The apartment itself was pretty good and mainly as described. However, the visit was a disaster. There was a strong smell of gas which gave me a severe headache, and so I had to leave after the first night and check into a nearby hotel. They were only prepared to reimburse me a percentage of the price, and so I was left to cover all the admin and cleaning costs - and so the visit cost me $234 for 18 hours in an apartment I couldn't use.
Secondly, it was disappointing to be communicating with a "team" rather than the landlord. Every time I asked them anything, they had to check with the landlord, which meant each conversation was disjointed and I was unable to get quick answers. This is my second experience of renting an AirBNB being managed by Houst, and I won't be doing it again. The whole experience of AirBNB is diminished when you can't speak directly to the landlord and have to deal with a call centre.