New Hotel Collection | The Cordova Inn — Hotel in Saint Petersburg

My wife and I recently stayed in this hotel on a visit St. Pete to celebrate our 30-year anniversary. Booking this hotel was a huge mistake and our stay was a nightmare! We both believe we must share this feedback with you so you don’t have the same experience.

First of all, this hotel is currently making interior and exterior renovations, but they continue selling rooms but are not warning people of the construction noise and fumes. This hotel used to be called the Pier Hotel but has changed the ownership and now it called The Cordova Inn. The new owner(s) obviously care only about money in their pocket – not about the guest.

All the time, while we stayed there, we were in the midst of a construction site, not a hotel. They hired constructions workers and were painting external and internal walls – the smell was unbearable. My wife who is allergic to paint odors had an asthmatic attack and we almost called emergency (thanks to fresh St. Pete beach air that we able to escape from this place). Because of this strong odor we constantly had severe headaches. In addition, every day, the hotel was filled with contractors who started working at 8 am sharp, and their equipment was all over the place, blocking guests’ movement in the hallways and stairs. The contractors where talking loud and banging and drilling from 8 am to late at night. On one night, when we came back very tired – it was after 9 pm – the workers were painting the floor in the lobby, so they simply didn’t let us inside the hotel until the floor dried!

The air conditioner in the room is very old, noisy and didn’t work properly to ventilate the strong paint from our room. Our clothes and suitcases still have a stinky paint smell. The most disappointing thing is that the hotel staff was not very friendly, every time when we wanted to ask a question, the receptionist disappeared somewhere or acted as if too busy… they never apologized for the mess, noise, smell, and all inconvenience that was created during out stay.

The hotel itself is very old and has very old furniture in these stinky rooms. It looks and feels like a cheap motel (at higher prices). The TV is very old (small square box) with a sticky and dirty TV remote. All the window shades were broken (you can’t open them), the bathroom is so tiny, and the water pressure in the shower is very weak, so you feel like never able to wash off the soap… and no fan or any ventilation in the bathroom. No internet/Wi Fi in rooms - they told us that they have 4 routers. Maybe they do and you see them on your I-pad but once you connect, the signal is so poor that it gets constantly disconnected. The phone in the room was half broken and felt very dirty and sticky. The bed cover and the carpet had dirty stains; armchair in the room had worn out seat with holes. It did not look antique - it looked old and dirty. The bathroom does not have shelving for toiletries. All of the inside looks and feels like a cheap motel. But please keep in mind, they charged us $125/night + tax for this.

We are not sure if they will renovate all rooms, while guests are staying but what normally companies do is to close hotel for renovation and reconstructions to ensure that guests are not there, or at least provide fair warning.

I will never stay in this place and will not recommend...

The only part of this hotel where I don't feel catfished is its location on the map.

It does not look as nice as the pictures—for one, most of the cosmetic fixes are like putting paint on a rusty car. I feel like I’m going to fall through the floor with every step, the door is so crooked you can see daylight from the hallway, and the bathroom is incredibly small—more on that later. For some reason, only two of the three windows have blackout curtains, which really defeats the purpose.

There’s a fine line between "historic" and just plain "old." The Breakers in Palm Beach was built around the same time, and it’s not even fair to mention that hotel in this review. This place is just old—on life support. And I get it—you get what you pay for—but I’ve paid less for better. I’ve stayed at “historic” hotels in this weight class that were far less of a nightmare.

Now, climbing the stairs with my luggage, I was thinking to myself, “Oh God, please let there be a bathroom in the room, not a shared one.” There was, but it's tiny. I'm a big guy, and I struggled. You know what a small bathroom has? Small pipes. I’ll spare you the details, but long story short, I clogged the toilet.

The front desk seems to be randomly manned. No one was there in the morning, so we went about our day. We called later when the bartender said someone should be there, reported the clog, and hoped maintenance would take care of it. Ten hours later, we get back to the hotel and find a plunger in the hallway—and ten-hour-old doodoo stew marinating in the tiny bathroom. To make it worse, there was no water to even try to fix the problem due to another maintenance issue in the building, apparently.

I eventually got the clog cleared, but the damage was done. My girlfriend was in tears. Thank God I can still call her my girlfriend. I tried to crack a window open, but they’re all glued shut—perhaps to give the window unit a fighting chance at keeping the room cold.

After another walk—two blocks to the parking lot, a trip to Publix for Febreze, and two blocks back—we were finally back in action. My lovely partner does her thing and reaches for the blow dryer, only to find it’s broken. No high, no off—just low whenever it’s plugged in. Luckily, someone was at the front desk and we were able to get another one, and the day was saved.

So to recap: old, no housekeeping staff, no maintenance, no nearby parking, and a...

BEWARE OF FRAUDULENT CHARGES FROM THEM! DOUBLE CHECK YOUR CREDIT CARD STATEMENTS!

Upon check in they told us to pay for city parking which would be reimbursed at the end of our stay (3 nights, 4 days, $20/day), however when we checked out they CHARGED our card rather than refunding for parking (confirmed by checking the charges outlined in the folio they sent me when I checked out). When I called the hotel about this, they only reimbursed the $61 they charged us, not $122 ($61 they charged us plus the $61 they initially said they would reimburse for city parking). Additionally, overnight parking must be renewed at 9am, but checkout isn’t until 11am, but they will not reimburse you for parking on the day of check out despite having to pay for an entire additional day of parking. I spent a total of $81.96 on parking but was told I would only get back $61.47 and was actually charged an additional $61.47 instead.

If you book using a third party reservation system they will charge you an additional $15/person/day “resort fee” upon check in (that was $90 for a 3 night stay for my husband and myself) despite having NO amenities to be able to even consider themselves a resort; no pool, no gym, no dining, no parking, not even a 24/7 front desk attendant, all they have is a small bar in the lobby.

As for the hotel itself, they merely threw makeup on a pig. Furniture and finishes look really nice, but the building is old and the beds are super uncomfortable; no support and super bouncy (you will feel EVERY move your partner makes in the night). I left two items in my room (a small set of concert ear plugs in their case and a full size umbrella) and went back a couple hours after checking out, but they said someone else had already checked into the room and housekeeping didn’t find anything (even though I know exactly where they were left in the room). Their proximity to the pier and downtown is their only redeeming quality.

Side note: this hotel does not appear to be handicap accessible! They have golf carts parked on the blue lines of the loading ramp area of the handicap parking spots and the only way to get inside is via stairs, no ramps...