Our experience at this Airbnb will differ from others because we brought a pet and we stayed a month.
We gave the owners a 1000 Turkish Lira deposit. When we left they charged us for dirty towels, dog hair, and a mark on the wall that was already there when we arrived. The dirty towels were fair, but I find it hard to believe they had to charge us for having to clean our dog’s hair because we brought our own blanket to cover their furniture during our stay, anything else could have been vacuumed (we cleaned the apartment ourselves every morning). Plus in any case, our dog does NOT shed in the winter, so we found it hard to believe.
They charged us 250TL to paint over something we weren’t responsible for. It was a very light and faded marking about the size of an A4 folder that was about a meter off the ground. We saw it at the beginning of our stay and assumed it was old and the owners already knew about it. They said they had to paint over the entire wall, so we believe they possibly contemplated this project prior to our stay. There was nothing in our possession that could have caused that marking, and as I mentioned it looked old.
A warning to future guests: be careful how you handle deposits in Turkey. Make sure your deposit is protected by terms and conditions before you request your booking. Don’t expect to get your fair amount back. We were very afraid of getting scammed because of their eagerness to confirm our stay without settling the deposit beforehand. Our fear was confirmed. This was settled by Airbnb in favor of the hosts.
Besides this we think the hosts were very polite and good at replying to messages in a prompt manner. They assisted us with food delivery and answered any questions we had about the district. When policemen were in our building, they were very responsible about keeping us informed.
The location is great; not exactly in Balat, but it’s close to the outskirts. There are lots of unique businesses nearby.