After booking my stay, I found some pretty nasty reviews about the hotel. I, literally, lost sleep fearing what I would find when I arrived. As I was traveling alone, this fear was even stronger.

Gratefully, I did not have the experience others reported having. I arrived early and had no problem checking in. The lobby s amazing and a wonderful people watching location. And this hotel is fabulous for the people watching. It is a bit dark and the furniture could use replacing. If this was owned by the Ritz, I'm sure those things would be done.

My room was clean with a king sized bed with sheets that fit. No bed bugs, or bugs of any kind, were found in the room. The fridge was stained on the door, but inside was spotless. It did freeze my V8, even when set on 2. The room was comfortable and had been recently renovated, though clearly not by union or craftspersons.

The staff were helpful and I noticed them asking people on numerous occasions if they needed help. I did notice people were always waiting for the valet and parking seemed to be a huge ordeal, esp. with the events that were going on. Also, i have no idea where the all weather tennis courts are that they claim to have. I would not suggest bringing a car to this place.

The Friday night I was there brought some huge party with tons of people who felt it appropriate to give all of the children toy guns as favors, a wedding, and two proms! Obviously, there were some issues. Some parents got their children hotel rooms to use after the prom. So, there were drunken teenagers yelling, screaming, running through the halls. Yes, I would have loved security to arrive more quickly, but in a hotel that size with that many things happening at once, their response time was in line. Plus, they arrived with the Miami Police. There were no further issues after that.

The pool was clean, as hard as that must be seeing as it is right on the ocean. I saw staff out there everyday cleaning. It was disappointing that towels were not available after 6 pm, but this may have been due to being the tail end of off season. There were no beach loungers available until Saturday, the day I left. that didn't stop me from hangin out on the beach every morning and afternoon. There was a beach comber that came by several times and the ocean rescue patrol had a visible prescence, even on the weekday.

Are there things taht need fixing -- lots. Was it clean? Yes. Great beach location? yes. If you want more than that, pay more and stay someplace else.

When I checked in I received a coupon for the Jazz club and as long as there were seats available, it could be used. I saw Arturo Sandaval on thursday night. Of course, the music was fabulous. It was a very intimate setting with wonderful acoustics. I think the standard ticket price ($35) and the $15 required purchase inside the club is ridiculous. The prices are phenominally high, and will probably keep many patrons from coming into the club. I would have paid the money to get a good seat to see the show, but I never would have wanted to spend the money on the food/drinks. In a sense, I lucked out and didn't have to as the wait staff was incredibly rude. I arrived a few minutes late and went to the bar to see if there was an open seat. I sat in a partial view stool. After getting bumped a minimum of 50 times by the waitstaff as they went by and trying to find a position that wouldn't lead to getting hit, I moved to the back of the club where there was no view of the stage, but the music was wonderful. I lucked out on the required minimum $$ as not a single staff member so much as acknowledged my existence as a human being, much less a paying customer. But, one waiter in particular had no issue throwing constant temper tantrums, including swearing.

I did not eat in the hotel, the prices were outrageous. I found it uncredibly difficult to find a decent meal in the area. The Venezia pizza place across the street has decent pizza, but I sat in the bar area and ordered teh gnocchi one night and I could not believe how horrendous they were. But, the bartender was adorible and easy with the wine. Another meal was eaten at Panna, a few blocks north. Everything looked great, and the vegtable soup was fabulous. The chicken parmesan was a tad below average, but edible. The mosstacoli was over cooked and the parmesan cheese tasted as though it was stored in a very moldy location. It nearly made me gag.

The final day I had lunch at Nick's, across the street and up a block. fabulous food and wonderful service. Definitely recommend.

The Deauville was once and could again be a really grand hotel. The place has a lot of history and has seen many famous visitors and hosted many famous musicians.

We got a great rate on an ocean front room with a balcony and decided to give it a try. If you can look beyond the shortage of staff and some deferred maintenance, this is a great place.

We ignored the bad reviews we read in advance and went with an open mind. We had a great stay but were constantly commenting on the "little things" that could be done to reinvigorate this hotel.

