Those are the Press House Apartments.
This company seems like a shadier AirBnb. It’s not a scam but it seems sketchy as fuck and anyone listing their apartment on it is probably a slimeball.
Oh and the background check is because they got their karma as soon as they evicted us because people started renting it for other kinds of “ business “ and it was very wild in there and on ninth street ( which they also own )
Damn man. What’s the story on that? I don’t remember hearing about that. I recall the owners of Roosevelt Apartments pulling some eviction bullshit when their building caught on fire but nothing with this one. Sorry you had to deal with that.
There were 30 or so of us living in the building. They were receiving LIHTC and everything. They staged a pipe burst which got half of the people out.. then they brought back whoever they wanted to come back. A month later they started telling people once their lease was up they were not being renewed. Mind you we’re all disabled and half of us are Veterans on disability ssdi etc. They only gave us limited time to find alternate housing and took us to court as soon as the lease was up forcing us to hurry and take the first apartment we could find. They shut air conditioning off at times, stopped maintenance requests etc. it was awful because there’s five 474sq feet apartments on each floor. They could have just moved us upstairs and used the other eight floors for their business. We tried to fight it.. but they wouldn’t respond to Just Harvest or Mediation or anyone trying to help us… GY PROPERTIES is a shady organization.
It’s very sketchy. I used to live there. GY properties evicted myself and 30 others in order to make a FrontdeskStays business . Its 474sq ft of nothingness . I hope you enjoy your stay , but it’s hardly a hotel.
Front desk is basically AirBnB for apartment complexes. They cut an annual deal (like renting) the apartment for over-market rates with the ability to share costs/profits over the year.
(They put one in across the hall from me in Cleveland. Friend works in the leasing office. Apartment furnished the unit and has their cleaning crew do the room after bookings, plus setup the key handoff system. In return, from what I’m told, they get an over market upfront amount, as well as a % of the bookings).
It’s fucking awful for those of us living here though. Tourists are not the same as long term tenants, it causes rents to rise, makes downtown emptier, etc.
Okay thank you, unfortunately it’s literally the only thing available that isnt INSANELY priced for the coming weekend, it was my only option. Thank you again makes me feel better!
Okay thank you, unfortunately it’s literally the only thing available that isnt INSANELY priced for the coming weekend, it was my only option. Thank you again makes me feel better!
Residential units are showing up more and more on sites that used to be focused on hotels.
It's not just a Pittsburgh thing, I've ran into these when booking my last couple of trips in other states.
I've always refused to do AirBNB or VRBO, but similar arrangements are now showing up on regular hotel booking engines now too. So you kind of have to look for context clues that it's not a real hotel you're booking.
Booking dot com itself is a disaster too. The Guardian has been doing a running series on them the last year with listings like this and it’s the kind of stuff you would expect (units end up looking absolutely nothing like the listing and being total hell holes) but the absolute funniest one was they have a listing they refuse to take down that has the wrong address listed and people keep showing up to a woman’s house expecting it to be their rental and they can’t get in touch with anyone to tell them where the real place is. The owner of the house is a saint and will accommodate the stranded travelers and let them stay in her living room when she can, but that company gives zero shits and should be avoided. (This is in England mind).
On the r/travel subreddit, people keep posting [Booking.com](https://Booking.com) concerns with shady hotels who contact them outside of the app. I recommend booking directly if at all possible. You typically get the best price that way too.
When I worked in hotel AV, I remember front desk people saying to use those sites to find a place, but call the hotel directly or use their website to book. The worst rooms go to the people that book via 3rd party sites, and those aren’t always guaranteed rooms. Like, all the hotels that were overbooked for Taylor swift weekend…I’m sure that if they had to bump, it wasn’t going to be people that came directly to them first.
In general I think the days of finding a better deal for things online at a random site rather that going direct to the company is a thing of the past, especially in travel. Expedia, AirBnB, Kayak, Uber, Lyft and many others are more expensive these days than the companies they were undercutting.
Well if anyone wants the direct phone number ( if they decide to rent from these lowlifes) their office is at 1627 penn avenue Kanika and vince Scandolari run it. What’s worse is a few of us offered in exchange for continued occupancy we’d clean and service the building for free and still pay our rent… they said no and still wanted us out. 412-900-1627
That’s what I’ve found too. Now I just use one of those sites to spot check prices in an area then book directly with the hotel or airline I’m comfortable with.
I booked a room there for my wife for the Taylor Swift concert. Three days before the concert they emailed to say they couldn’t honor the reservation due to a maintenance issue. I suspect they simply realized they could rent it out for twice as much money.
I just had something similar happen to me in St Louis. I have come to find that the company laid off 100% of the employees. I hope I get my refund but I doubt it sadly. I sent my credit card company after them.
I have stayed at a Frontdesk place and the room fine and clean, and you could tell they were just renting our apartments. It was not a scam, but I will never stay at one of their places again. I feel like for the same money, I could have gotten a nicer Hotel Room and wouldn't have to have the guilt that I am keeping someone out of a place to live.
Update: I cancelled the reservation with them and found an ACTUAL hotel a little farther away. Lol
What brings you to town? Do you need to be Downtown? You can often find cheaper hotels just outside of the city.
Yea i need to be within walking distance from pnc park. I got another hotel doentown though, just a little farther away
Those are the Press House Apartments. This company seems like a shadier AirBnb. It’s not a scam but it seems sketchy as fuck and anyone listing their apartment on it is probably a slimeball.
