Sonesta Redondo Beach & Marina — Hotel in Redondo Beach

I reserved a room block with this location for our wedding this year, and I’m very sorry to say that I would not recommend this hotel to any other bride or individual in need of a room block.||When I first contacted the hotel to inquire about a hotel room block back in October of 2024 for our August 2025 wedding, I was in conversations with Annie and Dinara from the planning team. They were somewhat responsive - up until the point that I actually signed the contract for the room block. After that, I had to wait days or even over a week to receive a response on the most basic of questions.||Our group rate was sorely inflated. We were quoted $239 per room and when I checked the hotel room rates a couple of weeks before the wedding, it was $217 per room. We paid over their peak summer prices, and felt taken advantage of. On top of that, the property charges resort fees and $40 for parking - despite not having resort amenities.||Annie offered us a “discount” on upgrading our bride and groom room to a suite for over $400. When I checked online, the price for the same suite was less than $300. I emailed Annie a screenshot of this and asked if they could offer us at least the same rate as was posted on their website for the suite, as we’d by then booked 3 MORE than our contracted hotel rooms, and she refused. A front desk worker later upgraded our room for free, and bless him for doing so, unprompted as I was just calling to ask about parking. ||I also booked our after party at the hotel’s restaraunt. The planning process was a complete disaster and I met with the coordinator Ruben for the FIRST time two days before the wedding. This was after months of me asking questions about how the bar would work, how much it would even COST, how we could order food, etc. and waiting weeks between responses. I asked for the final estimate and plan for months and was told the hotel was undergoing too many “internal changes” to get back to me in a timely manner. I didn’t get a final invoice or plan for the after party until a few days before it actually took place. As a bride planning an entire weekend for loved ones that traveled from around the world, you can imagine how stressful the lack of communication and just lack of care was. We were also charged well over $2000 for a party from people that assured us there would be enough food to feed 50 people. We had much less than expected attend the after party - and about half of them were able to get food before it ran out. ||The actual stay was equally terrible. I went to the property the day before check in to drop off gift bags for our guests, which I was told we’d be charged $5 each for to ensure delivery to each guest. I was communicating with Annie during this time, who told me she’d make sure the front desk knew I was coming and would get the bags out. When I dropped them off at the front desk, the worker there had no clue I was coming or that they were giving out bags. ||TWO of our guests did NOT receive their gift bags, which contained complete schedules and itineraries for the weekend. This caused them to miss our rehearsal dinner, where their seats and dinners were prepaid for, which is completely unacceptable. I went through the care of labeling each bag with a guest name as they requested, and it still didn’t get done. ||The hotel was undergoing some painting project during our stay that meant some of the rooms had their patios completely covered in plastic wrap. I asked the manager to please not place our guests in the rooms where they could inhale paint fumes and have their patios blocked, for health concerns. My request clearly went ignored, the BEST MAN for our wedding was placed in a room with the patio completely taped off with duct tape and plastic wrap and paint fumes in the air. ||Several of our guests reported the rooms themselves were unclean, one of our groomsmen also had dirty towels waiting for him in the bathroom. ||Truly, it felt like the blatant lack of care never ended because my husband and I then ordered steak and eggs the morning of our wedding for breakfast - and we received ROTTEN meat. It was completely sour. We called room service to take it back, they took it and brought back another rotten piece and then the front desk tried to charge us for the meal on the way out the next day. ||The mother of the groom also left behind her coat at the hotel, because the bellhop man told her he’d unloaded “everything” into her car but somehow missed her jacket still on the bellhop. The hotel tried to charge her $50 to mail it to her, she had to drive down and pick it up instead. ||The location of the hotel is not worth the pain - we were nickel and dimed for absolutely everything and received a severe underperformance in return. I’m so disappointed with the impact this had on...

