Hotel Review: Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North, VA

After spending a few days in Virginia Beach, Shae, Truffles and I headed a few hours north to northern Virginia.

We’d originally considered staying in Washington D.C., but realized that most museums in D.C. were still closed due to COVID. There were a few exceptions though, such as the International Spy Museum which was fantastic and did an excellent job dealing with Coronavirus safety concerns.

Seeing as there wasn’t much point staying in downtown D.C. because we’d already visited many of D.C.’s outdoor attractions last year, we figured we could save money or points by staying at a hotel on the outskirts. There were some fairly cheap hotels available near Dulles airport, so we decided to book one of those using points as it was such good value (more about that later in the review).

The hotel we booked was the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North and we stayed there for three weeks in total. Overall it was a pretty good stay, especially because we were able to get an upgrade to a one bedroom suite which gave us more space and comfort. Having said that, the living room, bedroom and bathroom had some fairly poor design features, while the breakfast offering wasn’t all that great in hindsight.

Here’s a full review of our stay at the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North in Virginia.

Check-In

Shae started off our stay spending a few days in Washington D.C. with her friend, so it was just me and Truffles checking in. We arrived at about 3:30pm and I don’t remember there being any wait getting checked in.

One thing to note if you need a luggage cart – they don’t keep them by the front door like most hotels. Instead, you need to walk through the lobby and round to the left to the elevators as they’re stored there.

As you can see in the photo below, there were acrylic screens set up at the front desk for COVID-related safety. They’d placed tables in front of the front desk to help ensure guests stayed 6 feet away from the front desk agents. Other COVID-related things to note is that there was an automatic hand sanitizer dispenser right there, along with a key drop container and separate containers for sanitized and used pens.

We’d booked a two queen studio suite as that was the largest room which was bookable using points. Seeing as I have Globalist status (the highest status tier with World of Hyatt), when checking in I asked if it was possible to get an upgrade to a one bedroom suite. I’d checked online earlier that day to see if they still had availability for that room type and they did, so I was hopeful my request would be successful.

I wasn’t certain they’d grant my request though. One of the benefits of Globalist status is that you automatically get upgraded to suites, although their Hyatt House and Hyatt Place brands are excluded from that policy. We’ve gotten upgrades at both these brands before, but it’s not guaranteed. Thankfully they confirmed the upgrade, so we were soon on our way up to room 304.

One Bedroom Suite – Living Room

When entering our one bedroom suite, the living room was straight ahead and had a corner sleeper sofa and a small ottoman. On the opposite side of the room was a wall-mounted TV with a shelf beneath it.

There were some good and some bad things about the living room layout. There was a two foot gap between the far end of the sofa and the window; we actually liked that because it was a great place to store some of our stuff (we travel full-time and so bring more into our hotel rooms than your average person).

The room felt a little sparse though, like there was missing furniture. Speaking of which, it was strange that there was no coffee table or side table – just a tiny ottoman which was barely usable as a coffee table.

The air conditioning wasn’t great either. It seemed like most of the cold air output was into the bedroom, so when Shae went to bed at night, the bedroom would get cold (which she didn’t want) and the living room got very warm while I worked (which I didn’t want).

The TV only had one HDMI outlet in the back which was used for the hotel’s TV service. That meant we couldn’t also plug in our Fire TV Stick to watch other stuff which was a shame.

On the positive side, there were plenty of power outlets around the living room as there were some on each side of the sofa, as well as beneath the shelf under the TV.

The corner sofa was comfortable and spacious too – even Truffles agreed.

The living room did have a table, but it was a long desk/dining table on the other side of the room. This had a tall office-style chair on one side and a couple of tall stools on the other side, although neither of those had any back support.

The little door you see behind the desk was a narrow closet which had a few hangers in it.

Kitchen

Many (but not all) of the rooms at the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North have a full kitchen. With us staying in the area for three weeks, having a kitchen for the entire time was one of the reasons we picked this particular hotel despite having a portable kitchen of our own.

