After spending a couple of months in Illinois while on our 5 year, 50 state road trip, our next state was Oklahoma.
Our first stop in the Sooner State was its state capital, Oklahoma City. The best hotel option for our budget was the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South as it was good value on points, includes breakfast and also offers The Mix three nights a week where they provide free dinner, beer and wine.
Residence Inn is one of Marriott’s brands and they offer every 5th night free when booking award stays. We therefore booked a 10 night stay to maximize that benefit as we wanted to visit Oklahoma City for at least a week.
Here’s a review of our stay at the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South.
Check-In
Our check-in experience was great. Latisha checked us in and she was extremely friendly; we saw her several times during our stay and she was always incredibly personable.
We’d arrived at about 6pm just as The Mix was starting (more about that later). Once we had our keys to room 221, we headed upstairs with our stuff to unpack quickly so that we could head back downstairs for our free dinner.
Room
We’d booked a one queen bedroom suite; we always appreciate having a separate bedroom area as I’m usually up much later than Shae, so having the lights on in the living room doesn’t affect her sleep.
When entering the suite, the living room was straight ahead, the kitchen to the right, the bedroom off to the right past the kitchen and the bathroom off to the right through the bedroom.
Living Room
Straight ahead of you when entering the living room was a desk and office chair. Beyond that was a sofa bed and coffee table.
By the window was an armchair, with the TV on top of a small set of drawers.
The TV had a pretty good selection of channels. There were some additional channels to those listed below as there were at least channels 97-99 as well.
Between the bedroom door and the kitchen was a small dining table with a couple of chairs.
Back between the room’s entrance and the kitchen was a narrow closet containing bedding for the sofa bed. The blanket was thicker and heavier than I’d been expecting.
Kitchen
Residence Inn is one of Marriott’s extended stay brands, so each suite includes a full kitchen. This includes a full-size fridge-freezer, microwave, dishwasher, toaster, coffee maker and stove top.
In the upper kitchen cupboards there were plates, dishes, mugs, etc…
…while in the drawers and lower cupboard there was silverware, cooking utensils and cookware.
One small way that Marriott could improve the kitchen at Residence Inns is to include some kind of food storage containers. It’s not such a huge issue for us as we have storage containers in our portable kitchen, but most people won’t be traveling with those. If guests have leftovers after making dinner, it’d be nice for them to have an easy way of putting them in the fridge.
The kitchens in IHG’s Candlewood Suites brand have several large Rubbermaid containers, so something similar at Residence Inns would be a good idea, especially seeing as Residence Inn is a more premium brand than Candlewood Suites.
Bedroom
The bedroom included a queen bed, with tables on each side of the bed. Unfortunately their bed wasn’t comfortable as it was extremely soft and bouncy.
Now, I don’t think I’m fussy about beds. We’ve slept on more than 50 different beds so far this year and this was the first one I’ve had trouble sleeping on. Shae got chatting to another guest during our stay who complained about how bad her bed was, so it wasn’t just us.
Opposite the bed was another TV on top of a dresser.
Between the bedroom and bathroom was a larger closet containing an iron and ironing board. Somewhat strangely, there was only one door on the closet even though it was long enough to warrant having two doors.
One feature we did appreciate was hangers with hooks that could be rotated as that made it easier to hang up laundry around the suite.
Bathroom
Off to the right of the bedroom was the bathroom containing the toilet and a bathtub with a shower. The water pressure of the shower was pretty good.
Between the bathroom and bedroom was the sink and vanity.
The toiletries were Paul Mitchell-branded which is what we’ve had at all Residence Inns we’ve stayed at.
Thermostat
It sounds weird, but the room’s thermostat deserves a section of its own as the temperature control in our suite was a pain.
There was a wall-mounted thermostat in the living room rather than being on an air-conditioning unit like some hotels. Normally you just adjust the temperature up and down as needed, but not with this one.
With this thermostat, you had to hold down the up or down button to set the temperature. That meant you could only adjust the temperature one degree at a time. It was also temperamental, so sometimes when you pressed the up or down button nothing happened at all. We eventually settled on 69° as a comfortable setting, although it felt a degree or two warmer than that.
That wasn’t the case in the bedroom though. The bedroom temperature was more like 60° or less with no way of adjusting the temperature. There was no thermostat in the bedroom or any other way to control the temperature – it just pumped out cold air day and night regardless of what the temperature setting was on the living room’s thermostat.
Thankfully the bedding was quite warm so we didn’t get frozen while sleeping, but it meant not wanting to spend any time in the bedroom otherwise.
