best place to exchange money in Venice

The cheapest and most convenient way to obtain local currency in Europe is via a debit card at an ATM. Use two debit cards tied to two different checking accounts (cannot use savings accounts) and you will have no problem obtaining 700E in one day.

Frank is right that the easiest and cheapest source of money are ATMs, as long as the withdrawal allowances work for you. You should check your withdrawal limits before you leave. I'm limited to $300 (or is it Eu 300?) per card per day.

Ask your bank to increase your daily withdrawal limit and obtain your euros from an ATM. €700 is currently about $940 and your bank's withdrawal fee and exchange markup may raise that to $975. As your bank may not be willing to raise your daily limit that much, you would have to withdraw over multiple days. Would your landlord accept traveler's checks? Wells Fargo would currently sell you €700 in traveler's checks for $1013.60 for pick up at a branch location. The total markup would be about 8%.

Your bank here increasing your daily limit is a good suggestion and can't hurt, but won't necessarily mean you can get that much from an ATM in Europe, because the ATM itself may have a limit which is affected by unpredictable factors such as amount of cash in the machine, day of the week, etc. In the past in discussions here, this is the one situation (deposit for apartment) in which a travelers check may actually make sense, as one possible option, if the owner is amenable, of course.

In several situations I have had just like you describe, i have contacted the owner and explained the situation and asked to pay the amount in 2 days. I have never been turned down. What would I do if I were to be turned down? Probably look for another place to stay since I would think the owner and I were not on the same wavelength to begin with. Good luck

I agree with Charlie. We always told our proprietors that it would take a couple of days to accumulate the euros and no one pushed back. In fact, when I paid a day before departure in Venice, the owner was amazed! In one place we paid one night's lodging at time of reservation by sending a check (months in advance), and in Rome although they pushed for "payment on arrival" they understood we needed to hit the ATM a couple of days before we coud pay 700 euros. Maybe your owner would take a US check in advance for the first night as an indication you are credible.

Julie, ATMs (bancomats) are the easiest and cheapest way to get euro. Check with your bank to verify your limit is high enough to cover the amount you want, if not, ask them to raise the limit. On joint accounts sometimes the limit is per card not account so two cards could each take out the limit on the same account. As Frank suggested, open another account to increase the amount you can withdraw. It is also a good idea for a backup. The Italian bank ATM may have a transaction limit, usually between 250 and 500 euro, but you can perform multiple transactions until you reach your bank's daily limit.
When you get there ask your apartment owner where is the nearest bancomat? The owner will probably walk you to it so you will not be carring a lot of cash long.

What are traveler's checks?

Nigel, you are probably too young to remember the former (only) choice for travelers to safely carry money. :-) Seriously, remember when we used to pick up mail at the Amex offices? I went to Europe for 7 weeks when I was in college, and we stopped in every major city to see if Amex was holding our mail from home. Email is not quite the thrill of a letter waiting at Amex when you've been away for a long time. (Yes, I'm off topic. But a little history lesson for the young uns.)