Most of the hotels along the beaches of Pinellas County are booked up with evacuees fleeing the path of Hurricane Matthew, according to the Treasure Island and Madeira Beach Chamber of Commerce.

  • Hotels throughout Treasure Island, Madeira Beach sold out
  • Residents who evacuated here worried about situation back home
  • Category 4 Matthew expected to cause major damage in Florida

"Treasure Island Beach Resort is sold out. Bilmar Beach Resort is sold out," said Chamber President Missy Hahn. "A lot of them are sold out."

Darlene Kole with the Clearwater Regional Chamber of Commerce said all the big hotels on Clearwater Beach are also sold out. Both Kole and Hahn said they have a list of smaller mom and pop hotels that still have some vacancies.

“We have had visitors walk in and look for rooms,” said Hahn. “We’re aiding them finding places. We’ve called our hotels and we’re getting who has availability.”

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Palm Beach Gardens resident Corey Saban said he spent Wednesday boarding up his home and felt lucky to find a room for Thursday night at the TradeWinds Resort in St. Pete Beach.

"We looked about an hour later and everything in the St. Pete area was sold out,” he said. “We looked in the Naples area, 367 rooms available, all sold out.”

Saban is traveling with his family and said he’s worried about where they’re going to spend the night on Friday.

“There’s nothing available,” he said. “We’re probably going to spend a lot of time in the car driving around.”

TradeWinds Resort President Keith Overton said his St. Pete Beach hotel has gone back and forth from being sold out.

“We’ve had an interesting phenomena. We’ve had a lot of cancellations from people who are out of the state of Florida who are looking at it going, ‘Uh, I’m a little apprehensive about going there,’” he said. “As soon as those cancellations occur, we get bookings from residents who are on the East Coast, who are obviously seeking safe haven over on the West Coast here.”

Overton said his best advice to evacuees is to call the resort for availability.

"There’s nothing available. We’re probably going to spend a lot of time in the car driving around." - Corey Saban

“One of the biggest things that they want to know about is will we accept their pets?” he said. “We have 50 pet friendly suites and a dog park.”

Delray Beach resident Juanita Berti said she knew the rooms in Pinellas County would likely be sold out. That’s why she booked five nights at the TradeWinds Resort for her family.

“We’re here because there was a mandatory evacuation,” Berti said. “We came here (Wednesday) knowing full well that it was going to be more than anticipated. This is like being on vacation. I’m happy that we’re not there and waiting it out.”

Saban said he’s too worried about his home to relax.

“The anxiety is the worst part, sitting there wondering, 'Am I going to lose my roof?” he said. “Is the debris going to flow through my window? What’s going to happen?”

Hahn said early October is typically a slow time for Pinellas hotels.

“We were kind of surprised when we found that a lot of the properties were sold out,” she said. “They say with every cloud there’s a silver lining and that’s our silver lining right now is that we have availability, we’re here, our weather is fine and we’re happy to accommodate them.”