Hyatt Regency Kota Kinabalu = Very Good Category 1 Hotel

I stayed at Hyatt Regency Kota Kinabalu on a cash and points reservation.  This hotel is category 1 so the price was a modest $50 USD plus 2,500 points per night. Given that a night booked with cash at this hotel generally costs a bit more than $100 USD per night, that means I got more than 2 cents per point which is decent value.  

I used a Globalist Suite Upgrade Award to get upgraded to a suite.  The cash value of the suite is about double the price of the basic room, so approximately $200 USD per night.  Therefore money wise it might not be the best use of a suite upgrade but since I did not expect to be missing upgrade awards later in the year, I used one anyway. The suite is very spacious with 90 square meters and lots of space throughout.  Some older reviews in this thread mentioned that the room is not in very good condition, but personally I thought it was fine.  Obviously this is not a new and modern hotel, but the bathroom in particular was of very good quality and must have been renovated recently. Everything was roomy in the bathroom, including a large rain shower, large bathtub, and expansive space between the double sink counter and the rest of the bathroom.  The hallway leading to the bathroom is also used as a closet. It has a nice hardwood floor and is very wide.  The living room is separated from the bedroom with a door.  As you can see from the pictures, there is a lot of space including a working desk, a small round table, and a large L-shaped sofa. Finally, there is a powder room next to the entrance of the room; I always find convenient to have that extra 0.5 bath.  

We had good service in the Club Lounge.  The lounge is not small but it has lots of tables a bit close to each other so it felt a bit tight.

We visited the gym on a few occasions.  While the bedroom was probably renovated recently given how nice it was for the age of the hotel, the fitness gym was another matter. The equipment was fairly old.  In addition it’s quite an experience just to get there.  You have to go through several narrow corridors in the bowels of the building and without directions from staff you might not find it easily.  The wifi reception was very bad in the gym which was another negative.  

Overall we enjoyed the stay and considering the cost we would definitely consider coming back.  I hesitated between booking the Hyatt Regency and Le Meridien which is not very far away so similar location.  Both generally have a similar cash rate, perhaps HR is a bit more expensive by a small margin, depending on dates.  If paying cash I would not rule out trying LM, but I cannot be guaranteed a suite like at HR when using a Globalist Suite Upgrade award so it might tilt it in favor of HR.  In addition, HR is a much better opportunity to burn points than LM.  At 7k starpoints per night, it makes no sense to use points at LM, whereas the opposite is true at HR.  So if I return to KK in the future I am most likely going to book HR with points without much hesitation unless they move the hotel to category 2.  At only 5k pts per night for now, it is very easy to save enough points to stay there.