Summary:
A decent place to stay in downtown San Francisco if you have a limited budget, especially if you travel by car.
Here is a video I made about Motel 6 Downtown San Francisco:
Please note:
I stayed in this place during September 2018.
The pros:
- The motel offers free parking space for its visitors, which is a big bonus if you travel by car.
- The motel’s location is quite central, and close to shops & restaurants. It’s about 10 minutes by foot from Union Square, 30 minutes’ walk from Lombard street & 40 minutes’ walk from Pier 39. If you want to stay in the downtown area, you should consider it.
- The price I paid for my stay in this motel was relatively reasonable for a central place in San-Francisco, which is among the most expensive cities in the world.
- I was given an early check-in by the staff, just because I arrived early and asked if it’s possible.
Keep in mind this is not something I can guarantee that will happen each & every time. - The motel offers relatively large rooms with the basic amenities that you need to feel comfortable and convenient - cable TV, mini-fridge, air conditioning and a private bath & toilet. The private bath was important for me (and mostly for my entourage), when choosing a motel. Other places in this price range offered shared bath/toilet, thus I preferred to avoid it. The beds were relatively comfortable,
- Check-in & check-out went smoothly.
- The room was cleaned daily, new soaps & towels were refilled daily, I was given extra towels when asked (though we were 3 people and they gave us only for 2 all the time, so this is something they should have realized on their own).
The cons:
- Because San Francisco is very expensive, the price I paid for the stay in the motel wasn’t cheap in the first place. Though it was the best “value-for-money” deal I managed to find for a stay in this area for the dates I visited San Francisco, I suggest that if you spend so much money, then maybe it’s a good idea to consider paying a bit more and stay in a nicer facility. For me it was enough and met my expectations, but it appears my entourage were disappointed, thus I must emphasize that. Once again, San Francisco is very expensive, so I was focused on value-for-money accommodation solution.
- The motel’s location relatively OK compared to the near streets when it comes to homeless people, but this is something you won’t be able to ignore if you’re in downtown San Francisco. This is a very sad issue, and I was amazed how many homeless people live in San Francisco, but there was a time I came back home via 2-3 streets parallel to where the motel is, and I encountered swarms of homeless people. In the entrance of the motel there were always homeless people and from the balcony I could see them as well. On the pavement next to the motel I encountered more than once used drug needles. Fortunately, you cannot access the motel’s building without the keycard, so no worries about that.
- Some nights were quiet, while some nights noisy. The noise originated from the building’s bad acoustic (neighboring rooms, corridor) and from the outside.
- The balcony in the first floor is intrusive to the rooms next to it, so I left the curtains close the whole time.
- The staff was OK, but they are not tourism-oriented service givers. I don’t feel they did the extra effort to make me feel good, but they also weren’t as bad as described in the reviews prior to my visit. They didn’t give me a face or mislead me like I read in the reviews before me, though when asked for a recommendation for a good breakfast, we were given the conventional info, and not something that I couldn’t come up with on my own.
- Though the motel offers several Wi-Fi networks, all of them were very slow, and I really suffered from this issue.
- I didn’t like that my door had a shared room with the neighboring room.
Here are some photos of the place:
