Coastal San Pedro is a hidden gem.💎 Point Fermin is the neighborhood this house is in and it has amazing houses with unique architecture from every decade in the 20th century.
As architecture lovers we were in awe of what we saw - there are properties there that we couldn't tell what decade they were built in because they were so unique. The views and people we met were awesome and it's super close to the beach. Just a great neighborhood all around.
Anthony who is your go-to guy while staying there was really cool. Both him and his wife Kristin were just down to earth, authentic and all around good people. We enjoyed them so much - love you guys!!!!
Now for the bad part. The place itself screamed "lack of pride of ownership". The first night we arrived, we walked barefoot in the house for about two hours and both of our feet were jet black on the bottom - as a result we had to mop & vacuum the entire place that first night. There was dust & debris in the closet and along the floorboards, on the three ceiling fans, on the walls...everywhere. The three ceiling fans were caked with a layer of dust on the blades so we had to get on a little ladder and clean all three of them. Both the bedrooms have air conditioner units that are large and vent out thru the windows. Both of the filter screens were about 1/8 to 1/4 inch thick with gunk and the metal mesh intake screen on the back of them were caked as well. There were a few bugs that we encountered during our stay (on the bedroom walls, underneath the bed) that we've never seen before.
We had little moths flying through the house for half of our stay and our stay was just over two months. Eventually, they disappeared because we killed them all. There were gnats flying into the bathroom from the drain in the sink everyday and the water that came out of that sink reeked of sulfur. The water spout in the bathtub was corroded. One day after turning on the water, all this gunk and metal came into the tub which left a giant hole in the underside of the spout.
We killed four cockroaches in the front yard patio. The beautiful palm tree in the living room was dying. The soil was bone dry and the pot was too small for the plant's size. One of its stalks was bent in half and hanging over when we arrived, but we tied it up and fed it and the plant eventually came back to life.
The place needs a paint job. the dishwasher's door frame is bent so its tricky to close and when you open it to load dishes, it goes all the way to the floor and the rack slides downward and if you're not careful, the dishes can fly out of the rack and hit the floor. With the exception of one pot, all of the pots and pans looked like something you would find on the $1 clearance rack at your local Salvation Army. The bathtub/shower combo had been band-aided so many times to keep it afloat. The shower doors are on their last ride as well. The dining room chairs are all on caster wheels and two of the chairs have a wheel that comes off easily and one time before we knew this, I fell backwards from the wheel coming off and landed on the floor.
Once, David was lifting a pot off the shelf in the cupboard and just lifting it up caused the whole shelf to fly upward from the weight of the other pots at the other end and the shelf not being secured properly. When it came down it shattered a glass bowl and as he jumped back, the broken bowl cut his foot.
There is more, but this review is long and I'm sure you get the picture.
The last thing is that when Anthony sent pics of all this stuff to the owner (Tobe), Tobe responded to us by message. He waived the cleaning fee we paid, but disappointingly didn't take any ownership for the state of the property and placed the blame at Anthony's feet, which is neither fair nor accurate - Anthony isn't responsible for the cleaning because that is handled by an outside source and is overseen by the owner, not Anthony. As the onsite property manager, Anthony could only inform the property owner so many times of what needs to be replaced or fixed and if the property owner is unwilling to handle it the right way rather than band-aiding everything or just flat out ignoring taking care of it, his job is done and the responsibility falls onto the owner after being informed. For what is being charged per month, this house should be presentable, clean and safe and it was anything but. No, this wasn't a case of poor management - this was a case of an owner that is cheap, neglectful, unwilling to reinvest into his investment and unwilling to be honest with himself about where the responsibility lies and where the buck stops and in our opinion, that all lies squarely on Tobe because he ultimately decides if the house gets painted, the chairs are replaced, the cleaning service is worthy of keeping, or the bathroom is updated.
Never underestimate the power of denial.