Where to Stay and Park When Flying Out of LAX

My family and I took a trip to Belize and flew out of LAX since there are direct flights to Belize City from our local airports. Even though we have to drive two hours from San Diego to do this, it’s worth flying non-stop! Our flight was scheduled for Monday morning, so we decided to drive up to Los Angeles on Sunday and stay overnight. This meant we needed to figure out where to stay and park near the airport. Luckily, we found the perfect place, just half a mile from LAX.

Where to stay near LAX: Residence Inn

When traveling with our son, we typically look for rooms in hotels like the Residence Inn, Courtyard, Springhill Suites, or Fairfield Inn because they offer large, affordable suites with separate bedrooms. My husband travels for work and has points with Marriott, so we gravitate toward this line of hotels.

On this trip, we ended up at the Residence Inn by LAX, which is nice, new, and only a half-mile from the airport. When we walked in, I was surprised by the enormous lobby with comfy couches and seating. They also have a luggage scale if you want to make sure you’re not over the limit.

There aren’t many places to park for check-in. Usually, we just park under the overhang, but there was a shuttle waiting to take people to the airport. After waiting about five minutes, we were able to get a parking spot.

One bedroom suite

We stayed in a spacious one-bedroom suite with a separate bedroom and a sofa bed in the living room. The kitchen has a full fridge, microwave, cooktop burner, toaster, dishes, utensils, and a dishwasher.

There’s a short hallway in between the bedroom and bathroom with a closet and dresser. The bathroom is well-lit, with plenty of counter space and a huge stand-up shower

Being right next to the airport, it was pretty quiet, and I didn’t really notice the planes flying by. A car alarm went off a couple of times during the night, so that was the only really loud noise I heard. I imagine it would be hard to escape those sounds at any of the hotels in this area with the abundance of parking garages and planes landing.

Room types offered at the Residence Inn

This hotel offers studios, larger studios, one-bedroom suites, and two-bedroom suites. All rooms have full kitchens and a seating area.

Breakfast

We were able to grab a quick bite for breakfast before heading to the airport. There are plenty of places to sit in the breakfast area and in the large lobby. If you’ve stayed at a Marriott hotel, you’ve probably had the usual: fruit, yogurt, cereal, oatmeal, pastries, bagels, and some sort of main dish like egg and sausage, breakfast sandwiches, French toast, etc. They also have coffee (hot and iced), tea, and juice.

I was a little surprised at how late breakfast started, which was 6:30 a.m. on a Monday. Since a lot of people fly out early, I would have guessed they’d start earlier. When we arrived downstairs, there were a bunch of people waiting for the doors to open. When they did, everyone rushed in!

Days	Breakfast hours
Monday-Friday	6:30 a.m. – 9:30 a.m.
Saturday-Sunday	7:00 a.m. – 10:00 a.m.

Other dining options

In the same building, you’ll find a Starbucks, Jersey Mike’s, and Z’s Pizza and Taproom. If you want to venture out, I recommend checking out The Proud Bird, which is less than a five-minute drive away. This aviation-themed eatery has a variety of food options, and it’s especially great if you have kids because there’s a playground and planes flying by. Parents can enjoy craft beers and cocktails while their kids run around, making it a hit for everyone.

Amenities

Outdoor heated pool

Fitness center

Breakfast

Convenience store

Gift shop

Laundry service

Dining: Starbucks, Jersey Mike’s, Z’s Pizza and Taproom

Pet-friendly: two dogs per room. $100 non-refundable fee per stay

Hotel parking and shuttle service

The parking fee is steep at $54 a day, but my smarty-pants husband figured out how to park for only $13.95 a day! He booked parking directly through the Airport Center Parking website. It’s the same garage the Residence Inn uses for parking, but it’s a fraction of the hotel parking rate. The cost can vary for this garage, and I’ve seen it as high as $23.95, but they usually have specials and discount codes on their website.

Be aware that there are no in and out privileges if you book through Airport Center Parking. If you leave and come back, you’ll start a new day and pay the fee again. We made sure to grab dinner before parking our car for the evening.

This Residence Inn has a 24-hour shuttle service to and from LAX that runs every 25-30 minutes. On your way back, you can catch the shuttle from the upper level of LAX.

Where to park near LAX: Airport Center Parking

We’d already arranged to park valet at LAX, so we only parked in the Airport Center Parking garage one night before heading to the valet area. In hindsight, we wished we had parked there for our entire trip.

This well-lit garage only cost us $13.95 for one night. However, I’ve seen their price range from $13.95 up to $23.95, so check their website for current daily rates, specials, and discount codes. They offer a shuttle service to the airport, which is less than one mile away, and 20 electric vehicle charging stations.

If you stay at the Residence Inn, this garage is right behind the hotel, so you can walk to and from in less than five minutes.

Their shuttle runs 24 hours, every 15-20 minutes. Some reviews mention they had issues with the shuttle and how long it took to get to the airport because it made stops to pick up other travelers. I can’t speak to that since we didn’t park there during our trip, but I can say that I would have preferred a wait for a shuttle ride over the amount of walking we had to do to get to and from the valet garage.

The Residence Inn also has a 24-hour shuttle service, so you could potentially use that as a backup if there are issues with catching the Airport Center Parking Shuttle.

Why would I park at Airport Center Parking rather than Valet?

It was our first time valeting at the airport, and it wasn’t what we expected at all. In my little fantasy world, I was stoked because I thought we’d drive up to our terminal, and a valet driver would take our car. Then, upon returning, they’d bring our car to the terminal (much like someone picking you up for the airport). Well, that is not how it went down. LOL! Mind you, we didn’t really read into how valeting at LAX works. Oops.

When valeting at LAX, you drive to the valet garage, where you pull in and unload your car. Then, they park your car in the garage. From there, you have to walk to your terminal. On the way back, we must’ve walked at least a half mile to the garage where our car was waiting.

The service was good, but we felt that parking the car ourselves would not have taken any extra effort, and having the valet park was a little silly. It’s like making it to the finish line and having someone else cross it for you.

I don’t usually mind walking, but after a long flight and my son saying, “My legs are tired! Are we there yet? Can you carry me?!” on repeat, it would’ve been much better to sit down and wait for a shuttle to take us back to the Airport Center Parking garage. Walking through LAX was also madness since there were so many people. We were weaving left and right to get around people, stopping in the middle of the walkway to make it back to the valet garage.

Happy Travels

So, if you’re searching for where to stay and park near LAX, the Residence Inn and Airport Center Parking garage are great options that worked well for us. There’s no shortage of hotels and garages in this area, but these two are conveniently located next to each other, easy to access, and very close to the airport.