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Starwood’s SLS Las Vegas $69 rate costs $110 per night after tax and resort fees

Seeing Starwood’s SLS Las Vegas Tribute Portfolio Hotel at $69 per night caught my attention. SLS Las Vegas debuted August 2014 as one of the first Hilton Curio Collection Hotels. The hotel’s Hilton affair lasted until November 4, 2015. The hotel rebranded to Starwood Hotels new Tribute Portfolio on November 9, 2015.

Loyalty Traveler – SLS Las Vegas becoming Starwood Tribute Portfolio and W Hotel (Nov 9, 2015)

SLS Las Vegas

The hotel was a $415 million project built on the site of the historic Sahara Las Vegas. SLS has lost money since it opened, including around $90 million in the first half of 2015.

$69 rates look like a deal that can put me in one of their beds.

SLS Las Vegas $69

SLS Las Vegas $69 prepaid and $73 AAA flexible rates caught my eye.

So did the SLS Las Vegas $29 resort fee.

After hotel tax, resort fee and resort fee tax (yeah, there is 12% tax charged on the $29 resort fee for an additional $3.48 tax), the final room rate jumps from $69.30 base rate to $110.10.

SLS Las Vegas taxes

SLS Las Vegas $69 rate jumps to $110 after taxes and resort fee.

$69 room rate with 12% tax is a $78 room night. That $32.48 resort fee is nearly 47% of the hotel room base rate.

Still probably a good deal for Las Vegas, but more than I want to spend.

The SLS Las Vegas resort fee is a deal killer for me.

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8 Comments

  • eponymous coward January 24, 2016

    As a weekday rate for a hotel on the Las Vegas Strip, that’s pretty good. There aren’t going to be a lot of hotels without resort fees on the Strip. Some of the Hilton Vacation Club timeshare properties offer that, but that’s almost it.

  • Steve January 24, 2016

    I’m a resident of Vegas. Obviously (duh) tourism is vital. But the entire resort fee scam is disgusting, from marketing (not including full information about the existence or extent of a resort fee), to just the fact that any normal functioning human being reading what a resort fee “includes” which be scratching their head. If you want some sad entertainment, pick out any major casino hotel, go there during the check-out window, and watch poor outsiders who go to check out at the registration desk, be surprised when they get their final bill and the conversation that ensues. Yes, they should have known it by then, but many don’t, and many who should care don’t, cause hey, “we’re on vacation”.

    It’s the city government who understandably are in the POCKET of casino interests (duh), who could do something about it, but don’t, their hand is already in their pocket to get their tax revenue, and hey, if the casino’s bring more biz to Vegas, that’s what it’s all about for the local economy. But they make NO effort to bring some REASON to the practice, just as they failed miserably when the monorail that was built to serve the strip, was not extended to serve the flock of folks arriving at the Vegas Airport only a few miles away (making them pay crazy taxi rates and similar fees to third party vendors, just to get to their hotels). If gawd has any justice, he’d bring a death earlier to the taxi cab industry than is already happening.

    Yes, they’ve allowed Uber and similar companies, but not after kicking and screaming and making sure they get their cut.

    Selling me a hotel room at $69 and then telling me, oh yea, there’s a $29 resort fee that includes “benefits” that either no one ever uses or that any reasonably person would not expect to be included in their basic hotel rate, is just silly.

    Yes, tourism is all important to my city. But in having NO backbone to try and strike a reasonable balance in the casino hotels’ interest in maximizing their revenue, by inflated resort fees and the latest, parking in their garages, it’s contributing to a cynical view of life. With outsiders footing the cost, I figure they just don’t care enough to jeopardize the lords who they serve.

    It is sickening and disgusting.

    There ARE a few hotels in Vegas who don’t charge a resort fee and which are not dumps (one such example, Main Street Station). On your next vacation or biz trip, make an attempt to patronize those hotels and mention to them why you’re patronizing them.

    Shame on city government for not making ANY effort to strike a balance. $69 hotel rate and a $29 resort fee. Yea, that makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it?

    An embarrassed resident of Vegas.

  • nsx at FlyerTalk.com January 24, 2016

    Ric and Steve,
    Yes the resort fee is a scam. But showing tourists such an obvious scam before they even nail down their travel plans has one silver lining: It puts us on notice that other scams await us when we arrive.

    Las Vegas is the Spirit Air of cities. We all know that it will try to take our money in sneaky and clever ways. We then decide whether we want to live with that, try to beat the house at its game, or avoid doing business with them entirely. For me, it’s mostly the last option.

  • Ron Arnold January 24, 2016

    The resort fee scam and high tourist taxes caused me to change my travel plans and avoid Vegas on general principals. Other friends of mine feel the same way. Vegas needs to maintain honesty in its outreach to tourists or they will avoid the place. If you can’t trust the hotel, how can you trust the casino?

  • Tyler Johnson January 24, 2016

    I have had pretty good success getting resort fees waived in Las Vegas, especially in the winter. Recently in Dec. at SLS got it waived. Told them I didn’t use Internet and pools were closed.

  • James January 25, 2016

    At least they don’t charge for parking…yet.

  • nsx at flyertalk January 26, 2016

    James, renting a car in Las Vegas is already more expensive than using Uber and Lyft. Parking charges would end up killing the rental car business while hitting only people who drive to Las Vegas from SoCal and elsewhere. Standard price discrimination theory says that you should surcharge big spenders, not penny pinchers like people who drive to Las Vegas.

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