The location was great - near enough to everything and the ocean, but not in the midst of the tourist chaos. The ocean and beach were beautiful. We never made it to the jazz club in the hotel, but it looked really nice and was very well promoted throughout Miami.

The valet service is terrible - we had to wait 30 minutes to get our car back each time we wanted to go out. The hotel staff should get tough on the outside company that runs the valet.

Note: There is a $7 a day charge per room for the resort services.

My wife booked this hotel based on price and location close to the beach. We didn't read the reviews until about a week after booking and we started to become very worried and started to second guess ourselves, not knowing what exactly to expect. With this review, I can help clear up some of vagueness that we found in other reviews. I'll break this down into a couple different sections to make it easy -

Location -
The location of the hotel is pretty far north of south beach so if you are wanting to spend time shopping on Lincoln Rd. or to visit the clubs on Ocean, it's a $20 cab ride. The hotel is perfectly located on the beach and the pool area faces the sand, couldn't be better. There is a 24hr Walgreen's right across the street which was perfect, a grocery store down less than a block, and restaurants down the street all within walking distance.

The hotel -
The hotel is much the same as a lot of the others in the area in the way that it's just an older hotel. The lobby is a big open lobby that looks like it has never been updated since the early 60's. Not to say that it's dilapidated or anything, it's just majorly dated. Nothing was weird or dirty, it was just original 60's design. I believe that the hotel is trying to "embrace" their old swinger history in an effort to be lazy and not have to update their decor because it would probably be a multi-million dollar effort because EVERYTHING in this hotel appears to be original - flooring, carpet, wall coverings, light fixtures, etc. By the time we got to our room, we were giggling at all the old, crooked, and non-functioning stuff. The elevators were funny because they sounded and felt like they were an old man trying to heave luggage up a flight of stairs. If you've read any other reviews, a lot of them reference an odor or bad smell in the hotel. I noticed it but it wasn't overpowering or anything, it's just the smell of an old building. Also, there are no parking lots hardly anywhere in the vacinity and although I didn't rent a car, I can tell you that there were ALWAYS people waiting for the valets to return with their cars.

The room -
The room was fine and clean. It had a king mattress with clean sheets (that fit), TV, phone, fridge, and air conditioner. Of course, the carpet was ripped near the patio door and some of the fixtures in the bathroom were a little rusty but it was fine. The bed sheets were changed every day, the towels were replenished every day, what more do you want? The room was clean although a bit used and old but what do you expect from a 2 star hotel?

The pool area -
The pool area is huge with plenty of chairs and towels. The pool bar was okay although the bartender was an idiot, beware of the resort pricing for the drinks! The hot tub wasn't working which was fine with us. The had 2 seperate shower areas for cleaning sand off before re-entering the hotel. Nothing to really complain about for this pool area.

Hotel food - don't know, based on other reviews we steered clear.

Conclusion -
Basically this hotel is what it is, an old hotel trying to keep up and not being updated to keep up with the times. It would benefit most from an owner that would invest in it but for now it's just limping along with minimal maintenance. I would give it a 2 star rating but it did pretty well for us because the room was clean and we had no problems with anything, really. The beach access was excellent as we were there primarily for that. Check in/check out was easy and we had no reason to call the front desk or housekeeping for anything. If you are looking for a good value, it's pretty good. If you are looking some upscale place, keep looking. I would say this was the equivalent of a 10-year old LaQuinta Inn but on the beach. Just a little more money spent will bring you to an entirely higher caliber of hotel.

The Deauville was selected for the site of a business conference that I recently attended from 4/23-4/27. The whole place is run down and in very poor shape. The room I was in looked as if it hadn't seen any upgrades since the fifties. Complaints and requests to the front desk to be moved to another room yeilded nothing. As many of us were there at the same time we shared the horror stories. Missing light bulbs, outlets that didn't work, mold and mildew, broken beds, dirty rooms, lack of furniture in the rooms, chipped and peeling paint throughout.

I would never, ever stay there again. It has to be the worst hotel I have stayed in in the last 5 years of business travel. This is hardly a resort despite the $7,00 a day "resort" fee that they charge.