I picked the EconoLodge at AFB because it said it was seven miles from a Metro stop that had parking, it was incredibly cheap ($60/night) and it advertised a kitchen. It was actually about four miles from a Metro (the web information advertised that the nearest station was Addison, when it was in fact Branch Avenue). I got what I paid for. While the beds were comfortable and the hotel was not terribly noisy, that's pretty much where the pluses of this stay ended. The 'kitchen' was a slightly larger than average dorm refrigerator barely big enough for a small pizza box. The cupboards in the kitchen had peeling paint, and the stove top was starting to rust and looked about thirty years old - not something I felt comfortable cooking on. When I went to take a shower the next morning my boyfriend and I found hairs on the 'clean' towels. The knob controlling the temperature was very difficult to use, although we figured out how to make it work. the website advertised "Cable/Satellie TV"; we got eight channels. The front desk staff, while they were nice, did not speak or understand English very well, so it was very difficult to have questions answered. When I asked about the neighborhood and how to get to places nearby they could not tell me how to get there because they were "not very familiar with the neighborhood", and they did not offer any more help than that. The continental breakfast was a joke. It was advertised to run until 10 a.m., but every single morning that I went down (which was usually between 7:45 and 8:30) all the muffins were gone, leaving only old cereal, whole milk and sour orange juice. The first morning it was actually cleaned up before I arrived downstairs (9:45 a.m.). I asked the woman at the desk what happened to it and she just said, "Oh, the housekeeper, he forgets sometimes." Um...ok.
I was not at all sad to leave the hotel, though very sad that my vacation in D.C. was over. The neighborhood seems safe, though, and it was relatively quiet during our stay. But if you're looking for an ultra friendly, welcoming, relaxing place, I'd say try another motel.