Overall my Airbnb experience in Giovanna's AirBnb in Venice was poor at best. The conditions of the place are not as described (there is not keyless entry, no self check-in, the beds and interior are not as described, there is no living room, etc.) The biggest discrepancy is in the photos and how they align. They make the place look bright, cheerful and 'new'. There are photos showing a living room area, with a sofa. Instead the sofa is stuffed into a room with a hard and old bed. Overall, the place is dated, the wallpaper is yellowing, the paintings on the walls are creepy at best (specifically the 6-foot photo of an old woman in front of the master bed), and there are barely any dishes to use. Also, the place had a mosquito problem. We kept getting bit and finding a bunch of mosquitos in the unit in the morning, even though we kept all the windows closed, so we were not sure where they were coming from. We contacted Giovanna and she sent over bug-spray, but that did not help. We ended up leaving the AirBnb early.
We booked this listing because we were arriving late (midnight) and wanted a place to access easily. As mentioned previously, the listing for this AirBnb says that it has 'keyless entry' and 'self-check-in'. This is false. Leading up to the trip, I had many messages back and forth with Giovanna on gaining entry. When our flight departed london at 8pm on the night of our stay, I still was not sure how we were going to get into the apartment. This caused a lot of stress. In the end, Giovanna ended up hiding our key near the apartment and we found it okay, but it was stressful to find out these details after we landed and were almost at the apartment. At one point, we were not sure we would even have a place to stay.
Giovanna was mostly responsive, but we could tell we weren't really her priority. She asked if she could have maintenance people come in while we were in the unit and we politely asked that they come after the stay was done.
For the cost, we could've stayed in a much nicer place. The bed was hard, towels were very old, pillows were rock-hard, the shower and shower head were verging on unusable, ALL soap bottles in the unit contained the same soap (hand soap, shampoo, conditioner, all from the same - a green handsoap of some kind), and there were 2 plates to use. Also, the units have scary photos around on the walls. Photos of children, dark photos with faces and a floor to ceiling photo in front of the master bed. Coupled with the addition of the large wardrobes and constant mosquitos, my friend and I deemed the apartment 'the Exorcist apartment'.
In short, everything in Venice is walking distance and we definitely walked past other units and wished we had made a different choice.