While this apartment is spacious, in a lovely old building in a central location, has ceiling frescoes and terrazzo floors, it is not the most comfortable. Even though the apartment does not face the very busy street the building is on, you can hear the traffic clearly and constantly. Ambulances with sirens run by regularly. Exhaust smells drift in. Across from the apartment, there is a high school for boys who are very loud and rev their motos in the morning and peered through the bedroom windows at us. At night, the businesses drag carts along the cobblestones on that side. This was one of the noisiest apartments I have rented.

The apartment also suffers from a lack of maintenance, from the dirty curtains, the browning of the blue bedspread and pillow covers, the bulge at the end of the mattress, to the loveseat cushions that flatten out when you sit on them. The washing machine is wedged in a disused bathroom off the kitchen, very hard to access, and it spins poorly. One attempt to maintain the place was the delivery of reading chairs that had been recovered. However, although we were there for almost 3 weeks, we had to ask for a linen change and no one ever came to vacuum or dust the place. No vacuum or mops in the apartment. The plastic tablecloths in the kitchen were filthy. There were no basics in the kitchen but salt and pepper, and we eked out the last of the dishwashing soap. The few knives were dull and the non-stick pans were damaged. No spatulas nor microwave. Except for sheets and pillowcases, nothing is provided and other renters had been buying necessities, leaving the extras behind. We bought toilet paper and napkins ourselves. The internet connection is poor, as the Wi-Fi comes from the owner's apartment through 3 foot-thick walls, so it impossible to stream anything.

Except for the noise, this apartment could be wonderful. It only requires regular maintenance and occasional refurbishment for weary appliances and kitchen basics - washing of house fabrics, a mattress pad that actually fits the queen mattress instead of coming off and bunching, someone coming in weekly to dust the furniture, change the sheets, vacuum the floors, providing cleaning and usable cooking tools, toilet paper, towels, an accessible and fully functioning washing machine, and an in-apartment router, perhaps even a flat screen so that guests could connect their laptops and stream a movie after long days of walking and museum-going.