This was a seriously problematic Airbnb rental. Within an hour of making the booking we got a message from the host requesting that we talk by phone. We sent her our number in New York and she called. Her English is very good. She proposed that we could make a private arrangement not involving Airbnb. This would enable her to avoid paying various taxes. We said that this was not acceptable to us, since Airbnb provides a number of crucial services and guarantees.
Our flight to Paris arrived on time. As agreed, we contacted the host by email from the airport using Airbnb. She said that she would be unable to meet us at the apartment, but that her son would be there until 2:00 PM. We arrived at the building at 1:45, but found that we could not enter because the host had not provided the door code. She also had not told us which apartment was hers. At about 2:00 PM a young man (high school age) left the building. We asked if he might be the host’s son. He was. He was very polite, spoke quite good English and gave us a hurried tour of the apartment.
We found that the apartment has several problems. Perhaps the most serious, for us, is that the shower used the bathtub which has quite high sides and a narrow, rounded standing area. This made showering difficult and dangerous for us – we are both in our 70s.
Another problem we soon discovered is that the apartment is infested with tiny black flies that emerge whenever there is unwrapped food.
After about a week of our 3 week rental, we asked the host (via Airbnb email) whether there were spare sheets available. There is a good washing machine in the apartment, but no drier. So we could not wash and dry the sheets in a day. She said no. The only sheets available were the ones on the bed. So it seems she thought that we should use the same sheets for three weeks.

A final problem emerged on the evening when we had been victimized by a pickpocket who stole our mobile phone. We wanted to use the internet to change passwords on various accounts that might be accessed by the stolen phone. But the internet in the apartment was down for about 3 hours.

There are also many good things about the apartment. The neighborhood is pleasant and convenient. There is a Metro entry on the corner and a large, well-stocked Monoprix supermarket two blocks away. The appliances are modern (though we were given no information on how to use them and had to figure this out for ourselves). Since it is on an internal courtyard rather than the street, noise is not a problem. But it is not a good choice for older or mobility limited guests because of the shower. And it is not a good choice for stays longer than a week since no spare sheets are provided.