I cannot fault Kate as a host at all. She was extremely friendly, responded to all my queries straight away and was very attentive. Upon arrival Kate met me at the apartment and helped carry my bags. Something to note if you have heavy bags - the apartment is on the second floor with no lift but this was absolutely fine. The images do reflect the appearance of the apartment however as other guests have noticed - it is often quite dark. We also had a slight issue with the keys every time we entered and exited the building - the keys were extremely stiff so we spent a good 5 minutes every time trying to open the doors which at times was really frustrating.
One other issue we came across was that we found 2 huge cockroaches in the apartment during our stay. I fully appreciate due to the humidity and weather in NYC at the time, this is a common problem and as soon as I let Kate know she came round immediately with bug spray and organised someone to come out and take a look at the problem. Kate was extremely apologetic about this situation and advised this has never been an issue before. However I have stayed in the city many times before when the weather has been above 30 degrees and I have never come across any bugs like this. Although the apartment was clean, it is very 'well lived in'. I wouldn't describe it as modern at all but the location is great and easily accessible to everything. We stayed for the Gov Ball Music Festival so we were really close to the ferry and you can walk to pretty much everywhere - there are also some great places to eat and drink nearby and Union Square is a really nice walk only 40 minutes away.