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The host was on holidays elsewhere in the country, so I was left with self check-in (worked out well). My stay would have been August 11 to 23.
One bedroom flat which probably hasn't been refurbished since the 70s or 80s. What is presumably the lounge is used by the host as her bedroom, so wasn't accessible.
The pros were the central position and the lift. For the cons, keep reading.
1 - THE PLACE IS FACTUALLY FAR FROM QUIET: tram 11 runs in both directions from 6am to 1am every day (i.e. 19 hours a day) and its tracks are probably less than 30 metres/yards from the guest bedroom window. Car and truck traffic is also noticeable. If you are a light sleeper, avoid this place.
The host seems to believe that the lack of noise from the inside of the flat makes up for the external noise and that being central has to come with some noise anyway.
But central doesn't have to be noisy. I've stayed in Welhavens gate in Oslo earlier this year and it was even more central yet quiet, because the guest bedroom windows weren't facing the back road.
This place should NOT be advertised as quiet.
2 - THE KITCHEN WAS IN A BAD STATE: I was "greeted" by an unwashed frying pan which had solidified days-old remainders of bacon or something else. It had stinked up the kitchen and I had to clean it myself. But that wasn't the half of it.
The fridge was in bad conditions. Much of it was covered by a film of yellow stains, the shelf for the bottles had residue that looked like cigarette ash or something like that. It genuinely felt like it could be unsafe to store food there.
The stove was also sub-standard, with the extraction fan oozing some yellow goo.
This is all documented in photos I have sent to Air Bnb as I started my claim that the place was sub-standard.
3 - THE HOST WAS BASICALLY INDIFFERENT TO MY PROPOSALS TO IMPROVE THE SITUATION: the host was completely UNapologetic about the various issues, other than offering a meager $30 refund for the objectively dirty kitchen (whereas I proposed that she paid for a cleaning person to come and do the work, which in Norway would have costed more than that).
4 - THE HOST PRETENDED I CAUSED THE KEYS TO GET LOCKED IN THE DROP OFF SAFEBOX AND THOUGHT ABOUT CHARGING ME FOR A NEW SET OF KEYS AND LOCK: as I cut my stay short on Thursday 15, in agreement with Air Bnb, I received scant instructions on how to drop off the keys. As I dropped them off, the host had requested that I noted and relayed the new access code for the safebox at the Seven/Eleven. Whilst I had forgotten to do so, her claim that the key had therefore been made inaccessible were essentially false. After 24 hours of her mentioning that she'd need new keys and a change of lock and hinting at the fact that I should pay for them, I contacted the company running the pick up/drop off services.
They confirmed that the host would receive the new code on their app anyway (i.e. no way to have something locked just because of a missing code) and that that very same safebox had been opened about 24 hours after my drop off.
Note that in the meantime I had offered to go back to the Seven/Eleven to se if something could be done while she was travelling back to Oslo, but she ignored the proposal.
FINAL THOUGHTS:
Whilst I can't deny the presence of many good reviews in Aria's listing, the aforementioned bad ones (and this one) should make you think. The combination of her being away and her customer service attitude made my stay terrible, to the point I had to cut it short and look for another place. Chances are that things would have been different had she been present.
Yes, the place has its merits and it's quite cheap, but I think there are no substitutes for hygiene.
It's the second Oslo Air Bnb in a row in which the host is away on holiday, the place is left in substandard conditions and the guest is expected to just suck it up. But this is not Couchsurfing, it's Air Bnb. We are paying customers, and should be treated as such.