The location was great. It was within walking distance to Granville Island, buses to UBC, and buses to the SkyTrain. The kitchen and living room were spacious and well stocked. The price was lower than comparable rentals in the area.
However, the pros of the space were very much outweighed by the unpleasant experience we had with the host (Sam). When we arrived, Sam was cordial, showing us the rooms, how to operate the shower, and how to lock the patio doors. He gave me his phone number and made sure to tell us not to hesitate to call him if needed.
Despite the house having air conditioning, the rooms were too warm to sleep in, so I called Sam and asked if there was a way to adjust the temperature. He sounded irritated and rambled about a previous guest that had issues about it being too cold. Apparently, the A/C is controlled automatically, and there is no way to adjust it without him calling some company that controlled the settings. Eventually, he told me if it is too warm I should just open the windows, as it was cooler outside than it was inside at nighttime, so we did just that. Opening the windows did bring the temperature down to a reasonable level, but it was rather noisy with all the cars driving on Granville St. It was fortunate I brought earplugs, because otherwise it would have been difficult to sleep. We had to have the windows (and the patio doors) open essentially every night, as it was a warm week. But later, Sam would knock on our door and tell us to close all the windows because the A/C is running, which directly contradicted what he told me before. It was simply too warm in the bedrooms to sleep at night with the windows shut.
We had another incident when we were doing laundry and the washer malfunctioned. We made sure to use the appropriate amount of detergent and adjust the settings for the quantity of clothes we were washing. This was in the morning. We were in the kitchen when the washer was running. When my travel partner walked out of the kitchen into the front hallway, she noticed there was water on the floor and the washer had flooded, so we immediately shut off the washer, called Sam, and grabbed as many towels as we could find to try to block the water from going into the living room (where there are wood floors). When Sam arrived a few minutes later and saw the water, rather than quickly trying to find a way to remedy the situation, he started raging at us about why we didn't call him sooner and about all the damage this is going to cause. I was trying to explain that we called him as soon as we noticed the water, but I was perplexed that we would even be having an argument at that moment, as this was an emergency that needed immediate action. Eventually, he brought out a floor squeegee and a mop. My travel partner and I both assisted him in cleaning up the water. The squeegee didn't really work on the tiles, and the mop was too small to be effective, so I ended up using one of the bath towels to soak up water, bringing it outside to wring it out, and repeating this again and again until most of the water was gone. When the water was finally cleaned up, Sam insisted that there was nothing wrong with the washer because the cleaners had just used it the day before. He proceeded to run the washer to "prove" to us that it was working properly only to find that, when he would run it, the water level inside the washer would not stop rising until it was manually shut off. We ended up wasting an entire morning of our vacation helping Sam clean up while simultaneously being berated for causing something that was clearly not our fault.
I totally understand that appliances can sometimes malfunction, but the way we were treated was grossly inappropriate and beneath how any guest, or human, should be treated.
My flight home was two days earlier than my travel partner's. She felt a bit uncomfortable being by herself (with Sam living in a unit in the same house), so we didn't tell Sam that I was leaving earlier. When she checked out, Sam asked where I was. When he found out I had already left, he asked her if she had been alone for a long time. I don't know what he meant by that question, but that is a creepy thing to ask a woman traveling alone.
All in all, Sam was difficult to communicate with, self-contradicting, quick to blame, and unappreciative of the help we provided to him.