Hyatt House Charleston/Historic District: Bottom Line Review

Last month my wife and I drove down from Portsmouth, VA to St Augustine, FL. That’s a 10 hour drive, so we decided to stop overnight along the way to break up the driving.

Both Charleston, SC and Savannah, GA are two of our favorite cities in the south and both were (roughly) along the route. Being able to once again get dinner from Rodney Scott’s BBQ tipped the balance in Charleston’s favor and so I booked a stay at the Hyatt House Charleston/Historic District using a soon-to-expire free night certificate.

It was a relatively short overnight stay as we didn’t get in until fairly late that night. We tried to take advantage of some of the amenities and the location though and would happily return to this property on a future visit to Charleston.

Hyatt House Charleston/Historic District Bottom Line Review

The Hyatt House Charleston/Historic District is actually two hotels – a Hyatt House and Hyatt Place – that are in the same building. Both are (at the time of writing this review) the same category level in the World of Hyatt program which means that the award pricing is the same other than perhaps differences in dates as to when off-peak, standard or peak pricing applies.

The property is just off King Street and so is within walking distance of tons of bars and restaurants. Despite that, it’s a quiet property and so noise wasn’t an issue despite us staying on a Saturday night.

Base level rooms bookable with points include a studio suite with a kitchen which is the main reason we chose the Hyatt House over the adjoining Hyatt Place. Surprisingly, we received a room upgrade to a one bedroom suite; while you can use Suite Upgrade Awards at Hyatt Houses to lock in a standard suite, you’re not – in theory – eligible for suite upgrades at this brand when checking in.

Another great feature of this hotel is that there’s a rooftop bar where you can pour your own drinks. That made for a fun experience that night after we’d checked in.

Overall, we were very happy with our short stay and would certainly be up for staying here again.

• Points Price: The Hyatt House Charleston/Historic District is a category 4 property. That means it costs 12,000, 15,000 or 18,000 points per night depending on if it’s at off-peak, standard or peak pricing. It was off-peak the night we stayed, but rather than redeeming 12,000 points we used a category 1-4 free night certificate as that was about to expire.
• Cash Price: Cash prices can vary by a wide amount depending on when you stay and whether you’re staying midweek or at the weekend. For the night we stayed on a Saturday night in early January, it would’ve cost $253.35 including tax. Weekend rates in the summer can be $400+.
• Points Value: It should be fairly easy to get a solid 2cpp+ (cents per point) redemption rate at this hotel.
• Resort or Destination Fee: There’s a minimal $2.28 nightly destination fee. We didn’t have to pay this as it’s only payable on paid stays and we’d booked an award stay. I’m not sure what that fee is supposed to include.

