Sonder

Sonder probably has to be the best kept secret in the hotel and holiday business. No one has heard of them. So we decided to do our own travel review. It is not often that we find something that fits our modern day holiday needs, at least not as perfectly or as good as Sonder offerings.

Having a family of 3, which involves 2 adults and one 14 year old girl, (please don’t get me started) it means hotels are out of the question. There is no way we can all share a room and there is no way we can book a separate room for the 14 year old. It is just not allowed and also there is no guarantee it would be next door to our room or even on the same floor.

There are few options open for many families, who have similar numbers in a holidaying crew. Trust me, we searched for everything for our trip to San Francisco and it was not going to be ruined because of this one problem.

Then by complete chance we stumbled across an accommodation, called The Archbishops Mansion. It seemed too perfect, an upmarket, large property offering a 2 bedroom apartment and at a reasonable cost. It was advertised on booking.com but was managed by a company called Sonder?!?

Researching this Sonder company, we were a little nervous. The website seemed too good to be true, we were worried it was a trap. They’d take our money and when we turn up at the place, the door would be answered by an elderly male looking slightly annoyed.

After more research, everything checked out. There was even an app that we could load and check our booking. So we swallowed hard, paid our money and packed our bags.

This is where things got serious, we started to get emails from Sonder. They were telling us how we can enter the property, supplying us with pin codes and a route to our room. There would be no key and entering would be on a touch pad above the door locks. We had the codes sent over, one for the front door to the place and then another code for the apartment.

We were told that there would be no one there to greet us and to just let ourselves in. It seemed odd but we held our nerve and went for it.

Looking at the App, our booking showed live and all the messages were there for us to access. Even setting up the Wi-Fi prior to our arrival and the codes for the doors were all on there. Everything was in place. We had confirmations, we could get there whenever we wanted (as long as it was after 2pm) and still get access to the house and our room.

In our review, the Sonder rentals are something else. The set up of the house is a free for all, make yourself at home and even make yourself a meal in the well appointed kitchen. Our room was described, with photos attached so we knew what to expect.

We flew out to San Francisco and jumped in a taxi (by the way download the Uber app and sign into the free Wi-Fi at the airport, it will save you a small fortune). The taxi took us to the location and on arrival the place was massive. We stayed in an amazing location. It was a stunning house and it had everything we were promised. Sonder made the whole process easy and painless and our review reflects this. Arriving at the location, all the codes worked and we were in our room within minutes. The Archbishops Mansion had everything we needed to make our holiday a memorable one.

If you are in San Francisco, or any of the other locations that Sonder have a property… whether you want something different or need a double room like us… we can voucher for Sonder.

We would love to try all of Sonder’s places, it made our holiday a perfect one. If you plan of being in San Francisco, check out our Archbishops Mansion review and then grab yourself a room!