La Casa de Lope de Rueda

Booking.com should not allow listings like this. I’ve never felt so helpless as a customer. This was one of the worst travel experiences I’ve ever had, and what made it even worse was how Booking.com handled it. After being scammed by another host on a different platform, I made a last-minute booking at Holplace’s apartment near Parque de el Retiro, Madrid. The photos looked nice, but the apartment was uninhabitable. To start, I had to travel 25 minutes just to pick up the keys. The apartment itself was spacious and well-located, but that’s where the positives end. There was no air conditioning in 95+ degree heat, and no fans, despite Holplace claiming they were in the unit. I messaged them before 7 PM, and still, no fans were delivered that night. My son had a soccer game, and I couldn’t go out to buy any. We slept on the floor because the bedrooms had no airflow and were unbearably hot. The water came out ice cold, and the shower had no mount, just a handheld nozzle. The apartment smelled musty, tiles were cracked, and cigarette smoke came in constantly through the windows. This place hasn’t been renovated since the early 1900s, and it shows. Holplace eventually brought fans the next day and temporarily fixed the hot water, which failed again within 24 hours. Then a window shattered from a wind gust, and I was wrongly accused of leaving it open, even though I had consciously closed it. The window was ancient and clearly the most fragile in the entire building. Holplace didn’t show up to help, I did the cleanup with the building president. I contacted Booking.com customer service hoping they’d step in, all I got was a generic “we’ll get back to you in 24 hours.” That response never came. Not even a follow-up. I’ve never felt so helpless dealing with a travel issue. Booking.com, how is this listing even allowed? This place was unsafe, falsely advertised, and managed by a company that clearly doesn’t care about guest wellbeing.

Hot water is terrible - it went on and off. Reported the issue on day 1. It wasn’t resolved. The owners should maintain the water boiler

You need to pick the key far away from the apartment. The second bathroom doesn’t have shower.

We never actually got to stay here as the morning we arrived, they told us a pipe had burst in the apartment. This meant that after a 24 hour journey from the US, my family of 5 ( with a 1 & 3) year old had no where to stay. Holplace were not helpful at all in trying to find us a new place either, they offered us a refund and we ended up having to find last minute accommodation that was twice the price. Also, I wouldn't recommend this company. First, you have to go to a leasing office that is not near the apartment where hours are unclear.

The fact that you the ad of the property depicted 2 bathrooms and actually there were only 1 full and one more room with toilet and lavatory. So it was 1 and a half and I paid for 2 as we were 7 people, sharing one shower. False publicity.

The apartment is not maintained. We got to the apartment and we were very surprised that the bed fell when one of the kids sat on it. We had to put the mattress on the floor on our own. Other problems were with the water of the shower, broken floor tiles, very old kitchen, When we complained, we got slow responses. We requested for a partial refund but we did not get anything and at some point our emails were not even answered.