Howard Johnson Inn Florence

TERRIBLE hotel. Should have read the reviews beforehand. I came with my roommate for the NASCAR race and I knew we were taking a chance booking late, but this place was just so off the mark. The hotel is laid out in different buildings off the lobby, so not only did that make us feel uneasy but the woods behind our room and the men standing outside leering at us when we pulled up certainly helped nothing. As my roommate remarked, «It feels like we’re in a horror movie.» We were so scared we texted our boyfriends the address of the place and left the lights and TV on and a chair in front of the door while we went to the race. We even left the race EARLY because we didn’t want to get back to the hotel at God knows what hour. The appearance of the hotel is so rundown that I can’t imagine it lives up to any sort of Howard Johnson chain standards. It looks like it hasn’t been maintained since the 1990s — I’m talking outdated décor, overgrown grass, weird stains, etc. Blankets had been bleached within an inch of their lives and smelled it. Definitely not worth the LUDICROUS $ 190 I paid to book the room, even on short notice. For the quality of our stay, it should have been $ 50. Go to the Comfort Inn down the road instead. For two single females, this hotel was a living nightmare and we were honestly terrified.

DO NOT STAY HERE!!! This place is awful! It is in a nice area with nicer hotels around it, yet it still ends up being shady and almost scary to walk around outside.
We had to find a hotel that allowed dogs, so I’m sure we were put in the worst set of rooms due to pets. However, we we t through 3 keys before we got one that worked on our door. Then, when the lock opened, the door was stuck and we had to kick it open. We get inside, and the lights by the bed didn’t work. One just wouldn’t turn on and the other didn’t even have a bulb in it. Switched bulbs around and we got one of them working eventually. They have us cups, tea bags and coffee… There’s no coffee maker in the room. I lost my head and stepped on the carpet barefoot… It was sticky! Yuck! The bed itself wasn’t too bad, but the pillows are uncomfortable squares that I couldn’t use to sleep (luckily we brought our own. The tub was also lately disgusting! My hopes for a nice hot shower were dashed! I’m writing all this, and we have only been on our room for half an hour.
I will NEVER stay here again. If you need a hotel that allows pets, keep looking. There MUST be a better option!

This review is based on the cost of the room And the relationship to pricing first the carpets are dirty from all the working people forced on the road for there lively hood This is there only comfort on the road And the beds pillows and sheets are great really staff are helpful and breakfast okay if you need to be protected from they way most people are forced to live pass this by There are lots of options here in town that are new if you need a resort hotel for a race down the street

Came here to sleep overnight for a few hours while traveling. The room and bed were comfortable– the pillows were extremely uncomfortable– they were small squares and stuffed with rags?! The room did have a lot of electrical outlets which is a definite plus. The complimentary breakfast was awful– no wide selection of food. Overall the room was worth the price we paid which was very reasonable.

Really nice hotel. Manager was nothing but helpful. Beds are super comfortable. I travel a lot for work n this is one of the nicer hotels I’ve stayed in.

Won’t dignify Unilocal by giving this any stars. The room was falling apart. The door jamb falling off the door. Tiles coming apart in the bathroom. Carpet so stained, I put socks on so my feet wouldn’t touch the floor. Water leaked in the shower. Aren’t these regulated. This motel should be burned to the ground.
BUMMED BECAUSE Unilocal WOULDN’T LET ME GET PAST THIS REVIEW WITHOUT GIVING A STAR. IT DOESN’T DESERVE ONE.

After looking at a truly decrepit room at the nearby Microtel and turning it down, the room we looked at here appeared to be good by comparison. Of course when one looks at a room in advance (always a good idea when staying at a place with which you’ve had no previous experience) one does not look behind doors or try out the shower, etc. Would that we had done so at this Howard Johnson. We hadn’t stayed at a HJ in decades and since there were no reviews and adjacent hotels were three times the price, we figured we’d give it a chance for one measly night. Big mistake. After checking into the room and trying to take a shower after dinner, we found mold on the back of the bathroom door, ants galore and, much worse, a shower floor that was absolutely unbelievable! It seems this old place had renovated their bathtub/​shower combinations years before with one piece plastic shower/​tub combos fitted right over the top of the old ones. Unfortunately, due to years of use and/​or bad installation to begin with, the plastic insert had separated from the original walls and tub, leaving large pockets of air trapped in between. Just looking at the shower tub from a distance these air gaps cannot be detected, but step inside the tub and you’re in for one rocking rolling time trying to maintain your balance on a wet surface that makes it seem like you’re standing on a very unstable beach ball! And it didn’t help that the walls I tried to stabilize myself on moved, as well! I barely managed to get through my shower without getting physically ill — I was getting seasick from the unstable rocking motion — and warned my husband to avoid the shower altogether since it was truly dangerous standing in that tub! Overall, the room we had and probably the entire building should be condemned and torn down. The mediocre «free» breakfast we had in the adjacent Asian restaurant the next morning only added to our dissatisfaction. Cheap? Relatively so at $ 50 for the room. But worth it? Definitely not. I was just surprised that Howard Johnson e-​mailed me a customer satisfaction survey a few days after our stay at this place. Surely they must already know how bad it is if they’ve inspected it at all in recent years. Regardless, the next time they inspect I suggest they try to take a shower in the bath of room 106.