For reference, my husband and I are frequent travelers to CDMX for both family and work purposes. For the sake of future guests, I am leaving a detailed review of the pros and cons of Arely's place.
PROS:
- The location. If you've been to CDMX before or if this is your first visit, the neighborhood simply cannot be beat. Being in front of Parque España and within walking distance to everything from El Castillo to Chapultepec to all of the best restaurants and bars is a huge plus.
- The building is very secure. There is a 24-hour doorman and surveillance throughout the entire property plus a double front entry to the apartment itself. We felt incredible safe.
- It's quiet. Although the building has tons of guests/residents, you can still get a great night's sleep on a Friday/Saturday night when the city is lively and people are partying. This is coming from a light sleeper. :)
- There's a washer/dryer inside the apartment. Huge plus as we were traveling to CDMX for another 7 days after having just spent 4 days in Tulum.
- Good host communication. Arely was always responsive and in a very timely manner.
CONS:
- The check in/check out times. Again, we've stayed in many Airbnb's globally and this was by far the strictest and unreasonable schedule. Check in is at 4pm and check out is before 11am. Please be mindful that Arely's reasoning was because a 5-hour time slot is needed to deep clean the apartment, which brings me to my next point...
- The apartment's cleanliness and details do not match its price or location. A few bullet points that should not be factors given the cost per night and the 5 hours it apparently took to clean the apartment before our arrival:
* All of the towels were old and smelled like mold after one use. My husband's and I washed them all various times but that didn't fix the issue. When I asked Arely if she had new/different towels, she said no. Which is strange if you are managing as Airbnb where these things need to be replaced frequently.
* No access to clean water
* No paper towel in the kitchen
* Six napkins left in the kitchen for our entire stay. And when I asked Arely to replace them, she seemed very irritated.
* One kitchen towel
* No hand soap in the kitchen
* The kitchen sink handle is broken. If you pull the lever to turn on the sink water, it comes completely detached.
* Various dining room table chairs are complete broken. If you sat in them, the chairs would collapse.
* Mold growing in both showers
* Toothpaste on the walls in the bathrooms
* Paint chipping on all of the walls
* Horrific lighting in both bathrooms.
* No fan or AC (this is crucial to have as this apartment does no get any light or air circulation whatsoever)
* WiFi only works in the dining/living room
The reason I am leaving such a thorough review is because these details really matter and you are paying to have thought and mindfulness applied to the kind of place you are paying to stay in for a week. These are things I wish we would have known before booking. The most frustrating fact is that it was clear as day that 5-hours worth of cleaning didn't happen prior to our occupying the apartment. 1 hour at best.
Our experience was good overall but there are definitely better places to stay in this area and we most likely will not be staying at this Airbnb again.