Waters Edge was a bit of a mixed bag for our recent family trip. It was 2 adults and 6 kids ranging in age from 6 to 15. We booked room 1502 which was a 2 bedroom, 2 bath unit, with 2 pull-out sofas.

The Good: The unit was clean and spacious. The pull-out sofas were fairly new, and the kids slept great on them. It was nicely decorated, but the kitchen was starting to show some age. There was plenty of room for everyone. The view was great, and the beach area in front of the hotel was very nice. The pool and spas were fine - as were the seating areas around them. It was a pretty easy walk to the Garden City pier - about 1/2 mile.

The Bad: Horrible smell in the parking deck. I finally concluded that it was related to the garbage chute collection container. Common areas (halls, snack shop, elevator wating areas) are well worn at best, really rough at worst. Waiting on the elevators was a huge pain on Sat and Sun - which i presume to be the busiest check-in, check-out days. The beach was bit crowded as there are a number of larger, multi-unit properties in that immediate area.

We had a good time, but I am on the fence about returning to this property. Unfortunately, there are not too many choices for partial week rentals in the Garden City/Surfside area.

The only good thing about staying here was the view. The problems started the second I got there. I couldn't even get into the room because the lock was broken. They told me to turn the key and push hard. When I did this, the door frame literallly moved - if I were stronger, I would have knocked the frame and door down! The paint was all chipped so I clearly wasn't the first person to have problems with the door. I was staying there by myself while visiting a friend in Garden City and was concerned about not having a working door lock. I went down to the office and asked them to change my room but they wouldn't. They sent the maintenance man up and he asked me to leave my key with him while he worked on the door. I didn't feel very good about doing that, but I felt like I had no choice. When I came back, the door was working and my belongings were all still there. Upon entering the room, I was extremely disappointed at how disgusting the room was. It smelled bad; the rugs were gross with stains and cigarette burns; the kitchen was dated and dirty. All the furniture was falling apart. The dresser drawers were broken in the bedroom; the kitchen cabinets were falling apart and the smaller bathroom door was cracked on the bottom and wouldn't close all the way. The livingroom drapes were dingy and broken at one end. Then, when I went to go to bed, there was only a sheet on the top matress, not the box spring. Both must have been 30 or 40 years old. Stained and worn; sunken and uncomfortable. The pillowcases were so thin, I could read the room number written in magic marker on the pillows through them. As if that wasn't bad enough, there was a loud,clanging noise that went on all night long. I ended up sleeping on the couch on the living room every night. It was awful and I wouldn't stay there again if you paid me to.

We had to find on short notice a place to stay in South Carolina. We drove from Florida that day and I managed to locate the Waters Edge while my husband drove. I didn't have near the time, or energy to research our stay as I normally do. I heavily relied on the experiences from others on tripadvisor. We stayed in a 2 bedroom, oceanfront, fully equipped condo. Upon our arrival at 2 am I was really disappointed by the inital room. It was gross (room 402) and made my skin crawl. I figured I would deal with it after some sleep. When I woke up @ 9am I went to the lobby and politley pointed out my disgust. John was so nice that he let me look at other rooms and credited us the night. I picked out room 1411 and it was so much cleaner and nicer. The only negative comment about this room was the outdated tv's. Seriously if thats the only complaint, then I consider myself lucky. We weren't in the room except at bedtime to even turn the tvs on. We had a great time. The pool was fine, the hot tub didn't work well and was pretty sandy, but that wasn't all that important. The ocean was awesome. This is out second vacay in South Carolina and could really see us doing a timeshare. We love it. Hope this helps in your vacay planning.

We chose to take a weeks trip to Garden City and stay at Waters Edge on the recommendation of a friend and his experience. We rented a 2 bedroom for 7 nights and were very impressed with the unit we were given. All of the units are privately owned and are rented out and maintained by a property management company. We had stayed at a similar place in Hilton Head the year prior and had a very bad experience with the unit we rented. To put it simply it was a dump, and we were somewhat hesitant to end up in the same situation on our very next vacation. The unit we stayed in was recently renovated and was in excellent condition. It was also cleaned very well after the previous people checked out, foors were spotless, all appliances and kitchen ware were clean, and bathrooms were in great shape.

My quick summary of the positives and negatives.

Positives : Units are spacious and have everything you need for an extended stay with the exception of food.
The setup with an indoor and outdoor pool right on the beach is fantastic.
The bar is nice if you want to stop by and have a drink or shot.
The restaraunt is really good as well, youre not going to get fine dining but they have great burgers, fries and finger food that is great for a quick snack while hanging out on the beach or by the pool.
And a well stocked convenience store for items that are urgent. I wouldnt use it as my main source shopping spot, but they have some great beach items and some necessities should you run out and dont feel like getting in the car and driving to a store.

Negatives :
The building is older and with that age there is some need for updates and regular maintenance.
The only reason I did not give a rating of 5 to waters edge is that they need to do some serious cleaning to the 2 stairwells. A large amount of bleach needs to be applied to the walls and floors of each stairwell and scrubbed extensively before being washed down. They smell AWFUL!!
A bit more attention given to regular cleaning of each units entryway area would be nice as well.
The building is 15 stories tall, however only has 2 elevators. Not much that they can do about it, however they definitely need to spend some money to have regular maintenance done to keep them working. There were about 15 of us all together staying here and a group of 6 or so got stuck in one of the elevators for 5 - 10 minutes. And one of the elevators was out for most of one of the days we were there as well. Luckily we were on the 6th floor so not a huge deal for us to walk up the stairs to our room, not so good if you are in one of the upper floors.

For us the positives far outweigh the negatives, we decided while we were there that we would be going back again next year and staying at Waters Edge. A great location, very family friendly, lots to do close by, and again the setup by the pool is just great since we spend the vast majority of our week hanging out in that area.

Cant wait to go back!
Cheers