Key was supposed to be in a lock box down a dark un lit ally way. When we finally found the lock box there was no key inside, so could not get into our unit. We later found out that the (?) person, Jack, had tried to text us that he would meet us at the front of the apartment building with the key, however we were enroute on the flight to Sydney and did not receive his message. Our phone’s didn’t work in Australia because we needed SIM cards to be able to make calls and send text messages which we got the next day.
Since we didn’t have a key we decided to have the cab driver take us to the building anyway and figure out what to do next. Due to the time spent searching for the key location and finding the building and standby time our cab fare ended up being $137 from the airport.
When we got to the building jack was there waiting for us with a key. He gave us the key and left. When we tried to use the key in all 3 of the elevators to get to our apartment none worked. After 15 min. A security man asked if he could help, we explained our situation,he tried the key and told us it wasn’t valid for this building, it wouldn’t operate the elevators or open the unit we had rented. We had no way to contact “jack” so we ended up finding a hotel near by. There were four of us (two couples) so we ended up in two rooms that cost each of us $200 X 2 = $400. And we were unable to use the apartment for our first night.
The next day we were able to text jack about our problem and he brought another key to our hotel, it worked and we were able to finally get into our apartment.
Due to bad instructions, lack of complete instructions on security procedures, and a useless key it cost us an additiona $587 for lodging and not being able to use our apartment, and $77 in extra fees for the cab. Total unnecessary expenses $664.00
We have contacted jack with this information asking for reimbursement of our unnecessary extra costs, however we have not heard back from him.
As a side note there is a letter posted in the elevators of the building stating that this building and all units are for long term permanent use and not to be used for short term or vacation rentals.
The unit is nice and in a good location however due to all of the problems we encountered I would NOT recommend this place to anyone, and air b&b should look into this property since it is in violation of the building rules.