Odette

We arranged a long-​term rental for a San Juan apartment through Airbnb because we recently had had a very good experience with an Airbnb rental near Cannes France. Unfortunately when we arrived at our Airbnb rental is San Juan last night, we found many serious problems with the with the rental unit and the unit did not begin to meet the representations on location, condition or quality made on the Airbnb web site.
The most serious problem is the location of the parking that was associated with the unit. When my sister-​in-​law saw the unit last fall she was told the the parking was on-​site. When we were given instructions to access to the unit, just before we arrived, we found out that the parking was in the garage associated with the Marriott hotel. We had been told by Odette that the parking just was «at the corner, implying it was almost next door. Although inconvenient for rapid in and out use, we had to acceded to this. However, upon arriving we found that the parking location is approximately 3 blocks (+350 Meters) from the unit. This will not work for us because I am 71 years old, have a bad hip replacement and cannot walk that far over the uneven San Juan sidewalks. Additionally we were told that there would at least be a loading /​unloading space at the front door of the apartment. Today the property manager told us that this was his parking spot and and he often left this truck there day — and Night.
The next problem was the apartment as listed as Beachfront property. No part of this property touches the beachfront. In fact there are two other apartments between 7 Cervantes and the beach.
In addition to the parking and location problems we found:
The apartment was advertised as an air-​conditioned apartment. The unit (540 sq.ft.) is really a studio converted to a one bedroom. Since the AC unit is on the living room, there is no AC in the bedroom when the bedroom doors are closed. Odette says no one has ever complained because you can just leave the door to the bedroom open to have the A/​C cool the room. However, this means it is not really a one-​bedroom setup, which is what we rented: a separate bedroom and living room.
We asked for two sets of keys but were given only one set and told when we arrived is will be several days before a second set can be obtained. Since there are two of us, this means one of us has to either stay in the apartment or we have to leave and return together, a major inconvenience.
Most of the storage space in the unit is locked for the owners use leaving only one closet for the tenants. The closet available for tenants is chock full of linens, chairs baskets, etc.
There is no storage space for clothes. The unit has a total of 2 desk drawers, two small bedside drawer and two small shoe drawers in the closet. The little shelving space provided in the closet is completely full of old mismatched linens and towels
And there are many other problems and deficiencies with the unit to include:
The sheets on the bed were stained. We had to borrow linens from my mother in order to sleep on the bed last night.
louvers to the bathroom door are missing (no privacy) and makes unit look shoddy and not well maintained.
TV remotes don’t work. You can’t control the volume on the TV or access any of the menus
Vanity cabinet door in the bathroom is falling off
Living room drapes are not wide enough to block window and won’t close, so there is no privacy.
Bedroom shades are not hung correctly so they can’t seal out light.
Towel rack in the bathroom has been ripped off wall and not replaced
Bedroom mattress is lumpy, sagging and totally worn out.
The microwave is so old the start button has worn off.
The living room light does not work.
There is was no bulb in the one lamp located by the bed.
The shower drips and is very hard to wrestle into a closed position.
The exhaust fan in bathroom does not work
Jerry-​rigged duct tape handle in kitchen pantry door.
I could go on but I think you get the idea. Nothing in the apartment was new. Everything in this apartment was of the very poor quality when new, and has not worn well with age. This is not what we would had expected based on the description and rental rate of the unit.