Stan’s apartment is charming and cute, perfectly located in the trendy 11th neighborhood. It has a newly renovated kitchen with lots of dishes and useful supplies and things like a dishwasher. The building looks very pretty and there’s even a small elevator. The apartment is bright, sunny, and compact. It feels like you’re staying in the place of a young student, with books and art everywhere. It’s really well situated and great for a short stay in Paris.
But as one of the other reviewers said, it wasn’t that clean. (Alize wrote this in her Nov. 2021 review.) The floors were clean at least, but there were other areas that needed attention. The shower definitely needed a scrubbing. Also, the kitchen counter/shelf bathroom counter, faucets were a little dirty and dusty. Crumbs on the kitchen counter. Old bar of soap left in the bathroom. Weird white stains on the throw pillows on the couch. Holes in the bathroom covered with paper and duct tape.
For a $1200+ stay they could have wiped things down a bit for me!! At least clean the shower.
The thing that got me was the shower was already clogged when I got there. As soon as I turned it on, I was standing in a a pool of water. I only did 5 minute rinse. It was massively annoying. When I asked Stan about it, it seemed like no big deal to him, and he said that no one had ever complained about this before. Probably because typical dudes don’t care about or pay attention to standing in a pool of dirty water… but being in new apartment on vacation it's not pleasant! And maybe other people are too afraid to say something.
After much back and forth conversation, he begrudgingly admitted that sometimes it gets clogged it you take a shower too long. This felt a bit dishonest or weird, because as I told him repeatedly, water started filling up immediately in the shower, ie, it was a preexisting thing. I hadn't been in there a long time. I did a very quick rinse off, and didn’t even wash my hair.
Luckily, he had Drano in the apartment, so I removed the metal plate and poured a bottle down there, which fixed it. But clearly, he’s dealt with this problem before, so he shouldn’t have been so dismissive or weird about it.
For $1200, I shouldn’t need to Drano other people’s showers on vacation. It’s gross. It was stressful and a waste of precious vacation time.
Look, I get it. It’s just some average dude’s apartment. Typical dudes don’t care much about cleanliness. And he’s just trying to make a living. Obviously you’re staying in a home versus an anonymous hotel. Overall the place was fine, it's best as a crash pad if you're not going to spend much time there. It was fine in the end, but could have been better maintained if you’re renting it out to complete strangers. Especially for the price.