do not want to lose out on my money since I was denied a refund and had not been here for a hour. As of today, I have been here for 1 week and it has been an extremely miserable week. As stated above, the rooms are awful! I refuse to bring my belongings out of my car because I do not want to sit them down, let alone sleep on the bedding. The walls are filthy, the carpet is visibly dirty and needs cleaning, the appliances are extremely old and the knobs to the stove does not stay on. I had an incident where the toilet was clogged and I reached out to front desk (who has been horrible since my arrival on 5/17/2025) I was told that housekeeping had left for the day and I was welcomed to utilize the plunger she had. How disgusting and rude is that to tell a guest to plunge their toilet? I told her absolutely not and contacted the front desk again the next day while I was at work. Once the rude young lady realized it was me, she stated "she would get a housekeeper to my room" and hung up in my face. I arrived back at the hotel roughly 3-4 hours later to see that everything was still in place, toilet still clogged, and room untouched. I then contacted the front desk again and she stated she could offer me the plunger again. We had a back and forth exchange and I requested a room transfer and was denied. She stated they do not transfer rooms unless there was an emergency as if me having a non working toilet was not an emergency. I requested to speak with the manager and was denied for the 10th time. A short time after, I received a call to my cell phone that my room would be changed. My current room is horrific! Way worse than the previous room. There are cigarette holes in the head board, the furniture is in deplorable conditions and should have been discarded long ago, and there is a horrible odor in the room, along with visibly disgusting carpet. Like the previous room. the walls are disgusting with some sort of oil residue on it. The light switches have stuff on them, which indicated they have not been properly cleaned. It is clear that housekeeping does not do a thorough job cleaning the living quarters. That is if they come by considering even with my request, I have never had a housekeeper do rounds to either of my rooms and again, its been a week. This has been a horrible experience and in all honestly, I do not feel safe here. I have never felt so uneasy or unsettling at an assignment stay. There is so much traffic here at this hotel that I do not feel like this is a safe place for me yet I have been refused a refund several times and have demanded, begged, and pleaded to speak with a supervisor and have been denied each time. I'm always told "they're not in" or "they're busy" by the same staff member of course. Some how they always seem to be available when she reached out. She is the only staff member I have had encounters with and each one has not been pleasant. From what I've seen, she is working day and night. Yesterday, 5/23/2025 was my first time seeing a new face. Otherwise, it is the young lady who shows up to working in leggings and a tank top with her stomach out.

Sadly, this is just a brief synopsis of my concerns and disappointments. I have already made my agency aware so that other travelers with Aya does not experience what I've had to go...

The date was April 29th. A Tuesday, to be exact. I had embarked on a six hour journey with my wife, my brother, and our dear friend for a little getaway to try and take our minds off the collective stresses of everyday life. It was a trip we had been planning for months, to travel here to attend a two-night concert for our favorite band. The excitement was palpable, and we could hardly wait to make it to our hotel so our adventure could begin.

But as we pulled up to the hotel, something immediately seemed amiss. A darkened lobby, with what seemed to be no one attending the front desk. “Never fear.” I told my group. “It’s currently midnight. I’m sure this is perfectly normal.” I reasoned, before making my way inside as the rest of the group began unpacking the car. Once inside, It seemed as if the oddities just continued to stack. The lobby smelled of marijuana, and was mostly dark. There was no bell or any way to signal any sort of worker, and so after a few knocks on the desk and calling out with no response, I feared that I may have been too late. After two calls from my cell phone placed with no answer, I started to worry. That is, until my wife pointed out that someone had appeared at the desk.

Relieved at the revelation, I quickly made my way inside, posse and luggage in tow. The man at the counter apologized, and asked if I was the one who called. He said he was just about to answer, but I had hung up. I apologized for my error. We then went through the booking process, to which I was charged for the room despite having already paid for it through booking.com. I was assured that I had not in fact paid for it yet, and at that late hour I would have trusted anything this man said. After all, why would I have reason to believe otherwise? We got our room keys, and were then instructed not to go through the main lobby, but rather the side door. And so, turning around, we embarked.

And this is when things really began to turn.

The stairway smelled like it was used as the designated marijuana smoking area, and by the odor it seemed as if whoever purchased said drugs was on a budget given the assumed low quality of the smell. Ignoring this, we made our way to our rooms in hopes of getting a good nights rest in a quality hotel. However, upon reaching our rooms, we found that they were in a state of disrepair and deplorable conditions. My brother and our dear friend’s room had what looked to be red stains on the carpet that trailed underneath the bed, what seemed to be blood on their sheets (that did not belong to them), questionable stains that appeared to be bodily fluids on a black swivel chair, and carpet that appeared to not have been cleaned in ages. In my own room, we found a similarly stained chair with a back that appeared to have had cigarettes put out on the back of it. Our bathroom had what looked like burn stains on the sink, a bathroom door that would hardly close, a television that bore several scratches, and a door that had gaps large enough to see into the hallway through. My wife later informed me that she had found a live cockroach as well.

I attempted to go downstairs to inform the man at the desk of the issues, but no one was there. We attempted to call, with no answer. I decided to try and make the best of it anyway, and we went to bed. The next morning, after smelling the musty odor of discount store weed all night through the AC unit, i went to inquire of the room charge, to which I was told that the $509 that I paid a few weeks prior was nothing more than a hold put on my card by the booking company and that I would get it back. After calling said booking company, I was informed that was not the case and that I should not have paid anything to them, as I had already paid. Despite being very upset, I digress. We attended both nights of our concert, and departed. As I sit here writing this review, I pray that none of you make the mistake of staying here. Stay far away from this place. I assure you that anywhere truly is...

Worst service ever I reserved and booked a room for my son that was dropped off at the bus station on the other side of Raleigh and had to walk 10 miles to this hotel while I was reserving the room online I made sure to ask if there would be any type of security deposit once my son got there to check in. I was reassured over and over that no because I was booking the room online and filling out an authorization form that he would not have to pay anything. But once my son got there he was greeted by a very rude front desk employee who was very nasty when telling him he had to pay $200 cash deposit that would be returned to him once he checked out my son called me I told him no I already asked about that he did not have to pay that because I was reserving the room online, the lady at checkout proceeded to have an attitude and tell my son that she didn't care that I didn't speak to anyone at that hotel and that he had to have the $200 before he could check in. My son called me back I tried calling the front desk but again was directed to someone else I informed her of everything that went on she put me on hold called the front desk to tell them that I had filled out an authorization form online and that he shouldn't have to pay. The front desk told her that because it was I'm assuming after hours they had no way to print off the authorization form which none of this whatsoever was told to me while booking the room. My son called me I told him to go to the front desk and ask them could I email the authorization form she once again got rude with my son. My son went outside and because he is walking and is homeless he had to find somewhere to plug his phone up so he plugged it up on the outside of their building of the extended stay, while he was talking to me and we were trying to figure out somewhere to get him out of the cold the lady walked outside my son again just said excuse me ma'am the lady that my mom talked to said that you guys at the front desk should have asked if I had an authorization form she then told my son to leave the property or she would call the police. Now all of this is after I've already paid for the room, my son has walked 10 miles, and left there walked away turned around came back explain to them and was still told to leave the property. So people please watch and be careful how you reserve rooms online it is a ripoff it is a scam they are quick to take your money but not follow any type of guidelines or rules and when I asked to cancel the reservation I was told I would have to wait until the next day to do it and then there's going to be fees for me canceling because no one was there to cancel it at that time but they were there to make the reservation don't waste your money staying at this sorry Hotel it is...