Sonder the Congress

The Congress, Unit 2A I could not believe that Sonder would send us to this Dump. Our experience did not start well. The street address of our unit was 226 West Broughton Street, in Savannah, GA. That exact address is an optical shop. After half hour of walking around looking for the unit, inquiring at the optical shop, and freezing in the cold weather, I called Sonder. I was told to walk around the back and the door to our unit would be found in the alley. So, I walked into a sketchy, dirty, dark, garbage strewn alley and found the door to Sonder located between a Portable Toilet and some open garbage cans (see photos). Vagrants sat in the alley, and the smell of **** was in the air. The unit itself was large and dimly lit. The poor lighting hid the mis-matched furnishings that looked sourced from a second hand store. The task lights over the cabinets both malfunctioned. The bathrooms, on the other hand, were acceptable. The beds were comfortable. I spoke with the Sonder call center, who declined to put me in contact with a supervisor to address the problems there. The following day, I received a text message that there were no other units available. No other contact came from Sonder corporate. This was the fourth Sonder that we have used in the past couple of years. All of the others were clean, modern and a pleasure to use. This Savannah unit is an embarrassment to the Sonder and Marriott Bonvoy brand. I am still shocked that I have to write this review and will have to reconsider using Sonder in the future. It was that bad.

One problem Overall, it was a decent place that I would consider staying at again. It was huge and right within walking distance to everything we wanted to go to. There were some cleanliness issues, like hair in the shower and crumbs on the floor, but we were able to clean it and move on. My only issue was check out day. The cleaning lady sat in the narrow hallway with her son and all of her items (giant bags for bedding and a red wagon for cleaning supplies). She was there all morning as we could hear her and her son when we woke up at 9am. When we went to leave the place and pack up our car, she didn’t move a muscle so we were forced to carry all of bags and suitcases down an even more narrow path to the door. Then, her wagon was blocking the door to where we couldn’t even fit our suitcases through the door. We had to ask her to move her stuff multiple times which was met with moving it an inch away from the door. Her son was still sitting on the stairs, on his phone. It was extremely frustrating and dangerous as we almost fell down the stairs by having her stuff blocking the entire steps. Other than the check out, we loved the space and the fact that noise machines and ear plugs were provided due to city noise.

Don't do it! Pine floors are very noisy. Alley way entrance is scary at night and during the day full of construction work (making loading and unloading your car difficult). Parking option is far to walk. Soap/toiletries smell awful and showers did not feel clean. Kitchen did not feel clean. Overall I could not wait to get out of there. Also note - no elevator, the unit is on the second floor and requires a lot of effort if moving lots of luggage (especially with leaving your car in the laneway).

Excellent stay! We loved our stay at Sonder. It was spacious and clean. We were in the middle of all the fun. We were given earplugs and sound machines to help us sleep, but I didn’t even think it was loud, considering the apartment is in the middle of Downtown Savannah. We would definitely stay with Sonder again.

Great location. Clean and comfortable. Entrance was in the back alley but I never felt unsafe. I love their app! Would stay again.

Scenery is beautiful, comfy and warm great service