My husband and I booked with Debra with the impression that our Airbnb was a cottage separate from any other units that would have guest. Instead, it was a basement converted to a "mother-in-law suite". When we booked with Debra, we also booked knowing she accepted pets, her policy later changed, but she was still honoring guest who had booked prior to the policy change (we found out about this policy change a few days prior to leaving). My husband and I planned on keeping our dog in a kennel while we were away from the airbnb (which is a normal practice at home).
*****We also asked, in a message to her, if we could check in early. She never addressed this request, but instead replied with what seemed like an automated response. ****
Upon entering the airbnb, we realized that the unit was part of the basement attached to a large house. There is a side door (the chain lock was broken, but it had a lock on the doorknob) of the "cottage" that is connected to the garage (which is a shared laundry room with the house above, and I will also mention the garage door was left open for at least two consecutive days, leaving access to the door with the broken chain lock.) The pictures and description on the listing led us to believe that we weren't going to be sharing a house with another group. Had we known this we would have found another airbnb to book with, in consideration of other potential guest that might have been disturbed by our dog.
There is another review that states how loud the "cottage" is (we read this, unfortunately, after having stayed in the "cottage"). You can CLEARLY hear anybody that is staying in the upstairs unit. There was constant stomping, you could hear when they turned the shower on, or when they flushed the toilet (the walls seem to be pretty thin). The upstairs guest were also doing laundry quite often (even past the "quiet time" policy instilled by our host, Debra).
On our second day of a six day trip, the upstairs guest had complained to Debra that our dog was barking "incessantly". This is not normal behavior for our dog, but he is a guard dog. If he thinks that there is an intruder, he has been trained to bark to alert us. And between the constant stomping and strange noises coming from the pipes, he must have been set off.
The next day we changed our plans and stayed home with our dog to observe how he was behaving throughout the day. He was constantly unsettled by the noises coming from upstairs and we spent a tremendous amount of time trying to calm him down.
The following day we spent all of the day with him. We even took him to the conveniently located dog park across the street, and let him burn off some energy. We went out for dinner later that evening... concerned, but there were certain events we had planned prior to coming that we needed to attend to. We received another complaint that our dog was making too much noise. We were told by Debra, that for the rest of our stay we were not allowed to leave our dog alone in the "cottage", and that "neighbors" were beginning to complain.
We replied letting her know our concerns with what may be setting off our dog, and again we received no response.
At this point, my husband and I, are disappointed with our stay. We felt like we had been misled since the beginning. We were having to constantly adjust the vacation we had planned. And now none of our concerns were being addressed.
We did have another obligation that we had paid for prior to coming to Nashville that we needed to fulfill. We let Debra know, and of course there was no response. We medicated our dog to make him drowsy while we were gone, and fortunately we didn't receive a complaint that night.
The most ironic part of all of this was the construction taking place literally next door. The apartment building next door were installing balconies on two floors. This noise took place from 8:30am-5:30pm for the last two days we were there. Honestly, it was just normal noise for a large city, but I wonder if Debra received a complaint about that as well? LOL!
We left the airbnb exactly how Debra asked in her "check-out policies". It feels like Debra should not be in the business of hospitality. At no point did either my husband or I feel comfortable staying in her "cottage". There was no accommodating our needs, or addressing our concerns. We did the most to try and enjoy our trip, but staying with Debra was our biggest regret. I definitely would not stay in her airbnb ever again, nor would I recommend you do the same.