I’d love to say lots of great things about my stay at this apartment since I loved my visit to Lisbon overall, but unfortunately most of this review is negative. I would NOT recommend this place to others—especially if you’re a group of more than 2-4.
Pros: Convenient location to get around the city. I found lots of places to eat, drink and visit within walking distance. The A/C and heater in the main room worked well. The lookout from across the street is one of the best views in the city. Rebel coffee shop just a few doors down, also awesome coffee and great people. The overall apartment is very spacious. If the issues I list below were fixed, I’d have nothing but glowing things to say about the place. Netflix and the smart TV was a welcomed amenity and I found the property manager to be very responsive—even if issues reported weren’t completely resolved.
Cons: (and yes, the list is lengthy and thorough unfortunately)
1. Charged 20€ (which actually costs me $23 USD after fees via PayPal) to check-in early. The early check-in fee was disclosed in the listing, however the request to pay outside of Airbnb was not. I find the ask to pay extra fees off this platform to be unscrupulous—especially since the owner requested to be paid as a ‘family and friend’ instead of as a ‘business’ to circumvent fees on PayPal.
2. There was a strong smell of sewage at night in the toilet closet—but it did seem to go away during the day (the owner said this had to do with being close to the water and the water levels being low)
3. Listing is inaccurate about the basic size: Toilet closet does NOT have a shower or tub so this apartment IS NOT a 2 bathroom but a 1.5 bathroom (so potentially 8 people would have to share the 1 tiny shower found in the back bathroom)
4. The shower is a tiny closet with no shelves and the handle for the shower-head is broken, so you have to hold the nozzle in your hand the whole time. You have to put your shampoo, conditioner and body wash on the floor of the shower.
5. No shutters or darkening curtains are on the front bedroom with the supposed ‘view’ so all street noise and bright sun comes through. People were outside singing and partying until 4am every night I stayed (granted it was the week leading up to Easter weekend and a hostel is located downstairs in the same building)
6. No dresser, drawers, wardrobe, hanging rack or closet exists in the front room—so there is no option to hang or fold and put away clothes
7. Kitchen doorknobs don’t work
8. Back room is missing a doorknob on the outside, so my roommate got locked in when she shut the door—the fix when we reported the issue was to send a repair man to prevent the door from closing (vs replace and fix the missing doorknob)
9. Same back room doesn’t have a working remote for the heater/AC unit so both bedrooms have to share one remote
10. Same back room has NO Wi-Fi signal, so anyone staying in that room will not be able to connect to Wi-Fi. Owner sent a message acknowledging he’s aware of the router issue-but clearly doesn’t mention this in the listing
11. The living room Wi-Fi signal was faint, but mostly working
12. No heating or AC anywhere but in the two bedrooms so the majority of the space in the apartment stays very cold—with only paper thin (airplane type) blankets provided for warmth
13. The large TV has an annoying and obvious defect—5 white spots approx 1” each where the picture is lighter than the everywhere else. It’s not a complete dealbreaker from watching the TV but it’s just annoying enough to bother you.
14. The ‘faux’ fireplace doesn’t provide any radiate heating—it’s just a light show vs an actual heating element (as in the heating element does not work—as it is supposed to be a space heater)
15. The two mini portable heaters the repairman told us to use don’t work.
16. No real view at all in the front room, since it’s blocked behind a tall cement wall and roof tiles. This is why no photos of the ‘view’ is included in the listing although it is mentioned.
17. Ants crawling around and gnats or mosquitos flying around the kitchen the entire time of our stay.
18. No wine glass opener—had to retrieve one from the nice cleaning lady downstairs, even after telling the owner we didn’t have one. How can you host an apartment in a wine country and not provide a wine opener?
19. Mini fridge does NOT have a working freezer—missing door to close it off so nothing freezes or stays frozen.
20. Mini fridge is missing shelves on the door, so this minimizes the space available to only the inside shelves.
21. The kitchen sink is very slow to drain.
22. The dish drying rack is FILTHY. I would never put anything clean on it. It should have been trashed long ago.
23. Espresso coffee maker doesn’t work.
24. No sharp or useful cutting knives. The main butcher knife is a dull, cheap Ikea blade that doesn’t even cut a tomato. Had to use the bread knife for all cutting purposes.
Apartment has potential if the owner invested in fixing it up. Great location and large space.