I stayed at Maria's studio at the biginning of december with my boyfriend.
We were very pleased with our stay, everything was as expected, no scary surprises whatsoever!
Maria was very accomodating and answered all our questions before the trip. Since it was our first time in New York, she gave us lots of tips and ideas as to what to do and see in the city.
Unfortunately we didn't get to meet Maria during our stay, but her mother Natasha greeted us with the keys on our arrival.
The appartment is very easy to find and the location is great! Only a 3 min walk to the nearest subway-station with 2 express trains stopping there. They'll get you downtown in 10-15 minutes.
I checked out google earth beforehand to see what the street looked like, so we had no trouble getting there.
Natasha gave us the code to the building, so we went right in when we came. She waited for us in the appartmen to show us where everything was and how to convert the couch into a bed. She even offered to show us around the neighborhood to the nearest grocery store etc.
The sofa-bed was quite comfortable and more than enough for 1 week. The studio isn't that big, but that really didn't matter to us, as we spent most of our time exploring the city and not in the appartment. But it had everthing necessary, a fridge, a stove, a microwave... The internet worked just fine.
The only thing we didn't quite figure out was the TV, but I can't say we tried really hard and I'm sure Maria would have told us how it worked if we'd called her. We simply had no great use of it.
The neighborhood was great as well. We felt safe the whole time and there are plenty of small delis and other places to eat nearby. We also discovered some great bars with live music in walking distance from the appartment.

So to sum it up, we were very happy with our stay and would gladly stay there again on an other occasion!