The apartment: very well designed to provide quite a lot in a pretty small space. There are four bedrooms, two bathrooms, a nicely organized kitchen, and a small living room. The space was a bit tight for seven people in the kitchen / living room, but everyone was comfortable in their rooms. The apartment, kitchen, rooms, and bathrooms are well decorated and the space looks very nice. The electronic lock was actually pretty convenient. Of note, it is a first floor (slightly below street level apartment, so the windows open to the street where people walk. There is a washer and drier (that both work well), microwave, and Nespresso machine! Most important for us, since we keep working remotely when we travel: FAST WIFI! Thank you!
The location: the apartment is in a local neighborhood, some distance from the old downtown Madrid. There is a subway nearby (5 min walk) which can take you into the old city in about 20 minutes. The best location feature of the apartment is that you can walk to Las Ventas Bullring in about 10-15 minutes. Parking was tough in case you bring a car. We arrived on a weekday and I circled the area for about 45 min and couldn’t find a free spot, so I paid 25 Euros in a nearby parking structure (10 min walk). On the weekend, I was able to find spots daily, after circling for about 10-15 min, which is not bad at all for a big city.
The host: we received all the information we needed from Raul, especially about parking and the electronic lock. He left us food, milk, water, and coffee to get us started, which was very nice. Of note, guests have to provide copy of passports and other personal data on an app before check in, and the lead guest will be asked to leave a signed copy of the rental contract before leaving. This seems to be to comfort to Spanish law. We are generally concerned about our data privacy, so this was a bit of a concern for us, but we discussed it we the host and we made it work.
Value: we chose this apartment because we couldn’t find anything affordable with four bedroom in the center of Madrid. We were happy with our choice because we saved quite a lot of money, we had the space we needed, and we were able to still see the beautiful old Madrid by taking the subway.