Our sincerest apologies for a negative review, however with the number of issues we had and lack of response to our concerns we felt our honesty was best for future guests to be aware, as it is something we would’ve appreciated knowing prior to booking.
We don’t ever like to leave bad reviews, and this is the first time we have had an experience like this, but we feel we should be honest in our review so future guests are aware of some possible misleading inaccuracies in this listing.
Some of these things might be addressed before future stays, but it is worth being aware of certain things particularly the noise all night long.
Communication with the host David was delayed and at times non-responsive.
We felt the cost/value of the stay did not reflect the current state of the apartment, the amenities and location (noise ground floor apartment with bedroom windows on street and right next to entry and exit doors which buzz and slam all night long as people come and go).
We messaged the host David twice to discuss our concerns and ask about the possibility of a partial refund for the issues, as the apartment was already over our budget and we thought we were happy to pay a little extra for a quality space, but this was not the case and we received no response from David.
It should be noted that the apartment is on the ground floor right next to the entry and exit doors for the building. People coming and going all night long meant we were continually woken by the buzzer and the front door slamming and then the gate buzzer and gate slamming. The bedrooms are also on the street level with only frosted glass separating you and the street. With bars and clubs around there were people passing by talking most of the night.
The apartment was incredibly hot and stuffy (particularly as we visited during a heat wave). Even with the small windows open in the bedroom. The windows in the bedrooms open directly onto the street and is even more noisy when open which made it very hard to sleep. And it’s worth noting there is no air conditioning so without air conditioning or windows open it can get hot a stuffy inside.
The courtyard pictured in the listing is not a private courtyard. It is the public courtyard for the entire building so you cannot leave the back doors open at night for ventilation.
The apartment facilities themselves were very rundown with many things broken.
The window was broken in the master bedroom and stayed open. When we messaged the host David but he did not reply. I messaged him again the second night he said The cleaner advised you need to jam a knife into the window to hold it shut and sent a picture of the knife wedged in to show us how.
The shower in the main bathroom is broken and quite deteriorated with the powder coating crumbling off and the handle for the top shower broken and missing. Only the handheld works and it is stuck in at an odd angle that you can’t change which made showering the kids tricky. We didn’t use the shower on the ground floor because the room smelt so strongly of mould/mildew, ceiling and walls were crumbling and there was mould on the shower floor.
The sofa was badly damaged with one arm sagging and falling off completely and a large burn hole in the other arm. The sofa was also very dirty and badly in need of cleaning. It had blankets laid over it to cover the dirty marks.
The basement was The coolest place in the building however it smelt strongly of mould/mildew with damp rising in the walls. The render and paint was crumbling off the walls. Our daughter with asthma began coughing quite badly after 5 minutes downstairs so we avoided using the space.
Overall we were disappointed, but to finish on some positive notes the beds were comfortable and linen was fresh and clean. The proximity to restaurants, metro stations, cafes and Le Marais is good. David allowed us early check-in to leave our bags in the space while the cleaners were there which was nice.
Again, our sincerest apologies for a negative review however with the number of issues we had and lack of response to our concerns we felt our honesty was best for future guests to be aware, as it is something we would’ve appreciated knowing prior to booking.