We made reservations and prepaid for 12 nights at this cute old apartment by Galata tower. The location is gorgeous, the area is very old city and busy and full of life. When we booked we asked all the right questions and kept communication with the owner, he was attentive and answered all of our questions, or so we thought… he was very nice but simply was just telling us what we wanted to hear in order to rent it.
They stated in the listing that the place has AC, which it does BUT it’s only a small mini split unit in ONE room, and it was able to cool two rooms. The rest of the apartment and 3rd room is extremely warm, and we couldn’t use it or sleep in it. So we’re able to only use 2 rooms and beds instead of 3. They attempted to fix it by bringing fans and an infallible mattress but it didn’t help, not to mention that the air mattress was leaking air and got flat. We couldn’t do that for 12 more nights.
Theres two HALF bathrooms in the apartment NOT 1 and a half. One bathroom is a toilet and sink, and the other is a shower and tiny sink with no counter space. The bathrooms were remodeled. The toilet bathroom smelled so bad that my kids refused to use it. Owner said if we open the small window in it the smell will go away, it didn’t, It got worst!
They said that the parking is a 100 meters away! It is NOT. It’s 3 blocks away, and all the streets are one way! It took me 20 mins driving around to bring the car back to the apartment to pick up the family. The streets here are NOT car friendly. That’s a big problem for a a family with so many kids. We didn’t even have time to bring down the luggage, there was a pile of cars behind us honking at us! The owner was there helping me unload and he kept saying to me “hurry hurry this is big problem” as if we were committing a crime! When we were emailing with him he made it seem as if it was a piece of cake to park and drive here. He should have warned us about this issue, we would have stayed clear of renting in that area had we known that. This is not a place for a family or little kids.
We gave the owner a 32 hrs notice heads up that we’ll be leaving and requested a FULL refund for the days that we will not stay. We agreed to pay 100% of the days we actually stayed there. He didn’t respond to my text. We then sent an official cancellation request on Airbnb and then he responded with excuses and didn’t agree to pay our money back. He only gave us 50% of the money because that’s his policy he said. Regardless of policy, the ad on Airbnb is misguiding and inaccurate. The AC, the bathrooms, the parking are all misguided. This is why we deserve a full refund for the days we did not stay. Imagine us running around from hotel to another trying to find accommodations for 10 nights at that point with 4 little kids in Istanbul. EXTREMELY DISAPPOINTED. Not recommended if you have kids, a car, and hate smelly bathrooms.