A while ago we had a friend's family come to England to stay with us in our apartment in London. However, as Murphy's Law would have it, that very week we were visited by an unexplainable infestation of cockroaches in our aged flat, meaning the whole place had to be fumigated before we could move back in. Thus, not only were myself, my wife and child temporarily without a home, but we had nowhere to accommodate our friends.
Frantically we searched hotels in the area, but at such short notice were turned away due to no vacancies, or were offered outrageous rates. We turned to B&Bs, but were unable to find any with enough vacancies to house all of us. When we asked another friend for advice, we were recommended to try booking a couple of short-stay apartments London. Having never even heard of the concept before, I was told to think of them as "apartment hotels London has to offer". I approached a company and rented two apartments at 2 Hyde Park Square apartments - the price for the entire week was about two thirds of that offered by the cheapest hotel, and I was hesitant to see what the apartment would be like.
However, both my family and my friend's were blown away by the quality of the short-stay apartments that were provided for us. Not only were they beautifully decorated with lavish interior design, but there was plenty of space for the kids to run riot, and with our own fully-fitted kitchen we saved plenty of money on not eating out every night. In fact this apartment was many times better than our own flat, and as far as London apartments go, it was top-notch.
Next time we have a visit from one of our overseas friends, we may just have to put them up in a serviced apartment again - we all thoroughly enjoyed our stay, and moving back into our own flat again seemed rather too much like a downgrade.