The kitchen had a full-sized fridge-freezer, microwave, double stove top, dishwasher and coffee maker. It was a decent kitchen, although it would’ve be nice to have had larger burners on the stove top. They were both only 5-6 inches across, whereas the pans provided were closer to 10-12 inches across. That meant the heat didn’t spread evenly, especially when sautéing food.

The kitchen cupboards contained good quality plates, dishes, etc., as well as silverware and cookware.

Bedroom

There was a set of double doors between the desk/dining table and TV which led through to the bedroom. The doors were a little annoying because they didn’t stay closed, so we had to stuff a couple of Truffles’s dog toys under them each night to keep them closed.

The bedroom had a king bed which was very comfortable. There were blackout blinds which worked reasonably well, although there was a small gap to each side which let in a little bit of light.

On the opposite side of the room was a dresser with a TV on top.

The bedroom had a larger closet than the one in the living area and contained an iron, ironing board and luggage rack. Somewhat surprisingly, there was no bedding for the sleeper sofa in the closet. When unfolding the sofabed there were sheets, but it meant there was no pillow or blanket. I’m therefore assuming you have to ask the front desk for these items if you want them, perhaps due to COVID-related concerns.

Bathroom

Opposite the closet was the bathroom sink and vanity. It’s a little annoying how many Hyatt Places and Hyatt Houses are set up with the sink in the bedroom area rather than the bathroom because it makes it harder to use at night if there’s someone else in the room with you.

Many hotels are moving to having refillable toiletries in the bathroom, but the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North still provided small bottles of shampoo and conditioner and small bars of soap.

A crappy feature of the bathroom setup is that the bathroom’s light switch was on the outside of the bathroom. That meant the entire bedroom lit up at night when turning on the bathroom light before being able to close the bathroom door.

The bathroom itself had a walk-in shower. The shower “door” was fixed in place and only went halfway across. There was a 1-2 inch ridge at the bottom which helped ensure the floor didn’t get soaked, although it meant it would sometimes get drafty in the shower due to the open space.

The shower did have a cool design feature though. The shower door/barrier had a hole in it so that you could turn on the shower without getting wet.

On the other side of the bathroom was the toilet. Here’s a photo just in case you’ve never seen a toilet before.

Overall, we liked our room because of it having a separate bedroom and a full kitchen. However, its design in many ways left a lot to be desired.

Breakfast

All Hyatt Houses provide complimentary breakfast for all guests. In normal times, it’s buffet-style with several hot items, various breads, fruit, yogurts, etc.

Due to COVID, hotels have had to change their breakfast set up for safety seeing as it’s not a great idea having guests lining up close to each other and handling the same serving spoons, etc.

As a result, the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North provided to-go breakfasts each morning which you could get from the front desk. The boxes contained a muffin, granola bar, yogurt and string cheese, along with a small bottle of orange juice.

I was initially fairly impressed with their breakfast offering as it was sufficient food for breakfast and likely helpful for guests who wanted to grab something as they left the hotel in the morning.

In hindsight though, their offering wasn’t all that great for a few reasons. First, they offered the exact same thing for breakfast every single day, so the selection got a little old after a while.

Second, they seemed to start putting the breakfast packages together at about 5am, with breakfast running from 6-9am (I think) during the week. That meant the breakfast items would be sitting out for up to four hours, so if you got your breakfast just before 9am, the yogurt was warm and the string cheese was room temperature and floppy – not what you’re looking for from dairy products.

The third reason their offering wasn’t great is that since our stay at this Hyatt House, we’ve stayed at an Embassy Suites and a Residence Inn. Both of those hotels provided hot breakfasts in a safe way as they’ve had one staff member serving the hot items, with other pre-packaged items available for guests to grab themselves. Having a muffin, granola bar, yogurt and string cheese as your sole options every morning therefore doesn’t seem quite as great in comparison.

Amenities

Hyatt House is an extended stay hotel brand, so they have a number of amenities available for guests, That includes a guest laundry area with washing machines and dryers, although it was more expensive to use those than many other hotels as they charged $3 per load.

On the exercise front, there’s a fitness room with several pieces of equipment. We’ve stayed at some hotels since the pandemic began where they limited gym access to one guest at a time, but there didn’t seem to be any such restrictions in place at the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North.

