This apartment has many issues, but probably the most challenging for me was being told by Ali as soon as I arrived to lie to the neighbours if asked that we were his friends and not airbnb guests. This was very uncomfortable. I do not pay thousands of dollars to lie. Ali is clearly doing something that is against his rental agreement. If I knew of this before I would not have rented his place.
Furthermore, the apartment looks very different than the pictures in the listing. The listing shows a bright and spacious apartment -- the apartment in reality had twice the furniture as shown in the picture. There is a swing in the middle of the living room that is perilously close to tons of glassware. There wasn't even space on the floor to put our suitcases, and the closets or drawers did not have an inch of space. The balcony is listed as a perk, but we were told after we reached that it had safety issues and could not be used. This should have been communicated in advance through the listing. Finally, the listing says there is a queen bed, but it is a double bed. Overall, very poor experience.
To top it all, after we left he made ridiculously large and completely erroneous claims on damage done to the apartment. He is clearly looking to make money in unethical ways.