You will probably get more room for your money in Eixample part of town and that would be a decent location for tapas, sightseeing etc. In fact you might even want to explore apartments even a bit further out for a better value. Barri Gotic, Port Vuelle, even Las Ramblas, expect smaller rooms for the money.

We used Friendly rentals and were pretty satisfied but here is what you really need to pay attention to - I assume you are all staying in one apartment? it would be good to notice square footage. My daughter and I rented what was advertised as an apartment that would sleep six - wow, that would have been a nightmare. The bedrooms and one bath were incredibly small.We slept in one room, put our luggage in the second, then had a modest living area with sleeper sofa. So just pay close attention to room size, bed size and such - hopefully another poster may have a specific recommendation of a nice sized apartment.

http://www.fodors.com/community/europe/barcelona-rental-apartment-for-two-plus-valencia.cfm



http://www.fodors.com/community/europe/hotels-or-apartments-in-madrid-and-barcelona.cfm



I discussed our 2-bedroom, 2 bathroom apartment, along with many restaurants, here:

http://www.fodors.com/community/europe/barcelona-dining-report-winter-2011.cfm

We stayed in this apartment as a family of five adults, but it can fit six:
http://tinyurl.com/7ojtdln
Great area for food and shopping and near many key sights.
Things to look for are two bathrooms and as an earlier post said, square meters (10.76 square feet per square meter).

Take a look at Banys Orientals, great value (105€ for a double) and in the vibrant, medieval El Born district close to "everything": fabulous cafés, tapas bars, restaurants, museums, Plaza Catalunya, Passeig de Gracia, Las Ramblas, the Ciutadella park and the Barceloneta beach is ten minutes walk away.
El Born: http://www.barcelona-tourist-guide.com/en/areas/el-born.html
Banys Orientals: http://hotelbanysorientals.com/

You'll need three bedrooms and that can be difficult to find with good location in Barcelona so you may want to consider renting two apts in the same building. Apartments are small - a "large" apartment will be about 80 m/sq which is about 850 square feet (a square meter is about 10.6 square feet).

Barcelona rental agencies are $.10/dozen but stick with the ones you find on www.apartur.com. To find multiple apartments in same building, the agencies will label their apartments like "Gotic 1, Gotic 2" etc.

Get a map and consider the area between Placa Catalunya, Diagonal, Tetuan and Verdaguer Metro stations as the best for your purposes. Anything within that box or a couple of blocks from any part of it would work.

If Barcelona is the last stop for you in the Eurozone, try to get a place that will NOT require a cash deposit because you'll get a fat wad of Euros on the day you leave and will have to change that back to dollars at terrible rates. If you'll go elsewhere after Barcelona, this is not a concern.

We stayed in the Eixample neighborhood & really enoyed it. The location is perfect for restaurants, sightseeing & getting to any place you want to go. We walked to Barri Gothic, El Born, Barceloneta, Las Ramblas, etc. We stayed at the Hotel Gran Via, a nice hotel & our room was quite large, as was our bathroom. Of course, with 3 couples, you would need 3 rooms, so an apartment might be a better choice. But the neighborhood is great.

Many thanks to all for your comments and great suggestions. Due to miss-communication number one son has already booked one room so we are now looking for a 2 bed apartment (much easier!) or 2 hotel rooms. Eixample seems to be the first choice of area. BigRuss - good point re deposit in Euros! This happened to us in Buenos Aires where we ended up with a pile of US $ which, being English, we didn't need but the same principal applies here (plus, how long the Euro will last is anyones guess!!)

Kinhe - loved the look of Banys Orientals have emailed them but don't seem to be able to get any deals on any of teh consolidation sites.

ekscruchy - thanks for the link to your dining suggestions/report - excellent info as always1

I too thank Ekscrunchy for posting the link to the restaurants visited. We go to Barcelona in 2 weeks time so it's super useful ( and thanks to Eks we are going to Begur too!)
I have been trying for weeks to get into Tickets in Barcelona but no luck!!! ( I am also on the waiting list for cellar can roca in Girona!!!)