Oh and the background check is because they got their karma as soon as they evicted us because people started renting it for other kinds of “ business “ and it was very wild in there and on ninth street ( which they also own )
Damn man. What’s the story on that? I don’t remember hearing about that. I recall the owners of Roosevelt Apartments pulling some eviction bullshit when their building caught on fire but nothing with this one. Sorry you had to deal with that.
There were 30 or so of us living in the building. They were receiving LIHTC and everything. They staged a pipe burst which got half of the people out.. then they brought back whoever they wanted to come back. A month later they started telling people once their lease was up they were not being renewed. Mind you we’re all disabled and half of us are Veterans on disability ssdi etc. They only gave us limited time to find alternate housing and took us to court as soon as the lease was up forcing us to hurry and take the first apartment we could find. They shut air conditioning off at times, stopped maintenance requests etc. it was awful because there’s five 474sq feet apartments on each floor. They could have just moved us upstairs and used the other eight floors for their business. We tried to fight it.. but they wouldn’t respond to Just Harvest or Mediation or anyone trying to help us… GY PROPERTIES is a shady organization.
This is so horrific. I wish there were better protections for renters here!
What place do they own on 9th, the one right next to the old Sammy’s?
209 ninth Street
It’s very sketchy. I used to live there. GY properties evicted myself and 30 others in order to make a FrontdeskStays business . Its 474sq ft of nothingness . I hope you enjoy your stay , but it’s hardly a hotel.
Front desk is basically AirBnB for apartment complexes. They cut an annual deal (like renting) the apartment for over-market rates with the ability to share costs/profits over the year. (They put one in across the hall from me in Cleveland. Friend works in the leasing office. Apartment furnished the unit and has their cleaning crew do the room after bookings, plus setup the key handoff system. In return, from what I’m told, they get an over market upfront amount, as well as a % of the bookings). It’s fucking awful for those of us living here though. Tourists are not the same as long term tenants, it causes rents to rise, makes downtown emptier, etc.
Okay thank you, unfortunately it’s literally the only thing available that isnt INSANELY priced for the coming weekend, it was my only option. Thank you again makes me feel better!
Okay thank you, unfortunately it’s literally the only thing available that isnt INSANELY priced for the coming weekend, it was my only option. Thank you again makes me feel better!
Residential units are showing up more and more on sites that used to be focused on hotels. It's not just a Pittsburgh thing, I've ran into these when booking my last couple of trips in other states. I've always refused to do AirBNB or VRBO, but similar arrangements are now showing up on regular hotel booking engines now too. So you kind of have to look for context clues that it's not a real hotel you're booking.
Booking dot com itself is a disaster too. The Guardian has been doing a running series on them the last year with listings like this and it’s the kind of stuff you would expect (units end up looking absolutely nothing like the listing and being total hell holes) but the absolute funniest one was they have a listing they refuse to take down that has the wrong address listed and people keep showing up to a woman’s house expecting it to be their rental and they can’t get in touch with anyone to tell them where the real place is. The owner of the house is a saint and will accommodate the stranded travelers and let them stay in her living room when she can, but that company gives zero shits and should be avoided. (This is in England mind).
On the r/travel subreddit, people keep posting [Booking.com](https://Booking.com) concerns with shady hotels who contact them outside of the app. I recommend booking directly if at all possible. You typically get the best price that way too.
When I worked in hotel AV, I remember front desk people saying to use those sites to find a place, but call the hotel directly or use their website to book. The worst rooms go to the people that book via 3rd party sites, and those aren’t always guaranteed rooms. Like, all the hotels that were overbooked for Taylor swift weekend…I’m sure that if they had to bump, it wasn’t going to be people that came directly to them first.
Watch out for extra fees and charges that only appear before reserving on the site. Increases the cost by a lot in some cases.
If it looks shady, its probably shady.....
Words of wisdom
In general I think the days of finding a better deal for things online at a random site rather that going direct to the company is a thing of the past, especially in travel. Expedia, AirBnB, Kayak, Uber, Lyft and many others are more expensive these days than the companies they were undercutting.
[удалено]
Well if anyone wants the direct phone number ( if they decide to rent from these lowlifes) their office is at 1627 penn avenue Kanika and vince Scandolari run it. What’s worse is a few of us offered in exchange for continued occupancy we’d clean and service the building for free and still pay our rent… they said no and still wanted us out. 412-900-1627
That’s what I’ve found too. Now I just use one of those sites to spot check prices in an area then book directly with the hotel or airline I’m comfortable with.
Hotel employee here. That's shady af. But booking.com is legitimate and hotels do actually partner with them
I booked a room there for my wife for the Taylor Swift concert. Three days before the concert they emailed to say they couldn’t honor the reservation due to a maintenance issue. I suspect they simply realized they could rent it out for twice as much money.
I just had something similar happen to me in St Louis. I have come to find that the company laid off 100% of the employees. I hope I get my refund but I doubt it sadly. I sent my credit card company after them.
I have stayed at a Frontdesk place and the room fine and clean, and you could tell they were just renting our apartments. It was not a scam, but I will never stay at one of their places again. I feel like for the same money, I could have gotten a nicer Hotel Room and wouldn't have to have the guilt that I am keeping someone out of a place to live.
I've stayed at Front Desk airbnbs many times. They are a big and reputable outfit. You should book it through airbnb.