Little Paradise

N

Nino Foleyvia Google

11 months ago

Booked this spot for $6,500 a month, expecting a nice place, but got a rogue operation — this Airbnb is illegal and it is banned by city law. This however does not prevent the host from acting like you are criminal for having a guest over for tea. Rules are her gospel—except, the ones that the city makes. Neighbors asked me if I was an Airbnb guest and were NOT happy to find out that I was, understandably. This made for a rather uncomfortable situation in the neighborhood. Fresh off surgery, I was a hobbling mess, but the host decided I was secretly Usain Bolt, ready to sprint to Applebee’s for dinner with friends rather than—horror of horrors—have a friend step inside to deliver medication and help take care of me. That’ll be $50 per visitor, please! The host has a “no visitor” policy which I initially understood to mean no unregistered overnight guests. I quickly learned this meant no one at any time can be in the house, which I now also understand is part of her attempts to evade the city of Saratoga laws, and her neighbors, by running a secretive operation. Then there was the guest debacle. My dad and I stayed there for the first two weeks, and when he left, I asked to substitute in a second guest— using the spot I’d already paid out for. The host insisted I pay extra for a ‘third’ guest, despite the obvious facts of the case: two people, max, at all times, fully prepaid. She continued to insist I pay for three guests that never existed. She eventually resorted to threatening me with eviction if I did not pay for a third guest that was not there—because nothing says ‘hospitality’ like tossing a recovering tenant over a phantom headcount. My poor elderly dad aged a decade dodging her nonsense and left early. What ultimately inspired me to write such a review, was the host’s intransigent and arrogant commitment to “rule following”, all the while violating actual laws in California. For that princely sum, I also got to play musical chairs with the house and leave for hours at a time so she could do laundry—$6,500 doesn’t buy privacy, apparently, just a front-row seat to her spin cycle. The moldy washing machine? A biohazard masterpiece. The broken garbage disposal? Avant-garde decor I didn’t ask for. I paid for a palace and got a sitcom plot where the villain’s a stingy ego-maniac on a power trip with a side hustle in hypocrisy. Book this if you love stress, absurdity, and a whiff of illegal Airbnb activity. I’d rather recover in peace under a bridge.