Mr. Rothschild by TLV2GO

We stayed for the five weeks we had booked, and the experience was mixed. The rooms were clean, renovated, and fairly well equipped, with a full kitchen including an oven, electric stovetop, microwave, full fridge, dishwasher, cookware, dishes, and cutlery. There was also an iron, ironing board, and drying rack. But the kitchen was missing basics like salt, pepper, oil, spices, and dishwasher detergent. We asked for oven gloves and didn’t get any, so we used towels, which felt a bit dangerous. We paid extra for a high floor and a “City view,” but room 425 looked straight at a wall from both the living room and bedroom windows. The only opening in it was office windows, where people could see into our rooms, so we kept the curtains closed much of the time. TLV2GO staff only offered a downgrade to a room with fewer features or one without a proper table, just a high counter. We needed a place to work on our laptops. The living room also had no carpet like some other rooms, leaving the floor hard and cold, and the safe they brought wasn’t attached to the cupboard, so we didn’t use it in case someone could simply carry it off. The central location made it easy to get around, with the Light Rail, shops, and restaurants nearby. But this is the middle of Tel Aviv’s “Party Central,” with nightclubs and dance clubs blasting music late into the night, including one right behind our window. It was worst Thursday and Friday nights, sometimes Friday and Saturday during the day, and happened during the week too. At times it was too loud to sleep or work properly. Fire and car alarms also went off repeatedly for hours. There were lots of homeless and generally unsavoury people around, even in daytime, and construction for the new Light Rail on Allenby made the street unpleasant and hard to be on. The recently renovated building visibly deteriorated during our stay. The outside was very dirty and wasn’t cleaned. The garbage room was suddenly locked and the bins were left outside. I don’t know if homeless people had been sleeping in there. The main door on Allenby had a broken lock, so anyone could enter, which felt unsafe. We reported it several times on WhatsApp and staff repeatedly said it would be fixed, but it took about two weeks. The washer in our room washed fine, but its supposed dryer only steamed the clothes and left them wet, so we had to hang everything on the rack. Staff were helpful with some things: they brought a toaster when we said there wasn’t one, and maintenance worker Aviel showed us how to use the TV system and washer/dryer and fixed things when needed. On other issues, they weren’t helpful, including the view we’d paid for and the missing carpet and unsecured safe. The service felt sort of typical Israeli customer service. We won’t return, mostly because of the noise and the grungy neighborhood.