The Mix Evening Social
Something we like about staying at Residence Inns is their evening mixer called The Mix. Between 6pm-7:30pm from Monday to Wednesday, the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South offers food, soft drinks, beer and wine. The food selection was comprehensive enough on each of those nights that it served as our dinner, helping save us money.
The night we arrived, there was broccoli, chips and salsa, grated cheese and pineapple…
…as well as honey sriracha fries and spicy chorizo sausage.
On other nights they had BBQ chicken burgers, Korean chicken with crispy noodles and a BBQ food truck. We missed the food truck, so I don’t know if the hotel covered the cost of the food or if we’d have had to pay for it ourselves.
In addition to food, there was red wine, beer, water and sodas available – all free of charge. I was actually very impressed with the beer selection. Although they had Bud Light, they had some tastier options like Stella Artois, Shock Top and Goose Island IPA. The other Residence Inns we’ve stayed at only had beers like Bud Light, Coors, Michelob Ultra, etc., none of which I care for.
They also had the TV on quite loud during The Mix; due to the time, Family Feud was on. Having it on so loud actually wasn’t obnoxious – in fact, it encouraged us and other guests to get into the show and call out our answers. It therefore made The Mix much more social and interactive than at the other Residence Inns we’ve stayed at.
It also helped us to get chatting to a few other guests – hi Jim’s parents and Judy!
Breakfast
In addition to the evening socials, breakfast is included every morning as part of your room rate. There were a few hot options every morning of our stay. The first morning there was scrambled eggs, breakfast potatoes and andouille sausage. Other mornings included turkey sausage links, pork sausage patties and more.
As hotel buffet scrambled eggs go, the ones at the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South were pretty good. The breakfast potatoes were nice and crispy which is how I like them.
Off to the left of the hot options was a separate section with hot oatmeal and several topping options.
They also had a few different breakfast cereals (which I think changed each day)…
…as well as a waffle maker.
On a separate island there were cheeses, yogurts and fresh fruit…
…breads, bagels, pastries and preserves…
…along with grated cheese, spinach, cream cheese and butter. For some reason, cream cheese was only on display on the first morning of our stay. The other mornings we had to specifically ask for some from out back if Shae wanted it for a bagel.
In the corner of the breakfast area were various condiments, salt, pepper, etc.
With regards to drinks, there was a juice machine (although apple juice didn’t seem to be available whenever I tried).
The Residence Inn Oklahoma City South also had a coffee and tea station available in the lobby 24 hours a day, not just at breakfast.
The breakfast area itself was a good size and also served as the evening social area and lobby seating. It always contained baskets of fruit including apples, oranges and bananas.
Amenities
I mentioned earlier that Residence Inns are an extended stay brand. They therefore have several amenities that you wouldn’t necessarily find at other hotels seeing as guests are more likely to be staying for long periods of time.
For example, the guest laundry area on the second floor had three washing machines and six dryers (although one dryer was broken). Each load cost $1.50 which is pretty reasonable; if you need quarters, the front desk can give you change.
The hotel had an indoor swimming pool and whirlpool. The temperature of the pool was OK, but the room itself was insanely hot – think sauna but hotter. It therefore wasn’t surprising to see its outside door propped open some days to cool it off a little in there.
The swimming pool’s outside door heads out to a courtyard with some outdoor seating and a grill.
Behind that is a sports court for basketball, tennis and more. We’ve never made use of sports courts when staying at Residence Inns, but I think you can borrow sports equipment from the front desk seeing as it’s doubtful many people travel with tennis rackets or basketballs.
Back inside, there’s a fitness room with a few pieces of equipment. I used it a couple of times but didn’t last long – there’s no temperature control in there and so it gets extremely hot and stuffy with no air.
If you need to use the internet or print anything during your stay, there’s a computer and printer off to the side of the breakfast area.
If you need anything to snack on during your stay, there’s a pantry area off to the side of the front desk.
Pet-Friendliness
The Residence Inn Oklahoma City South is a pet-friendly hotel and has a $100 pet fee regardless of your length of stay. That sucks if you only want to stay one night, but isn’t bad if you’re staying 10 nights like we did.
That said, we didn’t end up getting charged the pet fee. Shae had gotten chatting to Emerson (the hotel’s GM) as he was interested in hearing more about our road trip. He said he’d waive the pet fee as he loved the sound of what we’re doing – he didn’t know we’d be writing a review of the hotel, so that’s not why he did it. I was therefore quite happy to be saving $100.
