I was very excited about this rental, since the pictures of the house intrigued me and indeed the architecture of this house is wonderful, it just needs some TLC.
We arrived at night, which is unsettling, since you don't know what is around you. The caretaker forgot we were coming, so we contacted Eunice (the owner's local agent) and she was able to drive right over with keys. She was always available to answer questions for us and the caretaker (Geronimo) did help us with an outside ant infestation quickly. The people who are working with the renters are very nice and helpful. The panoramic views from the house and yard are amazing!
Regarding the TLC, the house was not as clean as we had hoped, cooking pans and utensils are in bad shape and the toaster is rusty.
There are some large iguanas that live on the house and in the yard, which we were fine with. The first night one of them scratched at the roof over our bed all night.
We also noticed a large insect and arachnid population near and in the house. Ants were living in the master bedroom's jets in the tub. My husband tried to clear them out of the jets, but the next few days we would still see some in there. My daughter's room in the guest house had a daily trail of tiny ants going from the bathroom sink up the wall.
We battled other bugs daily, but on our last night we lived our own Little Shop of Horrors. Granted, we are from the U.S. Midwest, and are not used to such large spiders, but we arrived home to see a very large spider sitting in the middle of the living room. Once my husband took care of it, my adult children went out to their guest house and started screaming. Not only was there an identical large spider in front of my daughter's door there was a type of tarantula, almost the size of an adult hand, sitting on my son's door. Once those spiders were taken care of by my husband, we walked into my daughter's room and found a scorpion inside. Needless to say, our 24 year-old daughter slept with us in the main house that night. My son toughed it out in the guest house.
We did love the town of Atenas and the people that we met there (Take the El Toledo Coffee tour!). The gated community that the house is in, was also very nice. Unfortunately, because of the bug/spider issues that we had, and the lack of cleanliness, we wouldn't rent this house again.
As for Costa Rica, we loved it! We went on to another house near Quepos and had a spectacular time.