Paris Apts.- Roaches!
 

We have often thought about renting an apartment in Paris rather than staying in a hotel. However, my niece just returned and said the apartment they rented looked really good in pictures and seemed OK when they checked in. However, when she got up during the night and turned on a light HUNDREDS of roaches ran for cover!. They had to buy traps and sprays and were very upset when they couldn't get any satisfaction from the rental agent. Their whole visit was unpleasant because of this infestation. Is this typical of Paris apts. or were they just in a bad neighborhood?

I should think if it were typical of Paris apartments there would be reams and reams of posts on this and other travel boards about it. Never having read such a post before, I'm going to assume that it's an unlikely occurrence.

Agree w/ above. I've been reading this board for years (including thousands of posts about Paris apartments)and this is the first time I've EVER heard of this situation. For the record, what was the agency and the specific apt.??

Sorry for your niece's experience but I have never read nor heard a friend complain of roaches.

It would be helpful if you posted the agency and location of the apartment, and what she paid, otherwise that info isn't going to be of much use to many people. I imagine if you book a really cheap apt. in Paris, you can get a not-so-nice place pretty easily.

IN any case, I've never seen a roach in France, I thought maybe they didn't have the climate for it. I might add I stayed one summer in a pretty grungy dorm at Cite Universitaire, and even there I never saw one (although there were certainly plumbing and dirt problems).

Thanks, eveyone. I feel better about possibly renting in Paris. I'm sorry I don't know the agency or exact location but I'll be sure and check with my niece before I make any committments.

Wags, when you check with your niece, please come back and let us know. That's the nice thing about these boards. ((b))

wags, please do that, I know from past postings Christina has stayed many times in Paris and would have heard of infestation. Maybe it's something else. other than a roach. I rember a week-end in Wales as a guest of London Friends and I screamed and jumped on my chair as what I thought was a genetically altered mosquito, that was the size of a bat. after my friend's had a good laugh, they explained this common flying thing, doesn't bite and explained to the other Brits that I thought it was a biting stateside winged thing.

I've rented nine different apartments in Paris, in locations all over the city. I have never seen one bug, even with open windows and no screens. I'd be very interested to hear about the location of these roaches and I don't think this is the norm.

There certainly are cockroaches in Paris, and I say this with complete certainty because I lived in a building that was infested with them! (I won't go into the gory details here though.)

They are not particularly common but they do exist (small ones are called "blattes", I believe, and the larger are "cafards"), and there are exterminator services to deal with them, along with sprays and poisons sold in most supermarkets.

It's not a huge problem though, and not something that people should start worrying about. As St Cirq says, if it was really a major problem, there would have been plenty of posts about it before now.

Ick ick ick!!! Thank goodness, the only times I have ever seen roaches or roach-like creatures was in Jamaica and they were not in my house!
Patrick rents in LOndon and Paris every year and he would have mentioned it if there were ever roaches , I think it is only typical there as it would be here, in a dirty uncared for flat.

I find it amusing that anyone would think that roaches only inhabit "bad neighborhoods."

true, singletail, they hop aboard shopping bags( I know that as a fact) BUT a good landlord doesn't allow them to stay or move next door, or floor because they will retiurn once the smell has left so all apartments and ajoining buildings must be treated.

I didn't think insects still existed in Europe; isn't that why they don't have window screens?

Last October we rented an apt from Hell and we had blattes.

blattes? Is that french for creepy critters?

I hate to let everyone know this most most citry apartment houses that have been standing for a substanital amount of time have roaches in them. However, if the management is diligent and apartment owners clean and tidy they can be kept under control (that is in basements, storage areas, closed walls, etc). If you ever see one in an apartment its a clear sign of neglect in regular extermination procedures.

I hate to shatter everyone's illusion that there couldn't possibly be roaches in the City of Light, but, yes, I'm afraid there are. In 1996, while studying French in Paris, I stayed for 3 mos. in the 15th arr. Ave. Felix Faure, with a lady in a 3 bedroom 2 bath apartment, with a big kitchen and lovely rooms that looked out on the Eiffel Tower. The lady I stayed with, as nice as she was, did not like to do dishes at night, only during the morning. One night, I got up to get some water, and turned on the light in the kitchen, and was horrified to see dozens of black roaches skittering around for cover in the light-I don't know how many- I was so freaked that I turned off the light and left immediately.

Needless to say, that sort of ruined things for me for the rest of my stay there, no matter how clean and nice the apartment otherwise appeared. So ends my little story. Yes, roaches are indeed present in Paris, and given my experience, I would imagine it is not only possible, but quite likely they could be found in serviced vacation apartments.

My daughter lives in what used to be called Spanish Harlem in NYC (122nd & Park) and the only roach she's seen since she moved in last August was one that "hitched" a ride in a furniture box from Ikea! Yep -- you can expect them, but they can be controlled by a vigilent landlord! (and neat tenants)

I saw my first cockroach in Paris when I was 15 (also my first prostitute and first street person; previously, I had lived a rather sheltered life).

It was at a fleabag hotel in the 9eme. Same type of situation--turned on the light and <i>les cafards</i> scurried for every crevice and drain. Seemed like there were hundreds of them.

Have never seen one anywhere in Paris since.