Meni Hotel — Hotel in Athens

I made two MISTAKES with this hotel:

When I decided to book there

If we can say that this was a "MISTAKE", I was looking to book a room for 2 adults and 2 kids(8 and 13 years old) and they provided a price of 315 Euros for a total stay. Since the other family that traveled with us, had the same number of people and kids of the same age I chose to book 2 rooms.

The total price for the two rooms was 630 euros, and that should be for 8 people in total. But here is the catch, booking.com rearranged 2 adults and 2 kids into those two rooms that i booked in the next layout, in the first room 1 adult only, and in the second room 1 adult and 2 kids.

And we paid two full rates for the rooms that we booked that should accommodate 8 people.

After arriving they noticed our booking "mistake" and after some verbal fight with the owner of the hotel who behaved like a fierce hyena to me, constantly yelling and violently waving with his hands to my face, they forced us to pay 180 euros extra for the "extra" people to the room or they treat us that they will kick us from the hotel.

So, maybe, legally they were able to do that, but from a human standpoint, they were a real disaster and they took advantage of our situation.

All this happened on a New Year holiday trip, so yes, they ruined our trip there, and we were not able to see anything positive after that traumatic scene at reception.

Now let's start from the beginning of our saga to this hotel...

They promise FREE parking, yes, in case you manage to find something free on the streets. I believe the hotel has more than 20-30 rooms, and in front of the hotel there are only 3-4 parking spots, so in some logic, they are always busy and you have to park somewhere else in a neighbourhood that is far from safe. We even were warned many times not to leave anything in the car, otherwise, we would find it with broken windows

Going to rooms is with one of the two elevators, and both of them are extremely slow, so if you don't have luggage i recommend taking the stairs.

On December 30th, winter, you are going inside and the heating is OFF, similar room temperature as outside.

About rooms, they are saying that it has one living room, and one bedroom, LYE!! everything is connected to one room with zero privacy between beds

The hotel location is just in front of the big road ring, and cars are moving 24h per day, rooms with ZERO sound isolation, so if you want to sleep at night, good luck with that!! You have a feeling that you are sleeping directly on the street

Breakfast, which is also interesting, I can't remember of any other hotel that has this bad breakfast. Just boiled eggs, some cheap salami, and cheese. There was some yellow liquid which I supposed to be juice, or maybe just water with some color inside. Bread and bakery few days old.

Like i mentioned above, the neighbourhood is not something that i would recommend, need to explore for a safe way to the city centre. A lot of homeless and junkies. You can even see them how they take drugs on the streets and no one actually cares about that. Stay away from this area!!

And the star of all this is the hotel owner, that is a special story. Not sure if smoking is allowed in Greece inside hotels and restaurants, but he was with his cigarette all the time. As mentioned above we had a verbal fight since I was not able to take all the things that he was doing.

Multiple times I asked the staff to tell him not to touch me and to stop yelling at me and to stop waving with his hands in my face. I felt that my safety at risk so I was ready to call the police, and after mentioning that he took a...

So, where do I begin. First off, believe all the reviews about the owner! Don’t make our mistake thinking we’ll just stay out of his way.

My partner and I booked this hotel via Expedia (6 nights end of September 2025). We arrived at 10.30pm to be told by the receptionist that we had to pay 60€, on top of the 30€ local tax (which is the only charge we were expecting to pay on arrival). They claimed Expedia did not charge us enough for the room. We attempted to dispute this, saying that is between you and Expedia, not us, as we had already paid in full to Expedia the quoted room price. The owner (old man) was there yelling at us and the receptionist (in Greek so not known what was being said). We asked what happens if we do not pay, and it was stated forthright, you will not be checked in. It was late, we were tired, so we reluctantly paid, as they were just not budging or being fair to their guests.

Even if you have no direct encounter with the owner, you will hear him in the middle of the night. We were awoken several times during our stay from hearing him down at reception yelling at either guests or staff (I assume) even at 2am in the morning. The TV in the reception is often on at an extremely loud volume. I asked the receptionist if she could turn it down, and she said she was not allowed. Also of note, the owner often sits in reception watching TV or in the cafe - he always seems to be around, day or night.

