I wish I am writing a glowing review; it would be a lot more pleasant and take less time. I hope my experience will inform the next guests.
I booked the place on August 22, 2022, 5+ weeks in advance of our stay. I reached out to Giulia on September 20 (10 days prior to arrival) to inquire about completing government forms and received no response. 3 days prior to arrival, Giulia What$app'ed me with a link to complete check-in which included a lengthy set of terms and conditions. I did not want to agree to the terms and conditions but it was 3 days prior to check-in, and prices on other lodging options were sky high, so I had no choice but move forward with Giulia's property.
Self-check in was not an option but Giulia's representative was flexible, met us at the property and gave us the keys.
The good / bad / ugly of our stay:
GOOD
- fantastic location - it is in a happening neighborhood with tons of food, drinks and entertainment right outside the door. you can walk everywhere to Milan, we couldn't ask for a better location.
- the unit itself is cute with lots of natural sunlight, tastefully designed and furnished.
- balcony is a great space, we used it from airdrying laundry to enjoying a glass of wine.
- I appreciated Giulia's colleague Vladimir's flexibility in meeting us, our train was delayed so i had to change our meeting time a few times. He was kind enough to accommodate which we really appreciated.
BAD
At first glance the apartment looked cute but upon closer inspection, we noticed:
- left over garbage from previous guests found in both bathrooms
- table lamp did not work, 1 of the 3 lightbulbs was cracked
- none of the remote controls worked; TV, split system air conditioner units
- WiFi, an advertised amenity NEVER WORKED, more on that later
UGLY
- We checked in on Friday afternoon, the first thing we did once we put away our bags was to connect to WiFi, it did not work and at 4:02 pm, i What$app'ed host Giulia about the missing WiFi, she forwarded my issue to her colleague Sonia. Sonia reached out 10 minutes later at 4:14 pm and I provided more details to her. When I did not hear anything back, I reached out to Sonia at 6:30 pm for an update and she basically said she doesn't work on the weekend and passed me over to Vladimir (same guy who checked us in 3 hours earlier).
- At 7:15 pm, I texted with Vladimir and no response.
- On Saturday, I texted Vladimir at 9:44 am, he replied about 4 hours later at 1:44 pm and asked when I would be available to meet the repair person. I told him we were out sightseeing and were not going to take time from our holiday to fix their WiFi; I suggested he met the person.
- At 9:40 pm, we returned to the apartment and the WiFi was still out.
- On Sunday around 2:30 pm, our AirBnB unit lost power (we turned on/off the electric breaker panel near the kitchen but no luck), it was a localized outage as the neighborhood and the building had power. I called the emergency number provided by Giulia, an answering service picked up, I described the issue and was told they would contact the owner.
We never heard back from Giulia / host / owner. We spent the night in complete darkness and had to take cold showers because the water heater was electric. We checked out of the property the following day, first thing Monday morning.
To the prospective guests, know if you ever run into problems, you will receive ZERO assistance from the host. If it's a risk you're willing to take, then this could be your place; but consider this...if for some reason you lost the keys on the weekend, you could be stranded because the host and her business are closed and you'd be SOL.