When you want a great lodging experience in Sedalia, the no-brainer choice is the Hotel Bothwell, an Ascend Collection Hotel in downtown Sedalia. A lot of the other hotel choices in town, well let's just say whether they're great, a hellish nightmare, or an off-the-beaten-path adventure, is determined by the stomach of the person who has to stay the night at that hotel.

Sedalia's Best Hotel According to Trip Advisor Travelers

Hotel Bothwell via Trip Advisor
Hotel Bothwell via Trip Advisor
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Trip Advisor ranks the Hotel Bothwell, An Ascend Collection Hotel the best in Sedalia. The hotel gets a 4.5 "excellent" ranking on Trip Advisor and is #1 ranked on Trip Advisor. That's not to say everyone has had a fantastic stay at the hotel. One bride who held her wedding there this summer gave it a 1.0 rating and seems to have had a horrible experience. Another guest was annoyed by the smell of cigarette smoke in the hallway, and one guest claimed his top-floor room was noisy because of the air conditioning ducts.

A lot of folks who bike the Katy Trail stay here and like that the hotel is bike-friendly with many of the riders leaving 4.0 -5.0 reviews. TravelLover63 left this review for the Hotel Bothwell in August of 2021 which sums up his or her 5.0 review:

This is one great hotel. Clean and well-appointed rooms, excellent drinks in the Oak Room and a fabulous dinner in the Ivory Grill. We really appreciated the staff - from the front desk staff to the bar staff to the grill staff to housekeeping. Great job guys. Thanks too to the hotel manager that we met upon our checkout. You’ve done a great job in putting together a wonderful staff.

You Should Know This About Trip Advisor

Trip Advisor's traveler reviews are the subjective opinions of the website's users. The site does check reviews, but there's nothing to stop someone who has a bad experience and has an axe to grind from really getting ugly in a Trip Advisor review. At one of my radio jobs, I worked with a travel service to book a lot of trips and experiences we'd give away on the radio. The guy I worked with at the travel service swore by Expedia, which in his opinion, tended to filter the bias of overly bad or overly good reviews out of their rankings.

That said in Expedia, they don't really rank hotels from best to worst. They do have a similar 5.0 / 1.0 rating system to Trip Advisor but don't really rank them. Out of all the hotels they list, there is only one motel, 17 miles outside of Sedalia that gets a ranking under 2.9. So it's hard to really make a judgment call via Expedia on what hotel is best, and what is worst.

This brings me to the following point. As I said at the start of this article. Much of whether you think a hotel is spectacular, mediocre, or I'll never stay here again, is determined by what you value in a stay and what you expect out of the hotel you're staying and how much you paid for it. So as we move forward looking at the three worst hotels in Sedalia according to Trip Advisor's reviewers keep that in mind. I'll also provide the Expedia ranking as well so you can compare the two sites.

The Three Worst Hotels According to Trip Advisor's Reviewers

#3 Worst Motel in Sedalia: American Inn 

American Inn via Trip Advisor
American Inn via Trip Advisor
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Let's start by pointing out that American Inn doesn't even appear on Expedia's List of recommended Sedalia Hotels. Although they give it 2.6 out of 5.0, and I'll continue by saying the hotel was closed in November of 2021 for not having a business license and being a nuisance property. They were allowed to re-open after passing an inspection in February of 2022.

Trip Advisor ranks American Inn as "Very Good" and gives it a 3.5 out of 5.0 on its website. Although all the reviews are prior to July 2021 and contain headlines like "Total Mess", "Gave My Reserved Room Away", "Do Not Stay Here", "Horrible Hotel" and "Hope All Rooms Weren't Like Ours?"  Irina D's review from June 2021, the hotel's latest said this:

The hotel is horrible, the service even more horrible, dirty room, lots of flies and spiders. Asked for a refund and got refused. The owner not bothered to solve the problems. The most disguisting place I have ever been in the USA

Rockhound Rick left a more favorable review back in 2019:

I stayed there in lieu of tent camping because of the weather forecast. All I needed was a bed, a bathroom, and Wi-Fi. The room was clean, there were no real issues, and everything was sufficient. The housekeeper, Dilla, was exceptional.
I would stay there again.

