Airbnb Review: Venice

We have really enjoyed using Airbnb for our international stays. It gives us the ability to pack fewer items of clothing, because we find Airbnb’s with a washer. During our trip to Italy, we stayed at 3 different Airbnb’s and all were pretty fantastic. The first Airbnb we used in Italy was in Venice.

Airbnb Review: Venice

One thing is for sure, I am a sucker for is a good view. I definitely try to find a balance between price and a views. Usually the better the view the higher the price, but every once in a while you get lucky.

Booking:

Cash back has been my main currency of choice,  that is due to cheap airfare and increased stays at Airbnb’s. I try to stack savings, promotions the best I can as well. Some of those Amazon promo’s have been a big money saver for me 🙂

At the time of booking all of my stays, Delta was offering an increased offering of 3 Skymiles per dollar spent on Airbnb.

After searching around we landed on one with a nice view of a canal and was $167 for the night. I did book using my USAA Limitless, so I earned 2.5% cash back in addition to the 501 Delta Skymiles I earned for this booking.

Arrival:

I typically reach out about 24 hours before our expected arrival to go over details for meeting, receiving keys, etc.

When I initially reached out, I didn’t receive any message back from our host. Not a big deal, because I felt things would work itself out.

I was able to finally get a hold of the host after we landed in Venice, cutting it a little close in my opinion.  I was able to reach him, because I decided to call him to discuss meeting at the Airbnb to meet for key exchange to the apartment, also we could drop our bags off.

Our host offered to pick us up for 15 euro each, Which based on the cost we had found, seemed fair and reasonable. He had told us he would be there in 30 minutes to pick us up…

Let’s fast forward about an hour and we were still sitting in the gas station parking lot where we were told to meet him. After another phone call, he said he’d be there in 10 minutes, which he did arrive. Talk about a rocky start.

After he picked us up, he drove us as far as we could drive, before using his boat to take us to our Airbnb. It is fascinating navigating Venice via boat and I really enjoyed it.

The Apartment:

In most cases, we have had very good luck finding nice Airbnb’s. I would say we had good luck with our Airbnb in Venice as well.

The pictures on Airbnb didn’t showcase how nice this Airbnb is. It was much larger than I was expecting and overall very impressed once we entered into the Airbnb.

Our apartment was very clean and the area where the Airbnb was located was great. We were far enough away from the larger crowds of people, but close enough to make our way there in a few minutes.

The Kitchen:

The kitchen was probably one of my favorite places in the apartment. It was large, clean, and had great views. The picture at the top was  taken from out kitchen window.

There was a kitchen table for sitting and there was plenty of space for the 4 of us to relax.

Since we were there for a day, we didn’t utilize the stove or oven, but when they were functional as I tested them.

The Living room:

The living room was quite large with a couple of comfortable chairs and couch. You can see there is a big window overlooking the canal as well.

The windows had the ability to open completely, or be cracked open from the top. It was nice to relax in the evening after dropping off our bags, then immediately heading out into the city.

The Bathroom:

This was actually very impressive, but it definitely had some areas for improvement.

The bathroom was definitely one of the largest bathrooms I have seen, let alone use.

You can just see how much space there was in this bathroom. The double sinks were great, especially considering we had 4 people in this apartment.

The tub, while quite large was actually not usable. There is a key piece missing in order to use it… The faucet was missing from the tub and when you attempted to turn the water on, it shot straight into the air. It was quite funny to watch, but that nice whirlpool tub, was just for show. Hopefully this is fixed sooner than later.

The shower room, which is where the toilet was located, had it’s own sliding door. It was it own room inside the bathroom, which I found to be quite interesting.

The shower was of good size and the shower head was adjustable. Probably one of the best things about the shower was the fact we did not run out of hot water once. I tend to take hot showers and in some locations I run out of hot water too quickly. This was a huge benefit, because with 4 people needing to shower, there was a concern about running out of hot water

The toilet and bidet weren’t anything special.  They worked perfectly fine and there were no issues.

You can see above the bidet is a towel radiator. I actually really like those, because they work so well! Unfortunately, this was not functional and we couldn’t utilize it.

The Bedrooms:

There were actually 2 bedrooms in this Airbnb. Some of the other Airbnb’s we booked had a sofa bed instead of another bedroom.

Both rooms had a nice view of the canal from the windows.

The beds were very comfortable and larger that expected. By that I mean these were large bed and not 2 twin beds pushed together.

The weather was perfect, to where we could leave the window open/cracked in the evening.

The floor really stood out to me,because the entire floor was in hardwood. It looked very nice.

These steps here led to another bed, but it was pretty hard to get a picture of anything upstairs. There was just a mattress on the floor above the other bedrooms. The ceiling was a bit low I  felt to really make that an extra bedroom.

If needed though, you could have fit another 2 people in the space above the rest of the apartment.

Conclusion

Overall, I thought this Airbnb was very nice. There were definitely some things that need to be improved/fixed, mainly the bathroom area. The communication from the host was definitely below average and that needs to be improved.

The apartment itself was gorgeous, but there are many places available in Venice. The lack of communication from the host is probably the biggest reason I would not return to this Airbnb if I were to return to Venice.

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