"Pet friendly" or just old and run down?

[MGMom]

Have any of you noticed that "pet friendly" accommodations are often a little run down and dirty? We take Scarlett with us as much as we can when we travel, but I am starting to notice that these "pet friendly" rooms seem to be subpar to other rooms in the same resort. I suspect that resorts slap the name "pet friendly" on older rooms and charge a non-refundable pet fee rather than refurbish a room that needs a little fixing up ( and I am not talking about cheap hotels.) We just returned from a week in a cabin in the mountains, but I had to spend the first night cleaning the bathrooms! Has anyone else noticed this? If so, how do you avoid it?

[Bruce H]

I have only had that happen once and that one wasn't toooooo bad. Maybe I've just been lucky. But then, we don't just look for hotels that advertise pets OK; we contact the ones we want and tell them we have dogs and let them tell us they don't accept dogs.

Never really paid that much attention, but I think they usually give us smoking rooms. Sometimes we have to pay a few dollars more and sometimes we have to pay a deposit. You might be surprised how many places take dogs if you tell them the dog is small and sweet talk them a bit.

[Cav Fan]

We have always had good luck when staying in a hotel with a dog, the rooms have always been clean and in good repair. Usually had to pay a few $ more.