Brand new apt, fully equipped, with small but sparkling clean kitchen and all the utensils (which is rare in airbnbs), great wifi, nice huge bathroom and good bed. Separate washroom one floor down with washing machine. The location is in the middle of everything, right next to uffizi gallery and walking distance to all the main spots in the city. The parking in garage only, super expensive if you are staying long term as we did, but basically its the only option. The apartment looks much bigger on the photos than in reality, but still we found it big enough and just right size for comfort. If you are visiting in the winter months, make sure to ask the owner to put the heating on at least one full day before your arrival, unless there were other guests before you. We came to a freezing cold apt and it took a full day to bring it to a nice temperature. After that it was nice and warm. Lorenzo, our contact, was super kind and quick to respond to anything. The check in was very smooth and easy, as you recieve a link tom open the main door and later you can either use a code or a regular key that is also provided.
On the negative side:
- the TV was not working when we arrived (yes, we love tv and it helps with out italian a lot) and nobody informed us about it, so we spent 1 hr searching for channels, just to be told the the tv is not working cuz of some problem in the building. We stayed for u full month, and not a single time were we contacted about the issue and we dont even know if they tried to fix it. It would have been nice if they made an effort to fix it during a full month stay or at least give us heads up if its not fixable.
- Even tho the apt has a prime location, this is by far the darkest apt we ever stayed at. there is 0 daylight, as the street is extremely narrow, and no sunshine comes thru. We had to put the light on first thing in the morning. If you are a short stay, i would say 100% go for it, but if you are staying longer and working remotely from the apt (as we did), the lack of daylight in the apt was a huge problem for us.
- There is a discoteque right across the street, basically under the window, with ppl shouting in the weekends from 11 pm to 5 am. This was actually extremely annoying and screwed our sleep several times. I asked the security guy from the place to try to move ppl from the street (our window) to the corner of it or inside after midnight and this actually helped a lot on our last weekend. Also, i think earplugs would do a great job, if you have those. Since the street is so central and kind of buzzling with young ppl drinking and having fun, another problem is the unbearable stunk of urine in the street, even tho they wash the street daily. This has of course nothing to do with the owner of the apt, its just ok to know if you are sensitive to these kinds of things. But this is far from the only street with that problem in florence, ppl simply pee everywhere in that city :(
Overall, I give this cozy place a 100% thumbs up, if you are a tourist (you will love walking everywhere) , but also if staying longer and working and dont bother lack of daylight. It was also one of the cleanest airbnbs we ever stayed at.