The Austing Haus

This is NOT a B&B. This is a Motel with free breakfast. The rooms are poorly maintained and smell like a motel. The ownership filks are very nice and always apologetic, but there are many problems.
I stayed in a room with no heat. No support to help out the first night. Second night they brought in a space heater. Lots if apologies, but no fix and no accommodation to me for the poor room.
This fits a $ 99 dollar motel, this certainly isn’t a bed and breakfast.

I wanted to like this place and I gave it every benefit of the doubt, but, sadly, for paying nearly $ 200/​night with taxes, I’m disappointed. The Austing Haus is more of an inn than a bed and breakfast. There are 33 rooms, or something like that, 11 of which have lofts. They serve a fresh, hot breakfast which was the highlight of the lodging. The owner, Bobby, was a very kind, friendly man who made breakfast that included buffet-​style scrambled eggs, bacon, breads, waffles, cereals, yogurts, cantaloupe, oranges, juice, coffee, tea, and milk.
Our room seemed quaint at first, with a queen bed and a ladder up to the loft with two twin beds. It wasn’t anything fancy, with a steeply sloping ceiling (see photos), but seemed nice enough. The queen bed was hard, but not in a good way – like in a cheap way and the bed squeaked a lot. The pillows were hard as rocks. The bathroom was fine-​clean and had a few amenities such as soap, shampoo, and lotion, and fluffy towels. The loft was cute, though we surrounded the hole for the ladder with our suitcases in case either of the kids felt compelled to sleepwalk. I definitely don’t recommend little kids staying up there. My younger child is 5 and doesn’t tend to get up during the night, so we felt okay with him up there.
I decided to take a bath that first evening, to relax. I turned the water on and it was red and super hot. We decided it was rust from the pipes and it went away if I didn’t have the water on so hot. That was fine because that water was boiling hot (BE CAREFUL!!) so at the temp where the water was no longer red was just right, actually. Still, that kind of grossed us out. I called the front desk to ask about it, but no one answered. I don’t think anyone mans the phones after 7 pm. The first night my husband and I were hot and did not sleep well. I turned down the heat in the middle of the night and after that we slept with just one blanket on. My daughter, apparently, was freezing up in the loft (surprisingly).
In the morning, after our return to our room from breakfast, our room smelled terrible, like someone had been passing gas all night in there. Now, with two kids in tow, we thought it was possible that the room was stuffy from us. However, after skiing all day and returning, the room smelled terrible. I think sewer gas was coming in our room. We were also supposed to get a shuttle ride to the slopes, but for some reason that didn’t happen and we drove ourselves. Not a big deal, as we had to be there early for ski school and parking wasn’t much of an issue, but still, we thought we’d have the convenience of a shuttle.
That second night, I called the front desk again to ask for more blankets for the kids’ beds since they were so cold, but no one answered. Why don’t they have extra blankets stored in the room? I mean this is northern NM in the mountains at an elevation over 9,000 ft in the winter! I decided to grab some towels from the hot tub room to put on their beds. I noticed that the hotel was empty except for one other car, and so as I walked down the hall to the hot tub room, I tried a couple of doors to empty rooms on the off chance that one was open and I could take a couple of blankets. Luck was on my side and I was able to borrow two blankets from a room (which we put back in the morning).
We slept a little better that second night, but only because we were dead tired from skiing all day. Our room smelled terrible. I don’t know why I didn’t complain. I think we were a little astounded and just ready to hit the road.
So, a real bummer. I think this could be a great place if they could invest in fixing it up a little. I’m not talking luxury accommodations – but the improvements would be costly and probably not obvious to the guests: Better beds and pillows, fix the sewer gas problem for heaven’s sake, new carpet, extra blankets in the rooms, new pipes maybe, etc. As it is, I won’t stay here again. I give two stars instead of one because breakfast was nice and the owner was pleasant.

Third visit to Taos, NM, to ski with my family. This is our first time at Austing Haus and we were very impressed. Personal service, great complimentary breakfasts, and friendly staff. The hot tub broke during our visit and the staff made every effort to fix it quickly. Very pleased and we will be back in the future.