• Parking: The Hyatt House and Hyatt Place offer valet parking for $38 per night. There’s no self-parking option at the hotel, although there is a public parking garage right next to the hotel. Although that parking garage advertises a daily rate, based on reviews on Google that daily rate is based on a calendar day, not a 24 hour period. If you stay overnight, you’d therefore be looking at a more expensive parking fee than the one advertised. For us, that was a moot point as we got free parking courtesy of having Globalist status and staying on an award night.
• 1 Bedroom King Suite with Kitchen & Sofa Bed: As mentioned earlier, we booked a Studio King with Kitchen and Sofa Bed as that was the best room type available when booking with a free night certificate or points. When getting up to our room, I was pleased to discover that we’d been upgraded to a one bedroom suite – an upgrade that Hyatt House properties don’t have to offer based on the terms and conditions of the World of Hyatt program. It was a good size with a full kitchen, corner sleeper sofa and walk-in shower.
  One minor quibble with the room is that we were unable to change the input on the TV which meant we weren’t able to use our Fire TV Stick.
• Housekeeping: We didn’t require any housekeeping seeing as we only stayed one night. The suite was very clean when we arrived though.
• Turndown service: None.
• Internet: The internet speed was good. We got a slightly late checkout so that I could watch the Liverpool v Arsenal game that day and there was no issue streaming that on a laptop.
• Dining: This hotel has several food and beverage options:
  • The Placery – This is a bar on the first floor where you can have drinks and appetizers in the evening and is also where breakfast is served.
  • Pour TapRoom – This was a fun feature. Pour TapRoom is a rooftop bar overlooking the city; it was enclosed when we visited as it would’ve been too chilly in January to have the doors/windows open. When entering you get a card that you scan at any of the 30+ beers and ciders on tap that you can pour yourself (wine is available up there too). You pay by the ounce, so you can try as little or as much as you like. This works out to be more expensive than getting a couple of drinks at a normal bar for the equivalent volume of beer, but it does mean you can try more types.
  • H Market – This is a pantry area where you can grab drinks and snacks.
• Club Lounge: None
• Spa: None
• Fitness Room: Yes. While it wasn’t enormous, there were several treadmills, a couple of ellipticals, a recumbent bike and regular bike, as well as weights. Someone was working out when I went to take a photo, but I managed to capture most of the equipment without them in the shot in the photo later in the review.
• Pool: Yes – an indoor swimming pool.
• Welcome Amenity: We got a $20 voucher that was redeemable at Pour TapRoom, although we were also advised we could use it at the H Bar or H Market if we wanted. I hadn’t been sure if all guests received one of these or if it was due to having Globalist status, but a commenter below pointed out that the photo of the voucher shows that it’s only Globalist members who get one of these when checking in. It was a much more useful amenity for us than a few pieces of fruit or a bowl of nuts as it gave us a good excuse to check out Pour TapRoom.
• Service: All of the staff members we interacted with were friendly and helpful, plus they gave us the suite upgrade which isn’t something they had to do.
• Pet Policy: The Hyatt House Charleston/Historic District is a pet-friendly hotel which charges a $75 pet fee per stay. Tax is added to that, so it comes to $85.50. While I’m loathe to pay a fee that high for a one night stay, I decided to chance it in case they neglected to charge the pet fee. Sadly, we did have to pay it!
  They allow up to two dogs per room, with a weight limit of 50 lbs per dog or 75 lbs combined weight for two dogs; I’m not sure how strictly they enforce that as our pup is only 10 lbs.
  The hotel’s location is in a very walkable part of the city, so there’s no problem walking your pup around when they need to go out.
• Location: The hotel is in midtown Charleston just off King Street. It’s less than a two mile walk to the southern tip of downtown Charleston and everything in between.
  After breakfast that morning we walked the 1.25 miles down to Byrd’s Famous Cookies as we loved those so much when visiting both Charleston and Savannah back in 2018. You can’t go wrong with their Key lime, Georgia peach or scotch oatmeal cookies, but you can try samples of all their cookies when you visit which we recommend.
  A mile north of the hotel is Rodney Scott’s BBQ which is somewhere else we visited in January 2018. Shortly after that he won a James Beard award and now appears on the Food Network and it’s not hard to see taste why – the whole hog BBQ there is delicious.
• Elite Benefits: I have Globalist status with Hyatt. Here’s what we received elite benefit-wise:
  • Free breakfast – this isn’t applicable as all guests get complimentary breakfast at Hyatt House hotels
  • Free parking – we did take advantage of free valet parking as it was an award stay
  • Suite upgrade – this benefit was, in theory, not applicable as the Hyatt House brand is excluded from having to give suite upgrades at check-in. Nonetheless, they did provide us with one.
  • Lounge access – not applicable as there wasn’t one
  • Late checkout – we could’ve stayed until 4pm, but wanted to get down to St Augustine at a reasonable time. However, we did end up staying until something like 1:30pm (regular checkout time is 12pm).
  • Welcome amenity – $20 voucher for Pour TapRoom.
• Would I stay again? Yes. It was in a good location for walking around the city, was close to restaurants and bars, it’s good value with both points and free night certificates and I love that you can get a full kitchen in a base room booked with points (some Hyatt Houses only have den guestrooms without kitchens as their base room).

Pros & Cons

Pros

• Value – Should be able to get at least 2cpp of value when redeeming points.
• Suites – You can book straight into a studio suite with a kitchen when using points or free night certificates provided there’s availability.
• Rooftop bar – There’s a rooftop bar where you can pour your own drinks and if you have Globalist status you get a $20 voucher to use up there.
• Location – Just off the main strip running through Charleston.

Cons

• Shower lighting – For some reason the shower lighting in our bathroom seemed very dark. The bathroom itself was fine, it’s the walk-in shower itself which was darker than expected. You can see that in the photo below, although there was still enough light in there to see what you’re doing.
• Parking – If you don’t have Globalist status, parking could be fairly expensive.
• Pet fee – $85.50 for a one night stay with a hypoallergenic dog (and so doesn’t shed) is high.

Image Gallery

1 Bedroom King Suite with Kitchen & Sofa Bed

Amenities

Pour Rooftop Bar

Nearby Snackage Options

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