Two things negatively impacted our stay (and its value): communication with Max, and no wifi.
Communication with Max unfortunately brought much negativity to our AirBnB experience. It started when I discovered mistakes in the amenities list – items we considered big added-values. I didn’t insist he provide them – I just wanted confirmation that the other amenities were accurately listed, so I could plan accordingly (for a family of 4). He didn’t understand, started acting like I was being a difficult guest, saying that my expectations were too high and that I should cancel. I tried to explain that my expectations were only what was advertised. I copy/pasted the amenities list to clarify, but this greatly offended him. He called me rude for this. I explained I was just trying to help, that having a new agreed-upon list benefited him too. He still thought it was rude, kept saying it was “too inspecting”. (Ironically guests are asked to sign an agreement stating that we’ve “inspected” pieces of furniture in good condition.)
After he admitted he misunderstood me, he never apologized for his tone/rudeness and overreacting (yet I apologized several times for my so-called "offenses"). If we had another accommodation option, I would’ve canceled.
After all that, we still found mistakes about the amenities at the apartment that caused us inconveniences. I avoided contacting him during our stay with problems/questions because I didn’t want to deal with him anymore. Paolo checked us in/out, and he was very kind.
From the beginning Max instructs guests to use email, not AirBnB messaging. At one point I copied some info from the emails to AirBnB messaging, and Max got very upset. Again called me rude because “it wasn’t a good way to start a relationship with the host” (?). I explained it was only for my reference (although it was also my right), and then he said I shouldn’t have done it because it was a privacy violation to send other people’s phone numbers through AirBnB messages. (I investigated, and found no basis for that claim.) I now regret not using AirBnB for all messaging.
After our stay he emailed to ask for feedback – I was understandably hesitant, but he assured me the feedback would help. So I sent feedback, positive and negative. He treated it like a list of complaints, blaming me whenever possible. He acted like the listed amenities weren’t obligations.
The wifi problem was with the provider, and we were told at check-in that nothing else could be done. We used all our data connection quickly (we were relying on wifi for entertainment for our son) and hoped wifi would return. The few times it did come back, it was weak/inconsistent, so essentially we were without wifi the entire stay. Max didn’t want to compensate any amount for this (I said we would accept whatever he offered), because it wasn’t his fault.
I would recommend the apartment, not the host. But if you have no amenity questions or feedback, there’s not much contact with him required.