Our stay at Derik's was a mixed bag due to unfortunate circumstances with a broken bed. This is a newer Airbnb, and I am confident it can be a 5/5 experience for future guests as the host continues to get feedback and improves things. I really think the stay would benefit greatly from investing in a nicer frame + mattress and making things easier on guests to ensure they are happy with circumstances.
The good:
- Location is incredible. This is blocks away from a myriad of restaurants and bars. Less than 10 minute walk to a beautiful water side trail and centrally located among other great neighborhoods it explore (Ballard and Wallingford to name a few). The neighborhood seemed very safe too!
- Check in and access was super easy. I'm planning to get a digital lock like this at home after seeing how convenient it was
- Very clean, free laundry on site is also a nice bonus if you're staying longer
- Host was quick to respond when communicating
- Pet friendly
The bad:
- After a couple nights of really uncomfortable sleep, we realized that the bed frame was broken, so the mattress was not being supported in the middle. We had initially assumed it was just a cheap mattress until we looked under the bed. Derik was quick to respond and got someone in to replace the broken frame the following day, but we had two nights of broken frame + one night of sleeping with a mattress on the floor. Until the frame was fixed, space was super limited which was a challenge. One of us is still dealing with neck stiffness a week removed.
- Without prompting, Derik credited us back some money for the bed issue, but we were credited less than a single night for something that affected us 3 nights + a day while we waited for it to be fixed. I explained why I didn't think this was fair and received a few more offers that I also felt were poor. In the end, we ended up getting what I considered the minimum acceptable offer (3 nights) and decided to just take it and move along with our vacation. Going back and forth and having to involve AirBnb support is the last thing most people want to do during a vacation, and I would have rated our stay higher if this had been easier despite the quality issues.
- The listing was marked as "parking on premises" but there is no dedicated parking. There is parking in the surrounding neighborhood, but you may need to walk a few minutes. This was mentioned in the text of the post, but not in the listing filters. This should be an easy fix
Other thoughts:
- The location is amazing, but the space does open directly to a fairly busy intersection. If you are noise sensitive, you might find this disappointing, but we had no issue as we live in a much louder area.
- The door can be tricky to get used to closing just right, but if you spend a couple minutes, you can get the hang of it. Someone mentioned being able to see through gap of door and feeling unsafe - this is definitely not the case. No gap + safe neighborhood. Tons of people walking dogs after 10PM.