I want to preface this by saying that Shawn seems like a nice kid and I do not mean anything personal with this review.
My partner and I booked his Airbnb for two nights. We arrived after a long drive and were ready to relax. Shawn uses a service called August that requires the use of an app to lock and unlock the door to the unit. Since we had never used this service before, we had to wait outside in the cold while we downloaded the app and registered for an account. This is not Shawn's fault at all, but the service's account creation was not working, so we had to message Shawn so he could let us in. Since we couldn't access August, we were unable to lock and unlock the door ourselves. This made us feel unsafe.
When we got into the entryway, we noticed that it has a strong smell of gasoline.
Entering the unit, we noticed the apartment was dirty. The best way to describe the overall appearance of the unit is by comparing it to a frat house. In the living room, a five gallon bucket and a lone speaker were being used as side tables.
After two hours, we decided we were cold enough to search for a thermostat and see if we could increase the temperature. There was no thermostat. At around 6:45 PM I sent a message to Shawn to ask if there was some way to turn up the heat. We awaited a response, but since we hadn't heard back, we resorted to turning on the stove and standing around it for warmth.
We delayed our bedtime for an hour hoping we would hear from our host so we could turn the heat up. I checked the bedroom for the first time and the bedding was polkadotted with stains and the pillows were nearly flat. My partner told me she would rather sleep on the futon in the living room, so we unfolded it. Its crack was full of food crumbs.
At this point, we were very uncomfortable. The laundry list of things that were wrong with the unit seemed too long to be resolved by the host himself that night, so we did not message him about it.
In our cold, tired daze, we booked a hotel down the road and vacated the apartment. We highly recommend the Courtyard by Marriott down the road. It was very clean and a little cheaper.
We checked into the hotel and around 10:15 PM, Shawn messaged me back to tell me that to turn the heat up in the apartment, I would need to download another app.
I've requested a refund, but Airbnb requires photo and video evidence of the issues. We didn't think to document any of this because we were tired and stressed out, so we will not be getting a refund. The extra $250 was a big hit to my wallet, but it's fine, lesson learned.
I've used Arbnb many times in the past and have never had an experience quite this bad or uncomfortable. I wish Shawn well and hope that we just caught his place on a bad day.