We stayed in this place for 21 days. In general, it's a fine place. However, multiple communications we had with the host made this into a really weird Airbnb experience.
I will split this review into 2 parts. The place itself and the communication we had with the host.
It's a fine 1 bedroom condo located on the 6th floor facing port. The place is recently remodeled in dining/living/bedroom space. You can tell it's an in-budget remodeling with a white IKEA theme. Most of the furniture seems new but not that durable. One of the screws came out itself one day from the chair in the living room. (and it can't be put back. Usually, low-quality chairs have this issue). There is another desk in the bedroom which is great for two people working at the same time. The sofa bed in the living room is too small and not comfortable at all. I feel that it serves neither sofa nor bed purpose. There is no coffee table which is also not good. The TV is hung too high. Basically, it's not a comfortable living room.
The bed in the bedroom is really nice. Super comfortable and in a good size. The soundproof is really bad though. Often time, I heard a lot of noise (car, people chatting, even wind, etc) and I thought the windows are open (while it's not. I was surprised by how bad the soundproof was a couple of times). Not recommend to people who are light sleepers.
The kitchen and bathroom are pretty old and not as clean as other spaces. We saw cockroaches every day from both places. The cooktop seems falling apart. We did not really cook there so it did not bother us too much.
The internet is fast and stable. This is definitely a big plus given that I had to attend 30+ hours of meetings every week.
The location is fine. Walking distance to a couple of great beaches and lagoons. Walking distance to Ala Moana shopping mall. It’s a 20-30 mins walk to the Waikiki Bay Area though. Parking is $23 per day but we could always find overnight parking around Ala Wai Boat Harbor.
There were a couple of really weird conversations we had with the host though.
The first incident happened when we called the host on a weekend. We confirmed with our host before our trip and then ordered a $1000+ camera shipped to the condo. The mailman left the package in the bigger mailbox and put the key in the mailbox of the unit. We called the host for the key and she said she does not have the key. The host was then agitated and kind of yelled at my girlfriend on the phone saying “DON” T TRY TO OPEN THE MAILBOX YOUR SELF” “DON” T CALL ME ON WEEKENDS” “IT” S MY DAY OFF”, etc. It’s weird but I could understand the frustration. However, one thing that I can’t understand is that she also said “I already told you that I don’t have the key when you asked me to send the package to the unit”. This is completely not true. I still have the chat history and at the time she only replied “Sure, but the mailman won’t deliver unless you are there. We cannot receive your mail on your absence”.
The second incident happened when she offered to send clean sheets after we extended our stay. After changing the meet-up time a couple of times, she finally showed up. In the chat, she said, “Just strip off the dirty sheets from the bed, put them in a bag, and I will bring in new ones for you to make the bed. But only the sheets, not the duvet cover of the comforter”. I then only put the bed sheet in the bag with some dirty towels as she requested. She did not check or even ask what’s in the bag when she arrives. However, after 1-2 hours after she left, she texted me saying that she asked for “bed sheets set - set meaning everything”. She did not mention anything about “set” before though. It’s not a big deal and she did come back to pick up the rest of the sheets. However, the way she texted made me feel uncomfortable.
The last incident happened after we checked out. She texted me saying that there is one mug and fork missing in the kitchen. Also, she saw damage to the desk in the bedroom. She hopes I can show “integrity” and “honestly”. I did break one of the mugs by accident but had no idea why a fork is missing. I replied and explained. However, she kept saying that the fork is missing no matter what so she’s gonna buy a new set because she might not be able to find one fork which matches the rest. And she kept using the words like “Just please show integrity and honesty on this; we truly appreciate”. This is probably the most humiliating sentence people say to me in the last 10+ years. I paid almost $5000 for the stay, and why would you keep implying that I lied about one fork? The fork can really be anywhere in the unit. It’s also not in the house rule that we need to count everything in the kitchen before we check out. it’s really just a basic fork that you can get from Target/Walmart for like $3 maybe. At the same time, I had no idea about the damage to the desk so I asked her to show the picture. In the picture, it’s just some water ink. As I said above, most of the furniture is really cheap, so does the desk in the bedroom. We stayed in the unit for 21+ days and used that desk as normal daily. It does not really make sense to accuse your tenants of damaging this IKEA-like desk with some little water ink which might come