Are there worse hotels to stay at according to Trip Advisor's Travelers? Apparently yes, let's move on shall we?

#2 Worst Motel In Sedalia: Motel 6 Sedalia 

Motel 6 Sedalia via Trip Advisor
Motel 6 Sedalia via Trip Advisor
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Motel 6 doesn't pop up in Expedia's list of recommended hotels either, although it gets a 2.5 out of 5.0 from Expedia and a 2.5 "Average" ranking from Trip Advisor Travelers. Here at the radio station the Motel 6 doesn't exactly have a stellar reputation either. Although, it seems to consistently get reviews, and not horrible ones at that. Some of the headlines say "What Can We Say, It Is a Motel 6", "Clean and Comfortable", "I Like the Room and the Staff", and "Found the Best Price in Town".

In fact, recent reviews going back to the beginning of the year give Motel 6 a lot of 5.0 out of 5.0 ratings. I did find a 1.0 review from September of 2021 that said the following:

Total hole only reason we stayed here was because it was the only rooms we could find in town. Had a “non-smoking” room opened the window to get the stink out and pulled the window shade back and there were four empty beer cans with cigarette butts in them. Bed sheets were stained/ripped. The wall was covered with marker or crayon. The bathroom was filthy. One of the worst places I’ve stayed.

The most recent review gave it 2.0 out of 5.0 and was from MLMRocksTravel who stayed there during the state fair:

We paid $100 for a room as it was during the state fair. Our normal Holiday Inn was asking $298. We have not stayed in a Motel 6 in probably 20 years, so I guess we are hotel snobs. I guess it was fine for people who know and want a Motel 6 cheap room. It was not nasty cheap, it was bare bones for people who want a very low cost option with nothing in the way of extras.

If you are ok with an older hotel, old hall carpeting but it appeared clean, snack shop that consists of every kind of soda you can think of, friendly family service, comfortable clean bed with only a thin sheet and thin spread, super loud air conditioner that sort of works and pops on/off all night, absolutely nothing in the bathroom except clean soft think towels (no hair dryer, shampoo, conditioner, nothing), working fridge, and questionable clintele, then this is your place.

You absolutely get what you pay for...and we have stayed in some amazing places for $100. This was not it, but supply and demand

In November of 2021 Kathleen H wrote this review while living at Motel 6 and gave the Hotel a 5.0 out of 5.0 rating:

We moved to Sedalia Missouri to relocate. Stayed at a couple other places before coming to motel 6. The location was perfect right down the road from my husband's job, close to shopping and food, the movie theater is even close enough to walk to if your out for a walk and a movie. Pet friendly, as I have 2 service animals that are a breed most frown on. Harry and the rest of his friendly staff have been great to us, prices are the best weekly rate in town. Rooms are great for the price and the bed I comfortable. We have been here a few months and will continue to be until we can find a forever home here. Thank you Harry and staff for your kindness and hospitality.

Personally, I wouldn't rank Motel 6 worse than American Inn, yet Trip Advisor's Travelers did. One thing that makes me nervous about the recent glowing reviews on Trip Advisor is they're all short. As short as Trip Advisor will let you make them. The 5.0 ranking I cite in this article to me seems more real. So, I'd pause and do some reading before booking this place for my family's stay in Sedalia. (Keep reading, I found some dirt while doing a little more digging.)

#1 Worst Hotel In Sedalia According to Trip Advisors Reviewers is Econo Lodge Truman Inn 

Truman Inn Econolodge via Trip Advisor
Truman Inn Econo Lodge via Trip Advisor
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The Econo Lodge Truman Inn gets a 2.9 out 5.0 from Expedia, and a 3.0 "Average" rating from Trip Advisor and ranks last in Trip Advisor's Sedalia Hotel rankings. Do a search for Econolodge on our website and there are 11 mentions of the hotel in our Sedalia Police Reports going back a year. That said, most of the recent appearances in our reports have little to do with disturbances or issues at the hotel.

