1. This hotel isn’t the best. It’s really a second-rate place.
2. When they remodeled their kitchen, they bought all new appliances of the best quality. They wanted nothing that was second-rate.

Synonyms: third-rate; fourth-rate. Antonym: first-rate. Expressions using rate generally go only as far as fourth-rate. Second-, third-, and fourth-rate are synonymous. There are no degrees of inferiority. They are all opposites of first-rate.