The best feature of Tara’s place is the location, a short walk to VanDusen Botanical Garden and Truffles Café, a great place for breakfast. The “Studio Apartment“ really is just one bed/sitting room and a bathroom. The “kitchenette” is a cupboard unit which hides a fridge, microwave, toaster, toaster oven, and a plug-in cooking unit. Dishes have to be washed in the bathroom sink, there is a draining tray and dishwashing soap. No tea towels, just paper towels. There is a power bar to plug in the appliances and an electric kettle for boiling water and a one-cup French press. Coffee and some tea bags are provided as well as coffee cups and 2 sets of plates, bowls and cutlery, some spices and utensils etc. There was some almond milk in the fridge.
Note that there is NO actual TV watching possible. The only entertainment options are the DVD movies (the “about 20 movies” consisted of exactly 12). No cable TV, no radio. There is inadequate light to read by in the evening. A TV unit and DVD player sit on top of the “kitchenette” unit for the sole purpose of watching DVD movies. The remotes were not working, the batteries were likely dead (one of the duplicate remote had no batteries in it). Tara did not address the issue, she instructed us to use the buttons on the TV and DVD player. We weren’t interested in watching any of the movies.
The amenities list misleadingly included ‘Cable TV’. We were not happy that there was none and complained to Tara, she had no plausible excuse in my view. I also was disappointed by the absence of washcloths, Tara texted that no one ever asked for them before and didn’t offer to provide any so I borrowed one from our daughter whom we were visiting here. Tara obviously doesn’t live in this house or even neighbourhood I suspect and we communicated only by texting or messaging through Airbnb. There are enough drawers for your stuff but no closet or hangers. The decor is tasteful and the bed and sofa are comfortable.
Overall I found the unit was overpriced for what we got, compared to other Airbnb’s we stayed at in Vancouver (other reviewers who said it was good value may have paid less, I don’t know). It’s one of two or more lower units in an older house with very thin walls. A noisy family with kids lives above and you hear a lot of foot stomping overhead and conversations coming from other units. If there had been Cable TV as per the listing of amenities I would have been OK with paying the (too high) price asked since I needed something for the specific dates of our trip and liked the location. I’m still waiting for a response from Tara about a partial refund I requested due to the misleading info on the amenities list.