Most of the Traveler Reviews are pretty lousy and include headlines like: "Nasty and Over Priced", "Wanna Get Diseases", "I Hate Giving Bad Reviews BUT...", "Do Not Book Here", and "Never Again". There were a couple of good reviews, but really, can you believe the 5.0 reviews when many others are 1.0?  Anyway, Barb S had a good stay here in May of this year and says:

We had an excellent stay & experience staying at the Truman Inn & Suites in Sedalia. We were there with other family members for a graduation. We all had an excellent stay. Very friendly, courteous & helpful staff.

Not to mention Cesley writes:

This hotel was very clean and well-kept. The staff was friendly and helpful. The location was super easy to access and by walmart which was great. They are pet friendly which was a great benefit. I would definitely recommend this hotel.

That said, the picture by Cresley's name looked familiar, and she had written similar reviews for the Motel 6 Sedalia and the Super 7 at about the same time. This got me back over to the Motel 6 Sedalia entry on Trip Advisor looking at those glowing short reviews. A lot of those reviewers left similar reviews for the Super 7 at just around the same time as they did for Motel 6. It definitely makes me wonder about the veracity of the great reviews on Trip Advisor for Motel 6 Sedalia and the Econo Lodge Truman Inn.

As for the less than stellar reviews of the Econo Lodge Truman Inn:

"If you love being robbed and sleeping in filth and being overcharged, you have found your place, my brother. 5 stars out of 5000. Would definitely recommend burning this place to the ground.-Monte M.

"There was hair in the bed and the sheet clearly had not been changed! The lady looked at me like I was crazy when I told her about the issues! Not to mention they charge $138 for the night. It was by far the worst stay I have ever had! Never again….if you are wise look just down the street!" -Candy N.

"Bed had blood stains and dog hair everywhere on mattress, bedding and pillow cases all stained,bathroom had large hole in door. Looked like someone shaved a monkey in the shower, Half the outlets do not work, Coffee was cold for breakfast, Milk had chunks in it and the juice machine was broke." -Jason L.

Let's wrap up our reviews of Trip Advisor's worst motel in Sedalia with a somewhat less over-the-top review from Trip Advisor Traveler Rashell from April of this year:

The hotel smells like cigarettes. The "nonsmoking room", had an ashtray and was not nonsmoking as it smelled horrible. The staff didn't know what was going on and apparently doesn't know how to make reservations or look them up. Neither did the manager. DO NOT STAY HERE. I felt like I was going to get robbed or kidnapped with my daughter.

 

My Takeaway From This

From the reviews, yeah, I wouldn't stay at any of the three hotels listed at the bottom of the Trip Advisor Reviewers list for Sedalia. I also learned, that while pursuing reviews see what else that person has reviewed and if they leave a lot of short, similar, positive reviews right around the same time as other area hotels. Be suspicious, very suspicious of them. Also if it doesn't come "recommended" by Expedia, it might not be worth considering, even if the ratings match Trip Advisor.

Personally, with how absurdly bad the reviews are for The Econolodge Truman Inn I'm amazed I ever see any cars in the parking lot. They are amusing though. Very amusing.

Check Out This Large Historic Sedalia Home Available on Vrbo

Check out this historic restored 130-year-old home in Sedalia close to the Missouri State Fair, our historic district, and The Kay Trail. This four-bedroom home sleeps up to 11 people in seven beds. It might just be the place to book if you have lots of out-of-town family coming for a visit. Or you're holding a family reunion. This home is hosted by House Sedalia and available for booking on Vrbo. The hosts have ties to our community and occasionally use the home when they're in town with their children visiting family and friends.

You Can Rent This Airbnb in Sedalia for the State Fair

Lots of people come to Sedalia for the Missouri State Fair. Some like to camp on the fairgrounds. Others check in to one of our local hotels. But what about Airbnb accommodations? There are many in the area if you don't mind driving in from Knob Noster, Warrensburg, or other towns. However, choices close to the fair in Sedalia are limited. This nice little home sleeps up to six and as of January 2022 is available for the entire Missouri State Fair for just over $2,800.00. You can learn more about this air b n b rental here.

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