The hotel had an outdoor pool, but it was closed for the season.

At the back of the hotel there was a multi-use sports court guests can use.

At the front of the hotel there was a semi-enclosed courtyard area with outdoor seating and a grill.

There was plenty of indoor seating available inside for breakfast, although this was largely unused all day due to the pandemic. Having said that, there were a few non-mask wearing groups of people that decided to hang out there in the evening.

The hotel had a separate room available as a business center with a couple of computers and a printer.

Just off the lobby was a pantry area with snacks, microwaveable meals, drinks and toiletries for sale.

Pet Policy

The Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North is a pet-friendly hotel. They accept up to two dogs per room with a maximum weight of 50 lbs per dog, or 75 lbs combined.

The pet fee is $75 for stays of 1-6 nights and $175 for 7+ nights. We stayed for 21 nights and so should’ve been charged $175 for having Truffles with us, but we were only charged $75 (well, $79.50 including tax).

The hotel has a number of grassy areas around the hotel, so there’s plenty of space for your pup to do their business. Keep an eye out as you walk around in the evening though. Truffles and I had walked downstairs and out through a side exit one evening when I spotted something running off through the bushes. Truffles wanted to go investigate, so I went to take her the other way, only to find ourselves face-to-face with a couple of raccoons who’d presumably come to root through the trash.

Truffles wanted to chase after them, so we headed in the opposite direction, towards where what was presumably another raccoon had run. Unfortunately one of the other raccoons decided to follow us as I dragged Truffles away, then it started chasing us. I was getting a little concerned as I didn’t want to have to boot a raccoon away, not only because I didn’t want to hurt it but because I was wearing flip-flops.

We were right next to the parking lot and thankfully someone sitting in their car saw what was going on. They turned on their lights and honked their horn which scared the raccoon away. Every day after that though, Truffles literally went sniffing out for revenge whenever we were near that area of the hotel.

Anyway, enough about our raccoon shenanigans. If you want to take your dog for safer exercise than raccoon-chasing, Chandon Dog Park is nearby which has separate sections for small and large dogs. The small dog area isn’t very big, but was sufficient for letting Truffles chase after her ball. It was quiet at the dog park one afternoon though, so I took Truffles to the large dog side to have a wander and sniff as that area was far more spacious.

COVID-19

It’s been interesting living in hotels and Airbnbs since the pandemic hit as we’ve been able to see how each hotel has dealt with it in different ways. Some have dealt with it better than others, although some have dealt with it equally well but in different ways.

Overall, I’d say the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North did pretty well safety-wise. Their front desk set-up (which I covered in the ‘Check-In’ section earlier in the review) was very good. They had a number of hand sanitizing stations on the first floor as you walked through the lobby to the elevator, while the TV remotes in the room were in a plastic sleeve, presumably to assure guests that they’d been disinfected between guests.

One area for improvement is that I don’t remember them having any restrictions on usage of the fitness room. That meant the equipment didn’t necessarily get sanitized between usage, plus it meant it had the potential to get crowded in there. (n.b. There’s a possibility I’m misremembering there not being any restrictions. I didn’t take any photos of any rules which I imagine I would’ve done if there were any restrictions in place, but maybe I missed them.)

Staff members were very good about wearing masks, although many guests weren’t as good with that. I saw a few different groups sitting in the breakfast area in the evening chatting with each other with no masks on, even though they didn’t seem to be eating together.

There was also one dumbass checking in who entered the hotel wearing a mask, but immediately removed it when he reached the front desk, complaining about how having to wear a mask was unconstitutional. It was probably good that my mask muffled what I said as I walked by.

Service

We declined housekeeping throughout our stay, so we didn’t have much need for service beyond stopping by the front desk for occasional supplies like toilet paper and dishwasher powder.

Having said that, the front desk staff members were always very friendly. Laura in particular was excellent, as was the guy who worked the night shift for much of our stay (I’m afraid I didn’t get his name). Truffles wasn’t feeling good for some of our stay which is something he immediately noticed as she walked gingerly through the lobby (she’d greeted him perkily a couple of days before). The fact that he noticed that change in her demeanor was impressive and he asked how she was doing after that. He also noticed when she was back to her usual perky self, so Truffles had a sweet spot for him 🙂

Check-In & Check-Out Times

Check-in starts at 3pm, while check-out is at 12pm.

