Pros of this place: location is great, right on the beach and walking distance to cafes, shopping, grocery, restaurants, etc. The apartment was quite clean, which was nice.
Cons: The apartment was run down except for the bed and the couch. Lots of broken tiles on the floor, fans that looked like they would fall out of the ceiling if you turned them on, mold around the tub. The toilet seat was so old that it was peeling and yellow….how hard and inexpensive is it to replace a toilet seat? We came during an extremely rainy week. It was clear that there had been leaks in the kitchen before and when the rain was heavy, water leaked in over the stove where we were trying to cook! It’s one thing if it was a new leak, but there was plenty of water damage from previous leaks to know that the problem was simply ignored.
I actually wouldn’t have cared as much about the run downness of the place except for that we had a conversation with Mario and he was bragging and going on and on about how he makes so much money from these rentals. He also explained that he’s not making an investment into the rentals bc he’s planning on tearing the place down in a month to build a 5000sq ft home. While this place is less expensive than other places in Malibu, we spent over $2000 there only to hear about how much the host didn’t care about the place. It felt like dealing with a slum lord. I won’t be going back and hopefully he does tear the place down in a month bc it needs some serious work.
I own a few rental properties myself and know that it wouldn’t take a ton of effort to fix the major issues in the apartment. I also work with many tenants and know how unrealistic they can be at times, and I am not being unrealistic.