The hotel is surrounded by grassy areas, although there’s an official pet walking area out the back of the hotel.
We can also highly recommend checking out Happy Tails Dog Park in Moore, a city about 15 minutes south of the hotel. It’s a great – and free – dog park with separate areas for large and small dogs. It’s spacious and everyone we met there was very friendly (we took Truffles there several times).
Service
Service at the hotel was excellent and I’m not just saying that because Emerson waived the $100 pet fee!
I’d been wanting to take advantage of a Marriott Amex Offer we had loaded to a dozen of our Amex cards. That was offering a $60 statement credit when spending $300 at Marriott brands, so I’d wanted to purchase multiple $300 gift cards to lock in the effective 20% discount on future stays.
Emerson went out of his way to try to get this done. Unfortunately he didn’t have any success, but I appreciated the amount of time he spent trying to accommodate our request as he also enlisted help from other nearby Marriott properties.
Like I mentioned earlier, Latisha on the front desk was extremely friendly throughout our stay, as was Darci and other members of staff.
Wi-Fi
Wi-Fi at the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South is free for all guests. We had a good internet connection and speed our entire stay which is always a relief.
Location
The location of the hotel isn’t particularly great. It’s next to what was once a huge mall, but the mall is now closed. The only things left near the hotel are an AMC movie theater, a Wingate hotel and a Texas Roadhouse restaurant.
Even though it’s a fairly deserted area, it felt perfectly safe. I walked Truffles around at night time from the hotel over to AMC’s parking lot and didn’t have any problems as it’s well-lit there.
On the positive side, the hotel is right next to I-35 and I-240 and so it has good transportation links. As it’s on the south side of the city, it takes about 15 minutes to drive downtown.
Cost
We’d booked the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South as it’s a category 1 Marriott property. That means it only costs 7,500 points per night. Seeing as every 5th night is free on award stays, we only had to redeem 60,000 points for our 10 night stay. That’s great value considering it includes breakfast, has a kitchen and also offers free dinner and drinks three nights a week.
If we’d paid cash, it would’ve cost $102.49 per night. That means we got 1.71cpp (cents per point) of value which is excellent for Marriott Rewards points; that’s more than double the value you’d usually expect.
Final Thoughts
I have mixed feelings about our stay at the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South. The food was good, service was excellent and it offered great value using points.
On the downside, our bed was extremely uncomfortable, the temperature control was annoying and the bedroom was freezing with seemingly no way of making it warmer.
Would I stay here again? Probably not, but that’s purely because of the issues with the bed. Both Shae and I slept terribly our entire stay; I can deal with that for one or two nights, but it sucks when that happens for 10 nights in a row.
There’s another Residence Inn in Oklahoma City North/Quail Springs which recently went down to the category 1 level and so only requires 7,500 points per night too. That looks like it’s a newer (or more recently updated) hotel, so I might be inclined to stay there if we returned to Oklahoma City.
The only problem with that property is that you can only book a studio suite on points, whereas the Residence Inn Oklahoma City South allows you to book a one bedroom suite for the same number of points. Having a separate bedroom is much more preferable, plus the service at the hotel was excellent.
If they were to get new beds and sorted out the thermostat / air conditioning issues, I’d highly recommend staying here.
Shae has a slightly different view than mine. Despite the bed and temperature issues, she’d definitely stay there again because of the staff. Being a ‘people-person’, having friendly, kind and talkative staff was much more important to her (I’m more introverted so that’s not as important for me). She’d love it even more if the bed and temperature issues were a bit better, but she wouldn’t hesitate to stay there or recommend the hotel (with the caveat about the bed as that was particularly bothersome to her), solely because of the staff.
Truffles Approval Rating
Truffles gives this hotel four paws out of four – pawfect! She greatly appreciated the pet fee being waived as it means we have more money to buy her treats.
She also liked having so many grassy areas and all the attention she got from staff and other guests.
Our Rating
Room = 3.8 / 5*
Hotel Amenities = 4.6 / 5
Food = 4.7 / 5
Location = 3.8 / 5
Service = 4.7 / 5
Overall Value = 4.6 / 5
Total = 4.37 / 5
*The room is marked down so much due to how bad the bed was, the issues with the thermostat and the bedroom temperature. The suite was perfectly fine otherwise – it’d probably have earned 4.7 or 4.8 otherwise.
Address
Residence Inn, 1111 E Interstate 240 Service Rd, Oklahoma City, OK 73149
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