Pros:
- Wonderful, lovely cat.
- Super unique decorations, beautiful apartment overall
- Great location, 2 min walk to the metro and tram to take you all over Lyon, plus lots of interesting cafes, bars and restaurants in the area.
Cons:
- We booked this stay in the middle of a heatwave, it was almost 40C the first day we showed up. The portable air conditioner did not work. It was 15 years old and clearly on its last legs. The first night we slept without A/C, there was a small misting fan that is not meant to cool down a room during such severe heat like this. I messaged Clementine that day to explain the situation, we went back and forth for a bit and ultimately it was decided that we would stay but the very next day I would acquire an air conditioner in town and she would compensate me for it. And that's what I did, on August 4 when it was again almost 40C I spent a few hours going to a couple different shops around town -- to her credit, Clementine did some research and directed me to these places -- and found an A/C, bought it with my own cash, and hauled it up 75 steps to the 3rd floor apartment (no elevator in building btw). She paid me back immediately and comped me for the Uber I took back from Bricorama. I feel like as an airbnb host, it was completely her responsibility to take care of this and I had every right as a guest to cancel and demand a refund but I didn't want to ruin her holiday, plus we did like the flat and especially her cat, so I wanted to stay and put forward some effort to help.
- This flat is on the 3rd floor, 75 steps up, and nowhere does it say that on her profile. One of the prior guest reviews mentions this. My wife has a bad knee so going up and down was really a struggle for her. We would not have booked this flat if we had known so much walking up and down was going to be happening -- there is enough walking to do in Lyon as it is.
- On the night before we checked out, the shower stopped draining. I messaged her about it and she expected me to take care of it. We took a couple showers each day and my wife and I each washed our hair but were careful to scoop the hair out before it went down the drain. In any case she advised me to buy some drain blocker from the market. The next morning, I went to the market, but my French is very poor and because there were a variety of different products and drain blocker is a dangerous and very toxic liquid, I didn't want to buy the wrong one -- also if for no other reason than to avoid wasting money. In any case I told her this and she said verbatim "lol ok, so I have to go buy it myself?". Just really rude, considering I was polite to her and had already gone out of my way to buy and hand deliver an air conditioner that weighed 25 kilos to her flat just days earlier. So I went back to the market, bought what looked like a suitable product, and left it for her boyfriend to take care of when we checked out. They claimed that there had never been a blockage before -- for an older building with old plumbing, I find that hard to believe but in any case it doesn’t seem normal for an airbnb host to expect their guest to take care of something minor like this.
- After we checked out of the airbnb, the host messaged me that she had to scrub the toilet because there was shit stuck to the inside. That’s because we dumped the cat’s poo -- per her own instructions -- down the the toilet right before we left. We left the airbnb in a reasonably clean state, running the dishwasher and taking the trash downstairs. I can understand being upset if we trashed the place but we treated it well and did more than probably 90% of guests. Especially considering we paid a cleaning fee, I don’t see why she was so upset that the place wasn’t spotless.
- Lastly, the wifi worked, sort of. But I still lost my connection on a couple of work calls because it was a bit spotty.
I can't believe this person is considered a "superhost" by Airbnb.