First off, Hotels.com is EXPEDIA. If you are trying to avoid Expedia, do not use Hotels.com. There were at least 3 impenetrable layers of faceless corporations involved in this reservation. Once I realized the hotel was not actually a hotel, was not merely ~$300 per night but double that due to a deposit, and was actually a much-needed housing unit that had been taken out of the housing market by some investment holding company, I tried to cancel. (This was within 15 minutes of making the reservation.) I then went into the vertically integrated corporate-unaccountability loop, of one entity handing me to another, round and round Maverick to Expedia to Hotels.com to Maverick (who did have a nice but powerless actual person answer the phone)... Ultimately I had to dispute the charge via my credit card company.
I stayed instead at a delightful traditional rooming house, Anthony's Town House, owned by real people who lived on site. And I booked with them directly!