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PMI St. Augustine

Where to stay for Nights of Lights: the Pomar House and St. George Street

White holiday lights strung over the Plaza de la Constitucion in downtown St. Augustine on a December evening

If you're coming down for Nights of Lights in December and you want a place with a door that locks behind you, start with the homes we manage in the historic district. Four of them sit on or just off St. George Street and Cuna Street, within an easy walk of the Plaza de la Constitución and the lights. On the unit where nightly rates are published, the Historic St. Augustine Balcony Suite with Parking, rates run from $122 to $470 before taxes and fees depending on the night. A $150 to $250 target is realistic for a December stay. It's not a guarantee for a Saturday in the middle of the season, and the gap between those two numbers is mostly a question of which nights you pick.

Park once, then walk everywhere

This is the whole argument for staying downtown in December. The lights are concentrated in a walkable core: the Plaza, St. George Street, the Bridge of Lions reflecting over the water, King Street past the Lightner Museum and Flagler College. People who stay at the beach spend their evenings driving in, hunting a space, and then driving back over a drawbridge that opens when it feels like it. People who stay in the historic district put on a coat and leave.

Three of our one-bedrooms let you do exactly that. The one that puts you closest to the middle of it is the Historic St. Augustine Balcony Suite with Parking, which sits on St. George Street itself, with the Oldest Wooden School House and the City Gates right there. It has a private balcony over the street, and live music carries up from below most evenings. The suite has a king bed, a smart TV, a mini fridge, and an oversized desk facing the street, and it comes with a parking permit for the Tolomato lot at 7 Cordova Street. In December, when every space downtown is spoken for, that permit is worth more than any amenity in the listing. Access is on the side of the building and up a flight of stairs, so if stairs are an issue, say so before you book.

The Pomar House suites on Cuna Street

A short walk off St. George Street, the Pomar House is a renovated Spanish-style building on Cuna Street with four suites across two floors. Access is through a coded entry: one code gets you into the building, through the Pomar House Suites door, and into your unit.

  • Cozy St. Augustine Apartment: Perfect for Couples (Suite Two). King bed, smart TV, kitchenette with a mini fridge, microwave and coffee maker, washer and dryer. Sleeps two. If it's just the two of you, this is the simplest version of the trip.
  • St. Augustine Apartment: Walk to Historic Sites! (Suite Three). King bed with a sofa bed in the main room, smart TV, kitchenette, washer and dryer. Sleeps three. Same building, same walk, a little more room if someone in your group wants their own surface.
  • Night of Lights HQ | Downtown St Augustine Suite (Suite Four). King bed, sofa bed, sleeps three. Worth knowing if a third person joins late or you want a bit of separation between the sleeping and sitting areas.
  • Historic St. Augustine Balcony Apartment (Suite One). A two-bedroom with a king and a queen, sleeping up to four. If your group is larger or you want a second room, this is the one. Same building, same Cuna Street walk to the lights.

All four suites share a small, genuinely useful perk: The Modern Rose occupies the ground floor of the building, and if you mention you're staying upstairs, you get a complimentary coffee with any food purchase. On a cold December morning after a late night out under the lights, not having to go further than the bottom of the stairs for breakfast is the kind of thing you remember.

The trade-off at Pomar House is parking. There's no long-term parking at the property, just driveway access for unloading bags. The city's paid garage is two blocks away at 1 Cordova Street, subject to availability. In high season that matters, which is why the St. George Street suite with its own permit is the one to look at first if you're arriving by car and want certainty.

How to make $150 to $250 work

The published range on the St. George Street suite tells you something useful: nightly rates in the historic district swing by a factor of nearly four across the year. The low end of that range is not a December Saturday. Three things move the number in your favour.

  • Go midweek. The lights are on every night of the season, from late November into mid-January. A Tuesday in December buys you the same Plaza, the same bayfront, the same Bridge of Lions, with fewer people in front of them.
  • Go early or late in the run. The weeks on either side of Christmas and New Year are the busiest stretch of the season by a distance. Early December and the first half of January are the same event at a different price.
  • Price the whole stay, not the headline night. Taxes, fees and, at Pomar House, garage parking all sit on top of the nightly rate. Work out the all-in total for your actual dates before you decide which suite fits your budget, because a cheaper base rate with daily garage parking is not always the cheaper stay.

We'll quote you the real total for your dates. Direct bookings carry our best rate guarantee, and we'd rather tell you a weekend doesn't fit your budget than have you find out at checkout.

What your evening looks like

From any of these suites, the walk is the point. Start at the Plaza de la Constitución, where the tree is and where most of the light-up happens. Work north up St. George Street, which is narrow and lit overhead and about as atmospheric as the city gets in December. Come back out to the bayfront and the Bridge of Lions, where the lights double themselves on the water. Then loop up King Street past the Lightner Museum, whose courtyard and architecture take the lights well, with the Casa Monica across the street doing its part.

Aviles Street is the quieter alternative if St. George is shoulder to shoulder, which it will be on a Saturday. For a view of the whole thing from across the water, people drive out to the Vilano Beach Pier or down to Anastasia State Park, both a short hop from downtown, though you'll want the car for that and a tolerance for the Bridge of Lions deciding to open at the wrong moment.

Before you book, check these

All five suites are self-check-in, with codes sent ahead. The Pomar House suites are on the second floor; the St. George Street suite is also up a flight of stairs. There's no lift in a building this old. A few more things worth settling in advance:

  • Your dates and the total. Availability in December moves fast and the nightly rate varies by night. Get the all-in figure for your exact dates, including taxes, fees and any parking cost.
  • Parking. The St. George Street suite includes a permit for the Tolomato lot at 7 Cordova Street. The Pomar House suites rely on the city garage at 1 Cordova Street, subject to availability.
  • Kitchen versus kitchenette. The Pomar House suites have kitchenettes built around a mini fridge, microwave and coffee maker, with a washer and dryer in the unit. If you plan to cook properly rather than reheat and make coffee, tell us and we'll point you at the right home.
  • Who's actually coming. The St. George Street suite and Suite Two each sleep two. Suites Three and Four each sleep three. Suite One sleeps four across two bedrooms. There's no flexing beyond those numbers.
  • The pre-arrival form. The primary guest completes a short form in our guest portal before check-in, and must be at least 21. None of the downtown suites take pets.

We've been managing homes in St. Augustine for more than twenty years, we inspect them, we clean them to hotel standard between guests, and someone picks up the phone at any hour of the night if something's wrong. Tell us your December dates and how many of you there are, and we'll tell you which of these to take.

Frequently asked questions