After jetting in from London via Denver (for a mates wedding) we were really looking forward to our stay in NYC. Upon arrival to the apartment at 5.30pm we found that absolutely nothing was ready and that the place was a state. A decorator was busy painting the ceiling, bedrooms had been painted so the whole place stunk of paint.

Not only that, Seith's wife was busy cleaning up the bedrooms and the apartment as apparently the maid had failed to turn up.

Before arriving I had checked with Seith to ensure that everything was going to be OK for our stay, he assured me that all would be in place and made no mention of any painting or decorating.

Seith's wife suggested that we pop out for an hour or so, by which time the place would be ready, hence we did so...upon returning, still nothing had been sorted.

After much disbelief and annoyance on our behalf, Seith's wife suggested that we stay in the apartment below, which was much smaller than the one we had booked. We agreed to this as the one we had booked stunk of paint and was still a mess.

Upon getting into the smaller room, we realised that the hot water did not work, Seith assured us that he would have it fixed by the time we got back from dinner. Upon our return, still no hot water!

Seith then proceeded to again fix this issue.

The following morning we checked into the actual apartment we had booked which was subsequently cleaned by the maid.

Unfortunately the trip got off to a bad start and i just wish Seith had told us of the painting and decorating which he was planning (you can imagine our surprise when we turned up to see a man standing on the table paining the ceiling!)

After this we did enjoy our stay, the accommodation is in a cool area and very spacious. Keep in mind there are 2 other flats that are rented out within the same building so when first entering you may see a bunch of random people in the communal kitchen and wonder if you are in the correct place.

So to sum up, started badly, just wish we had a heads up about the decorating but got better.