If you take a look at the photos and the location, this Airbnb looks almost perfect, but sadly it's far from the truth. For half the price, I'd say it's worth it to be so central in La Jolla, but the apartment really fell short of our expectations.
To start with, it's run by a property company and it's assigned a person to manage it. Unlike someone's home, you're dealing with someone doing their job, and as it's not their place, everything has to be checked with management. They were very friendly and polite, but because it's a business, very restrictive and inflexible unlike an owner, who can respond to your needs.
The apartment is on the ground floor and lacks a lot of natural light. The main room has some light in the afternoon but it's partly obscured by the roof of the second floor above. The photos - while mostly accurate - show a sunbathed apartment and that was hardly the case. In general it was fairly gloomy, with the one exception of the bedroom in the morning, which received some decent sun (the bed was also really large and comfortable, which was a relief).
The ground floor meant more noise and less privacy - people walking by the only source of light each day meant balancing privacy with natural light. The ceiling also isn't that thick, so we could hear upstairs neighbors in the mornings walking around in heels. AvantStay does seem to have other apartments in the building, so I'd make sure to get the second floor if at all possible, and they should make it clear in the listing which is which - including an exterior photo of the unit in the building so you know what you are getting. I've gotten pretty good over the years at inferring the quality of a place from its photos, but they really knew how to make it all seem amazing. Needless to say, our expectations were not met.
The interior is all new and nice enough, but lacks any personal touch. It's all Amazon basics, with only 4 plates, 4 bowls and 4 mugs. It's fine for a night, but not for a week or two. The dining table / work table, was in the back of the kitchen - it's dark and gloomy and really not a good place to sit and work. The internet was also pretty terrible. The router died numerous times and struggled to support 4-5 devices. Pretty ridiculous that we had better luck pairing our phones rather than using the wired WiFi in San Diego!
To their credit, AvantStay offered a small refund when we expressed our disappointment, but for a two week stay, they offered one night's credit at another property or less than half a night cash refund. Honestly, I couldn't take it and write this review, so I opted for this review instead.
My hope is they improve their operation, make the listing clearer and charge less for the apartment, or offer a large discount for weekly or monthly stays, cause it's really not sufficient if you need to spend any length of time in the apartment other than sleeping.