This is a great place to hang out in, but not a great place to stay overnight.
First, the positive things:
- The air conditioning units are amazing by Rome standards
- The bed and couch are very comfortable
- It’s a good price relative to hotels in the area, was clean and pretty
- It was nice having a smart TV — we could watch all the Netflix we wanted — and the wifi was great
Now, the bad:
- The noise pollution is awful. The bathroom (right off the bedroom) has no seal *at all* on the windows — nor is there a good seal in the bedroom — so you can hear everything from the street, even on the 5th floor. Dogs barking, normal cars, seagulls, even a mariachi band who plays three times a day, every weekend day, with their amp directed straight at our window. We live in one of the biggest US cities, we’re used to noise… but this was another level; we lost a lot of sleep because of the noise.
- The lack of bathroom seal also resulted in our bathroom smelling like trash when we woke up on the hottest mornings.
- The lack of communication from our host leading to check-in was stressful. We didn’t get a response from him for days to confirm our check-in time; we only heard from him the day before our arrival. Once we arrived at the airport, we let him know our ETA — per our convo — but no response. Once we were near the apartment we let him know our ETA — no response. We get to the apartment, and are standing on the sidewalk for 15 min, wondering if anyone is going to let us in. The man who let us in (not the host) was only 5 minutes late to let us in at our agreed upon check-in time, which isn’t that bad… but when you haven’t heard anything all day you start to worry.
- You have to go up *five* flights of stairs, but you still have no view from the top. The listing pictures and it being a penthouse made us think we’d have great views, but all you see are neighbors’ walls and a building dome.
Again, it wasn’t the end of the world. But I’ve never had so many ongoing issues in an Airbnb before, and I just want people to know what they’re signing up for.