Aesthetically speaking the apartment is very pleasing to the eye. It is also in a desirable location surrounded by food, shops, and parks. But, there are many quirks with the layout and it definitely needs to be better maintained. We enjoyed our stay but had to overlook a lot of the issues and inconveniences.
Assessment aside, Paulina was easy to communicate with and although she offered to send a plumber to fix some of the more pressing issues, the plumber said the job would have taken a whole day. We would have lost access to the bathroom for a day and would have had to manage with having the plumber working out of the apartment.
Read below for my honest assessment of the apartment. Make sure you ask whether these issues were addressed before you book. We spent over $300 to stay for a couple of days and looking back, I wish we would have known about some of these issues because it did detract from our experience.
LAYOUT
The whole apartment is nicely decorated and it photographs very well. The issue we had with it was that while it was pretty, it wasn’t very practical for our particular stay. We were a party of 4 people.
First floor has a nice layout with a spacious master ensuite and a good size living room/kitchen area. 2 people stayed in the master suite.
The second floor has a small bedroom but be warned, to get to it, you need to go up some steep steps with no handrails. Definitely not child friendly and if you have some sort of mobility issue, this place is not for you. There is also no bathroom on the second floor. Both bathrooms are on the first floor so if you get stuck in the smaller second bedroom you will have to make the trek up and down the steep stairs to use the toilet. The second bedroom is also quite small. There are no drawers or closets for your clothes and our suitcases did not fit in the room so we had to leave them downstairs which was particularly annoying because we had to run up and down for the bathroom and to get any items from our suitcases. There are also only 2 electrical sockets in the smaller bedroom which made it difficult to plug in our devices.
There is a TV mounted to the wall in the small bedroom but the cord doesn’t reach the electrical socket and even if it did, there weren’t enough sockets to charge our devices and plug in the TV. Same thing with the space heater - did not have a socket to plug it in to.
There is a nice roof deck right off the smaller second bedroom. But, again, to get to it you need to climb some steep stairs with no handrails. Don’t recommend it for small children. Can definitely see accidents and liabilities.
Lighting is dim throughout the apartment in the evening. The apartment light is a yellow hue throughout which made it difficult to see. Yes, the Edison bulbs were a great touch but they just aren’t bright enough to illuminate the space properly in my humble opinion. A quick switch to bright lights might help liven up the space. At the moment it is a bit on the dark side (at least in the evening).
MAINTENANCE
When we arrived we found a large industrial size trash bin in the middle of the kitchen full of water. Not a great first impression but we were told it was a contingency supply of water in the event there was an outage. The trash bin was not labeled so was not clear if the water was for drinking, washing, showering?
There were also some dirty dishes and silverware stored away with the clean dishes (like someone used them and put them back without washing them). There were towels in the master bedroom which seemed to be unwashed and there were ants in the living room, kitchen, and dining room table.
The stools in the kitchen were loose and the chairs for the dining table were wobbly and really uncomfortable.
The living room furniture was pretty but unfortunately, was also uncomfortable. The sofa also has tears and pieces of foam sticking out. Needs to be properly upholstered.
Also, a decorative feature by the window wasn’t secured properly and fell off when we tried to open the window.
We were unable to connect to the Wifi the first day we arrived. The house manual gave us the network ID and password but the specific network listed in the manual did not exist. The house actually has a different WiFi and password which we were given the second day we were there.
Other issues:
Master bedroom handle for the hot water fell off.
Towel rod in the master bedroom was not secured and fell off.

Toilet seat for master bedroom was not secure and made it difficult to use the toilet
Guest bathroom handle for hot water did not work properly. Could not turn the handle.
Shower rod in guest bathroom fell off when we showered.
In general, the pattern that I noticed was that while there was certainly an investment in staging and presenting the house well online, it could use a boost on the practicality, maintenance, and efficiency factors.