The unit itself was very nice and conveniently located. It was near a hospital and busy street, so if you’re sensitive to noise you might not like it.
But - I did not have a good experience with the check in process.
After booking, I received a message telling me to go to another site, make an account, and download an app. I felt uncomfortable with this because the Airbnb booking page repeatedly warns you not to go to other sites and that everything can be done within their app. The management company behind this listing, Sonder, assured me that they had a special arrangement to do this - but couldn’t any listing say this? If Airbnb continues to allow this sort of hosting service, they should make it more clear in the booking process that this is an approved partner and that registration and identification with outside apps is expected and required.
Over the weeks to come I was continually asked for more and more personal information. Upload a drivers license or passport. Next, take more photos to prove that it’s you. Next, verify your phone number. Some people might be fine with all these steps, but it was not communicated anywhere in the listing that this would be necessary. And personally, I have already made an account with Airbnb and don’t want to be redirected to make additional accounts and share additional personal data elsewhere.
Finally, I encountered a range of technical difficulties that didn’t make things any easier. For instance, the ID upload did not work in the app I had been told to download - it said to enable camera permissions, but in the settings there was no option to do so. After completing all the steps, I continued seeing error messages that things were “pending” and I could not receive check-in credentials.
Overall, this was not the easy and pleasant booking experience I came to Airbnb for. I am disappointed to see listings by third party apps like this on the Airbnb site. It might be good for Airbnb’s bottom line but isn’t a good experience for the customer.