You’re looking to save on hotels in South Florida and after finding the Chateau Mar Golf Resort you may have thought to yourself “Huh… seems cheap for a golf course resort. What’s the catch?” Well, there is a catch, but for most it won’t be a dealbreaker. Let’s have a look.
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I booked this hotel for a three night stay from Friday-Monday beginning November 1. I was looking to spend some Wyndham Rewards points and this hotel is a more interesting option at 15,000 points than something like a La Quinta nearby.
The cash rates for these dates on a short notice booking were $144.92 per night. Legal max rate is $1999.00 The Chateau Mar Golf Resort has an Expedia rating of 7.6. Check the Expedia rates for your dates.
Chateau Mar Golf Resort Location
Located about halfway between the beaches and the Everglades, this hotel is very central in Broward County. If your trip includes visits to both the beach and the national park this could be an ideal place to stay.
The area is not particularly well served by transit so you’ll want a car with you if you book here.
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Even with a car it’s not quite as convenient as staying next to I-95. My stay included a trip to Gulfstream Park which, even on a midday weekend involved a lot of traffic.
Chateau Mar Golf Resort Property
Here’s the catch as to why this hotel is generally inexpensive: There’s no golf. The neighboring Inverrary Country Club has closed and is in the process of dissolution. But the club owns hundreds of acres comprising three former golf courses which are protected by restrictive covenants.
This means that developers can only build a limited amount of new improvements and golf has to be maintained as a feature of the area. The courses are in a state of complete disuse. There’s no tee boxes, fairways, greens or obstacles. But it’s not at all overgrown. Regular maintenance is ongoing and when viewed from the hotel the courses appear serene and idyllic.
The hotel property has an interesting history. Jackie Gleason lived in this area from the time he was filming the Honeymooners and hosted an annual golf tournament at the country club. That tournament has since become the Honda Classic. It also hosted 30 PGA and LPGA events in its heyday so many of the legends of the sport have stayed here.
This hotel has “good bones.” It has everything you’d expect of a resort playground for the rich and famous, but in a somewhat diminished capacity at present. There’s still a pretty nice pool and tennis courts. There’s a large gym with a ton of potential but unfortunately this space is a big corner-cut with little for equipment and amenities. Two restaurants (down from six) and 10 or 11 meeting rooms/ballrooms are present. These are now used to hold a variety of events like weddings, funeral receptions, christenings, and dance parties.
If you’re looking for a wedding hotel and trying to maintain a strict budget I expect this would make an excellent choice. There’s plenty of space here for a wedding, reception, block of rooms, guest parking, and it’s a nice setting for wedding photos. If you’re looking at a cruise honeymoon or to fly out of Miami this hotel would work nicely.
Guest Rooms
The rooms here are pretty nice. You can tell that the most recent renovation was not long ago. There’s very little wear and tear. There’s also a lot of room and balconies on each room thanks to the good bones of the Resort Era.
But you can easily see where they’re cutting corners too. There’s no cable TV. There’s only Roku TV. There’s a lot to choose from in the service and all the major streaming services are available. I think you can watch real TV if you have your own cable login credentials. But to me this is cheap and a bad place to try to save money. I don’t mind it so much, because cutting corners is what makes it possible to keep prices down and ultimately keep the doors open. After all, a golf resort with no golf is an odd proposition.
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But they do feel very under-furnished. The record player is decorative only. The luggage table is a little weird and unnecessary. The place could use some nice side tables, especially to get the fridge up off the floor. It especially needs chairs or a sofa. Many guests bring balcony chairs inside the rooms. Being a genuine Florida Man now I travel with a camp chair in my vehicle which made the stay more comfortable.
But look, there’s no way you can say with a straight face that Richard Nixon, Frank Sinatra and Elvis stayed here in a room with no chair. They have some nice little round blue velvet chairs in the lobby that they’ve obviously bought in quantity. Every room would be much improved with two of these.
About Lauderhill/Inverrary
Lauderhill is kind of typical suburban South Florida. Its defining characteristic is Sprawl but it’s not a bad place to be. It’s keeping up with the times.
The Inverrary area within Lauderhill is a bit more interesting. It was one of the earliest Planned Unit Developments in the US and at the leading edge of the postwar suburban boom. The neighborhood has good bones too. There are more than a dozen individual neighborhoods that make up Inverrary as a whole. You can tell that this place must have rivaled Palm Springs in the early Sixties with wide, shady boulevards, water features, and mid-century homes and condos with iconic design elements.
When these neighborhoods were inaugurated they were clearly meant to be retirement properties/second homes/ vacation homes. I would venture that very few of them are serving those purposes now. It’s also obvious that some neighborhoods which began their life as modern condos have not aged well, and filtered down to rental housing at the bottom tier of the market. But that’s not something that should cause an issue as a hotel guest.
Bottom Line
I was curious what the deal was with this property. Now that I know the catch is no golf, I don’t mind at all, not being a golfer.
As someone who books a lot of hotels in this area I’ve seen rates here as low as $85 for close-in dates. That’s a screaming good deal for what is overall a very interesting and cool property, if not a luxury stay.
If you can book this room for less than $115 you should jump on it. If you want to use points to book or a points and cash combo that’s a big green light. Boutique on a Budget is the name of the game here.
If you’re interested in saving on hotel stays I recently used the Chateau Mar Golf Resort as an example of how a savvy traveler can earn a free night while redeeming free nights.
