Best-selling author Monica McInerneybooked an apartment online. She feels duped
I NEVER EXPECTED to spend my first night in San Francisco wishing I could levitate. Or that, instead of having good walking shoes for the hills and a warm coat for the fog, I had a suitcase full of rubber gloves and industrial-strength disinfectant.
The apartment we'd rented for a week through www.craigslist.org had looked great in the photos. In the funky Hayes Valley area of the city, just metres from shops and bars. Near public transport. A good price at $650 (€420). Just what we were looking for.
The previous year, while I was researching my novel Those Faraday Girls, we'd rented a New York apartment via a website. It was on Washington Square, in Greenwich Village, a light, airy apartment overlooking a communal tree-filled square, with a long balcony and French doors. I liked the apartment so much that Maggie, the main character in my novel, lives in an identical one.
The trip to San Francisco was also for research purposes, a trial of life as a local for my next book. Warning bells should have sounded when the owner of the rental apartment didn't get back to my e-mails about collecting the key until just hours before we were to fly out of Dublin. I'd paid in advance, so there wasn't the option of cutting our losses and finding somewhere else at the last minute.
His directions to the apartment and the key pick-up were like a crazed treasure hunt. Abandoned building. Homeless hostel. Finally the motorcyle bar, and the quest for George. The barman looked blankly at us. He had no idea who or what we were talking about. We tried ringing the owner. No answer. It was 11pm. We were jet-lagged.
We then heard our names being called. A young, cool guy in a baseball cap ran up the street. "I'm George. You're from Ireland? Cool. Come this way."
He took us to a pair of double doors beside the bar. The handwritten notice stuck to the glass: "Attention Tenants. The rodent and flea eradication program will commence next Monday."
Up a flight of stairs. Down a winding corridor. Through three sets of fire doors. Yes, that was urine we could smell. Yes, that did look like blood on the wall. Yes, the carpets did feel sticky underfoot. I was keeping my mouth tightly shut in case a flea or a rodent jumped in.
"Home from home, happy holidays," said garrulous George. "Light switches here. Bathroom here. Bed there. Just leave the key on the table when you go, okay? Enjoy San Fran. Bye!" He was gone.
It was the same apartment I had looked at on the internet. But the photographs hadn't shown the pile of rubbish in the corner of the kitchen - pizza boxes and bags of rotting vegetable peelings. The stains, crumbs and bits of bread on the kitchen table. The cracks and stains in the toilet. The seven half-used bits of soap on the bathroom floor and shower cubicle. The cloud of flies that streamed out of the unwashed coffee maker on the stove when I accidentally touched it.
We edged our way to the bedroom. More bars on the window. A wardrobe with a broken door. And the piece de resistance? Someone else's underwear on the floor by the bed.
We should have walked out there and then. But we were tired. In a new city. It was after midnight. We weren't thinking straight. We stayed.
I changed into pyjamas. My husband went to bed in his clothes. Neither of us slept. We could hear sirens outside and creaks on the fire escape. The bathroom plumbing emitted a series of recurring gasps and gulps. I thought I could hear the whirring of the flies' wings around the coffee machine.
We were up and dressed before 7am. We didn't shower. I rang garrulous George (no answer) and then the owner. No answer.
We walked to the nearest internet cafe and sent a frosty e-mail demanding an immediate refund of the rent, then searched the web until we found a hotel that would take us for a week. We got the last room in a Holiday Inn two streets away. I have never seen a cleaner, lovelier room.
The best piece of advice about online renting is:
• Don't believe everything you see. If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.
• Always carry a bottle of disinfectant when you travel.
• Never pay fully in advance.
As for our refund, I'm still waiting. The owner did eventually e-mail me, expressing astonishment at my complaints, insisting it had been spotless last time he'd seen it.
There has been a catalogue of excuses. The most recent one was that he'd cut off his thumb in a gardening accident and the medical bills were horrendous. He attached a photo to prove it. I didn't open it. This time I decided to take him at his word.
• Those Faraday Girls, by Monica McInerney, is published by Pan Macmillan, £6.99 in UK
• Have you had bad experiences with online renting? E-mail us at go@irish-times.ie