Please note, this hotel is situated on a roundabout. We expected some noise (not a bother to us) but unfortunately the sliding double glazed doors are not sound proofed, and the noise was unbearable. The level of noise from motorbikes revving, emergency vehicle sirens, and late-night revellers passing by had us struggling to get to sleep and stay asleep. The sound level was as if the doors were open – they were tightly closed. There is quite a thick gap where the sliding doors meet (in the middle), with a draught excluder type fitting, so not enough to keep noise levels out or even draughts (see picture).

The hotel, although not far from the city centre attractions (15-25 mins walk) is in an area that has a very run down vibe. There is a lot of graffiti on almost all shop and building fronts. The buildings and streets are very dirty from pollution, even by city standards (London is cleaner). The area had a lot of homeless people too, many who looked like they were on the drug spice (a drug known to make users look like zombies). They were harmless, we had no issues with them, but still not a pleasant sight having to pass so many of them near our hotel. They can’t help being homeless, I know, but the levels of homelessness and drug use in plain sight shows how little the city does to help its homeless folks. There were even women sleeping on the streets with their young children. Very sad to see!

The room was nice, and bed comfortable, just a few finishing touches issues, but nothing to really complain about. Our room was ‘cleaned’ most days, but not every day. When I say cleaned, just the bed made (sheets not changed once during our stay). It didn’t bother us, but may bother others. Towels were fresh everyday though, and bathroom wiped down. But the floor was not swept or vacuumed in the bedroom during our stay. After a couple of days we were feeling/seeing the dirt/dust on our feet when barefoot.

Should you stay here? I would not ever stay here again, and if I could turn back time I really wish I took all the previous reviews more seriously and...

’ve stayed at Meni Hotel & Apartments for the second time for many reasons, as I personally think it is one of the loveliest hotels I’ve stayed at. The hotel is clean and provides all basic amenities, except for toiletries—only shower gel and shampoo are provided, so please bring your own. They also don’t provide free water, so you’ll need to buy your own. We made our tea and coffee using tap water, and it was absolutely fine—we didn’t get sick at all. The hotel is located almost in the center of the city and is accessible by subway. It’s just a 10–15-minute walk to Omonoia and then to Monastiraki. Most of the time, you won’t even need to use the subway if you enjoy walking. The hotel is really nice overall, but rooms facing the main road can be noisy due to traffic on the square, even late at night. However, this might be a personal preference—the noise didn’t bother us. We really enjoyed our stay and would highly recommend others to stay there. That being said, I don’t think I will stay there again due to an unpleasant experience at checkout. Upon checkout, the manager asked if my parents-in-law were sick. When I asked why, she explained it was because they were wearing masks. I explained that they wore masks because everyone in the subway did, and we simply followed the norm. Since our checkout was at 11:00 and we had to wait for a taxi to the airport, we waited in the lobby. The manager then said that if we stayed in the lobby, we must wear masks. I found this request ridiculous. I believe she assumed my in-laws were sick because they were wearing masks, which was highly offensive and felt racially motivated. For context, my in-laws are in their 70s and Chinese. They wore masks as a precaution, yet the manager’s behavior made it clear she assumed they were unwell simply because of this. I pointed out that if they were sick, I would have been sick too, given that we were together the entire time. No one else in the hotel was asked to wear masks, which made her actions feel discriminatory. While she later said it was fine, the experience left a bad impression. Additionally, during our stay, the owner sat on the ground floor and smoked all day. The smoke reached all the floors, but we chose not to complain out of courtesy. We also never asked for housekeeping during our stay to help them save energy. Despite this, the manager’s attitude at checkout was unacceptable and left us deeply disappointed. The hotel itself is a great place, but the attitude we experienced was unacceptable. This makes us unlikely to return. My review is honest and not exaggerated. While I returned to stay a second time because of the quality of the hotel, this experience has ensured that I will not stay there again. Their rude and discriminatory attitude toward my parents-in-law was completely unacceptable. The hotel wifi is useless , it was the same when I stayed in August 2024 and it was the same in January 2024 . It was impossible...