Originally Posted by
VegasGambler
I agree with most of this.
The cash rates are priced like the MO. I haven't stayed at the MO, but I assume it's better.
But 30k pts is a significant discount over the cash rates, and availability is good (despite the talk of games being played, this hotel has A LOT of "standard rooms", with no crazy minimum stay requirements). You are not going to stay at the MO for the value of 30k pts, so maybe it makes more sense to compare the PH to the next tier of hotel?
I only stayed there once. I did not get upgraded, but the room was bigger and nicer than a suite at most NY hotels. It was certainly not a "true suite" (only a single room) -- nor was it marketed as a suite -- but a lot of hotels around the world pass off a lot of smaller single rooms as "suites". Considering how small hotel rooms are in Manhattan in general, this is significant... even with no upgrade, the "basic room" is a lot bigger and nicer than most "upgraded rooms" or "suites" at other places.
Honestly my main problem with the hotel is the location -- it's definitely in a nice / fancy / upscale location, but I prefer to be down closer to East Village / Chinatown / SoHo. That is just personal preference though.
I mainly agree here. First off, I didn't look at it as $750 a night. I looked at it as $1500 for 4 nights, ignoring the 30k/night points. Which I realize is a ridiculous way to look at it, but the rationale was that I have approx 600k points in my account despite burning them pretty aggressively on family vacations, and they grow fairly rapidly every month between travel and credit card spend. Plus, in reality, I just wanted to stay there since it was going to be 4 nights and I needed to justify it to myself and my expense report somehow.
That, by the way, is the sort of logic that I used when I justified to myself that buying a sailboat years ago was a good idea, and exactly the type of bad logic and wishful thinking that I demand that my team doesn't use in business decisions. Its good to use bad metrics and math to justify an emotional decision once in a while. It works well for NYC meals too!
Your point about the points that I am getting from the spend on the stay + the credit card bonus, I hadn't even thought of. Thanks....Look at how much money I'm saving by staying there!
I agree/disagree with the location comment as well. Yes, its a boring neighborhood that has near zero interest for me. I'd much rather stay near the W. Village for fun or near Penn for logistical ease. But, with the Q train steps from the hotel, and the B/D etc not much further, you can get most places fast. On this stay, I was commuting every day to/from NYU, and then usually back downtown at night for dinner and it was an extremely fast and easy train ride. It was easy enough and the comfort of a nice big suite for the week more than compensated for the location.