This is an HONEST review and one that I wish I didn’t have to write.||I visited Sonesta Redondo for business and was happy with the location, no issues there. I had made my booking through Hotels.com. They do have valet for $36 a day which is pricey, but nice for going in and out constantly and not having to worry about parking yourself for a just a bit more per day, which I used (valet).||The room is okay, bed is nice and the overall room is just older and outdated compared to similar price point hotels nearby. The air conditioner is strange and has a panel that extrudes from the wall and shower is very short. The only true issue I FIRST experienced was that the toilet really struggles to flush, you just got to hold down the handle or it won’t do it and break (which ours did). ||Then Sun morning where at 5am the smoke detector provided a rude awakening with the chirping beep of a low battery for a while. I waited for maintenance to come swap the battery and by the time they made multiple trips and constant beeping, I was awake so that was frustrating loosing some hours of sleep at a hotel. I’ve never experienced this before & was disappointed…but it didn’t stop there.||While visiting for business, the event we were here for was running behind and would probably require a checkout around 4pm to be safe. I spoke to Nadine at the front desk to ask what could be done for a late checkout and made it clear that if it was too late, I would be happy to pay either||- late checkout fee|- half day fee|- or even just buy another night stay if necessary||I was unable to get enough time I asked for a manager in hopes of being able to squeeze an extra couple hours for a fee as I was getting no where.||I was informed that I could get till 3pm for a late fee (which I did ask to be waived for the inconvenience of their smoke detector battery waking me up, which she denied and confirmed it was “just part of the experience”) after a lot of back and forth and unfortunately, it just didn’t work for me as I wasn’t even confident in a 4pm checkout, but was hopeful it would be enough or I could wait in lobby after.||I asked to buy a night or pay half day, etc and couldn’t pay either because to my surprise, they were OUT of rooms. I confirmed several times there was NO OTHER room type or any other way to get any room in general not just my type. Crystal, the manager, confirmed no rooms at all. In fact she said they were “overly sold” meaning they not only did not have any rooms, but didn’t have enough rooms for additional bookings made and they were hoping for “cancellations or changes” to be made to other guests to make it all work. ||I left the lobby planning on leaving at 3pm and waiting for hours in the lobby. Then, I got the idea to check online and what did you know… I could buy a room online! ||Not just 1 room either, I could buy ANY room type, any location (including ocean, pool, partial, non) and any bed type. There was low quantities on SOME, but not all and there was plenty. I checked this on Sonesta’s direct hotel website. Then, I checked on hotels.com which showed the same thing.||I went back, spoke to both Nadine and Crystal (manager) and asked how if I booked online I would get a room since they are sold out entirely according to them. They acted shocked and said but did you check the Sonesta website and I confirmed I could book any room on both Sonesta’s website, hotels.com, and even others…they could take their pick and it could be done. So why is that if they’re “sold out”. Crystal (the manager) stumbled through her “Um’s” and confusion and tried to frantically check the computer for some new excuse. ||New excuse…”oh you booked through a 3rd party and we cant extend 3rd party booking.” To which I asked, “but I thought you were sold out?” And again, struggled and tried to make excuses about how they are sold out blah blah blah. ||Booked another night for same room & magically, I was able to stay in the same room EVEN THOUGH they are “SOLD OUT” & “overly booked”. ||My Sonesta first experience & got management who...

Here is a copy of my email to Resort Pass about my egregious experience at this hotel.

"I recently completed my 3rd or 4th booking/stay for the Sonesta in Redondo Beach through your website. I had a pretty horrific experience and thought it was important I share here with your team to protect other guests.

My son turned 6 this past Friday and after spending much of the year in swim lessons his birthday wish was a pool day with a group of friends. On August 25, 2024 I used your site to book 12 pool passes so we could enjoy a day by the pool swimming with a small group of his friends and their mom's. Given we were a group of 12 and I had typically only gone with my son and partner, I called and spoke to the manager two different times leading up to the date to make sure we were okay to move forward. Now let me preface, at no time, was I warned about another event.

Due to the weather the day of and having a cloudy/cold morning, guests arrived to swim around 2 pm, instead of the initial 12 pm. Given the hours of the pool 6 am - 9 pm and the pool pass times, I thought this should be fine and confirmed with hotel management. They told me it would not be a problem because we had pool use through the evening and could even update our keycards for bathroom access should anything go wrong. Again, I was not informed of any other event.

Around 3:15 pm, hotel staff rudely came and began kicking my guests and my son out of the pool. Rudely yelling at children, 5 and 6 yr olds, to get out of the pool. This is beyond inappropriate but not where my issue ends, sadly.

When I spoke with hotel management, they said they could extend the use of the room we had also reserved beyond 4 pm to accommodate. I said this would not work because I live two blocks away, if it was space I was reserving or visiting the hotel for that could work but we were here to swim for my sons birthday. They repeatedly told me all they could do was extend our room time but we must evacuate the pool area and could no longer swim.

Embarrassed and frantic, after inviting 9 guests to join us who were now being kicked out of the pool and trying to drag their soaking wet children away from the pool, I called the manager again and said it was unacceptable and I wanted a refund. She said the best she could do, after making us wait, soaking wet without access to towels (since they're near the pool they made us evacuate), she said she could transfer us to another hotel nearby.

At this point, kids are whining and cranky and it is too much work to uproot 12 people and transfer to another location so guests decided to leave. Desperate to try and save my sons birthday that had now been ruined- my partner and I decided to go to the other hotel so we could at least swim with my son.

Upon arriving, we see a pool that 1/8 the size of the pool we reserved that was NOT heated. It was so frigid we could not use the pool. We then decided to order birthday dinner and at least eat and enjoy the view. When the hotel staff came to deliver the food, they dropped the tray of our food all over the floor. We then had to wait for them to recook all of our food and deliver it again.

Not even five minutes into eating, the hotel manager comes and says we need to leave. I was confused because we had just began eating. She claims she told the other hotel we could only use the pool for 1 hour. I explained we couldn't use the pool at all because it is frigid and we just had our meal delivered. We Aldo had the delivery guy turn on one of their portable fire places because it was so cold. She tells me, we can pack our food to go. I refuse because I certainly didn't just pay $300 for a meal to pack to go. And wine that I would have to leave behind because, I can't leave the property with wine. She tells me, if we are not leaving then she's turning the fireplace off and we have 10 minutes to finish our food.

My sons 6th birthday was completely ruined and I am shocked at how horrible we...