Wi-Fi

The Wi-Fi at the hotel was good. It’s been a month since we stayed there, so I’m afraid I can’t remember if we had to log back in every 24 hours which is what usually happens at Hyatt Places (we’ve stayed at loads of Hyatt Places, but not as many Hyatt Houses).

Location

The hotel is less than 10 minutes from Dulles airport, so it can be a good location for a quick overnight stay before or after a flight. It’s close to Sterling, Herndon, Reston and Chantilly, so you have tons of shopping and dining options within a short drive.

There’s a Sheetz gas station next door which has several charging stations for electric cars. There was also a taco truck at the end of the road; we never actually got around to eating there which was probably a mistake as it always seemed popular with other people when we drove by.

It takes about 45 minutes to get into Washington D.C. from the hotel, although that depends on traffic. If you want to take the quickest route, you’ll need to take toll roads. Those are EZ-Pass, but you can also pay with cash.

Parking

It’s free to park at the hotel and they have tons of spaces all around the property, so there should never be any issue finding a space to park.

Cost

We booked our stay at the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North using points. It’s a category 1 property in the World of Hyatt program which means it costs 5,000 points per night. That meant our 21 night stay initially cost 105,000 points. I already had some of those points in my account, so I transferred in some Chase Ultimate Rewards points to top up my balance as Hyatt is one of Chase’s transfer partners.

I say it initially cost 105,000 points because it ended up being cheaper than that. Hyatt was running a promotion at the time which offered a 15% rebate for non-cardholders when redeeming points and a 25% points rebate for those who have a Hyatt credit card. I have a Hyatt credit card, so I got 26,250 points back for a net total cost of 78,750 points. That’s only 3,750 points per night which is fantastic value.

If we’d paid cash, the two queen studio suite which we originally booked would’ve cost $99.89 per night including tax, so we got 2.66cpp (cents per point) of value by using points which is very good for Hyatt points. I think the one bedroom suite we were upgraded to would’ve cost about $120, so that made the redemption even better.

Final Thoughts

Overall, we had a pretty good stay at the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North. We appreciated being upgraded to a one bedroom suite, especially seeing as we stayed there for three weeks. The hotel has some good amenities and is good value when using points even before taking into account the 25% points rebate we received from a promotion at the time.

There were some areas for improvement though. Our one bedroom suite didn’t have a great design in a number of ways – bedroom doors that didn’t stay closed, mismatched temperatures in rooms, no spare HDMI outlets on the TV, light switches in the wrong place, no coffee or side tables in the living room, blackout blinds which let in light at the sides and more. The breakfast offering, while sufficient, wasn’t great now that we’ve experienced what’s possible for hotels to provide.

Despite what seems like a long list of negatives, none of those were deal breakers. If we were to stay in the area again, I’d certainly consider booking another stay at this property due to its good value, the fact there’s a kitchen in most rooms, the great service and that we could get an upgrade to a one bedroom suite provided there was availability.

Truffles Approval Rating

Truffles gives the Hyatt House Sterling/Dulles Airport North four paws out of four – pawfect! Getting an upgrade to a one bedroom suite meant it was much quieter in our room at night, so she slept well seeing as she couldn’t hear noises in the hallway.

The hotel is a good size, so there was a fair bit of space to walk around the property, while she liked the attention she received from some of the front desk staff. The fact that we were only charged $75 for a pet fee instead of $175 was an added bonus.

Our Rating

Room = 4.2 / 5
Hotel Amenities = 4.8 / 5
Food = 4.1 / 5
Location = 4.2 / 5
Service = 4.7 / 5
Dealing With COVID-19 (A new – hopefully temporary – category for our hotel reviews) = 4.6 / 5
Overall Value = 4.8 / 5 (Based on the number of points we had to redeem. The cash rate was fairly reasonable though.)

Total = 4.49/5

Address

Hyatt House, 45520 Dulles Plaza, Sterling, VA 20166