HomeAway

Up until this past February HomeAway did not charge a service fee to travelers who book through their website. But that has changed, rather than being up front about it the fee is not mentioned until one gets to the agreement. For someone who has been using HomeAway you may not even know of the fee. Oh it is there and once you submit you have incurred the fee.
I do not object to paying the fee, I object to the way HomeAway informs one of the fee.
It is clearly a way to increase revenues in sneaky, dishonest manner.
I am done with HomeAway, they are dead to me.

I booked a condo for hawaii on January 25,2017 and there were a list of all fees for the booking. I entered my credit card info, and submitted the booking. I was told everything is all set. Then I received an additional agreement from the owner and they said if I wanted to pay by credit card there would be additional fees. WTH?!?!?! Nowhere does it say that on the listing, or on any details until AFTER the fact. I called HomeAway, and they basically said "Too bad, you'll have to work that at with the owner, they just advertise with us. Good luck." That is crazy that they did that.

I would definitely NOT recommend HomeAway. They are no help, and don't hold their listings to any accountability. I will probably have to take the to court to get my fees back. I can't believe it.

Rancho Santa Fe *******@bensonmgmt. Com or anything benson. Put up $3200 in deposits plus $8000 for the house. Contracted for pool@ 84 (medical reasons) 71 when we arrived took three full days to heat up. Three days before anyone showed up and the answer was "must be something wrong it should not take anywhere near that long." I have service dogs registered, owner said his mother was seriously medically allergic. I said I understand. Then he called and said for $500 extra I could keep them in kitchen next to his mother's room. W. T. F. No toilet paper in some of the rooms, 1 garbage bag, no food containers. 1 tiny soap. Wanted us to clean house better than we received. Now he says we owe an additional $8000 for utilities. 6 days. Has kept $3250 deposit and wants almost $5000 more. For 6 days? Stay Away. STAY AWAY! 6658 la Valle plateada STAY AWAY!

I have been with Homeaway for 6 years, I was very please with them til they started on line booking. I was happy with the way things were working out so I didnt get online booking, big mistake starting June 2016 was the last call I got til one in January 2017. I had been getting calls daily and had my place booked ever year til I refuse to join online booking. I had a year contract til April 24 2017 which I payed for, they wanted more money from me with the online booking. I will never use them again and tell everyone not to use them.

We booked our accomodation to San Francisco a month ago. But right before our trip the Northen California fires started and the air in San Francisco was so bad that everything was closed (schools, museums, transportation). People were running away from there because the air was dangerously unhealthy. Of course we did not go and I emailed both Homeaway and the owner of the house we rented from asking to reschedule our trip. I never asked for cancellation. I asked to reschedule!

We have never received any respond back neither from Homeaway nor from the owner. Almost 4 thousand dollars is gone!

I will never ever use this website again. Disgrace!

Recently tried to rent a property and "book with confidence guarantee." I received an email from the property manager requesting my credit card number, expiration date and security code; obviously did not provide it. When I contacted HomeAway for support canceling the request that hadn't been confirmed yet, she just kept repeating that I needed to work with the property manager. After explaining the issue 6 different times, another woman began yelling at me on the phone and said she would "raise" a claim for me. When I inquired about the purpose of the claim, she said it was "what she's supposed to say but she doesn't understand the process" and hung up on me. 48 hours later HomeAway charged me a $49 processing fee. Worst service in the world. Just work directly with reputable property management companies and skip this BS.

Husband had a stroke 3 days before our booking. Spoke with homeowner (Taylor Plumblee or Linda Purvee Hutchinson -take your pick - same person) who was very sympathetic and offered 50 percent refund. She said it would take a month to get refund. After 6 weeks no refund. Called Homeaway. They refused to meet the homeowners obligation. Called homeowners who never returned phone call. Out $3200. If I had known I would have kept reservation and used it with my family. Never ever again. I take people at their word. They rented the property to someone else. They got double their money.

They are just an advertising space for unscrupulous property scams. Homeaway do nothing to resolve problems. They advertise properties but the location is not accurate. You wont be where you think you are. Being miles away caused me problems.
Owners don't respond and are not always genuine owner.
Very dangerous site andHA have no power to help once you have been scammed, sent to wrong accommodation and ripped off. Telephones manned by robots

The website claims that there are 'no hidden fees' but when I booked a flat in Paris the owner emailed me and informed me that there would be an additional 130 euros for linens and cleaning. At this new price I decided I would rather stay in a hotel so emailed the owner to cancel the reservation because there is no way to cancel on the website. I have had back and forth emails with the owner to get him to cancel the reservation and so far have had no luck. He took my deposit without informing me of any 'no cancellation' policy and is telling me he is going to take the entire amount off my credit card. I've had to dispute the charge with my credit card company so still waiting to see what happens with that.
In all, either stay away or be very methodical when booking. HomeAway takes all the control away from the traveler and puts it in the hands of the owner

VRBO and HomeAway (owned by same company) are a real renter beware saga. They will NOT allow negative reviews of their homes no matter how egregious the situation. I have had two miserable experiences and wanted to warn other renters but to no avail. #1 they don't want you to identify the property - this seems strange as the property name and unit are on the site where the reviews are - there is no mystery here, #2 And while they accepted a review on a place we stayed this summer (what a nightmare) they never posted it.
I reserved a condo through them only to have it rented out from underneath me with no explanation and no apology.

A ladies' trip was cancelled several days before scheduled, due to significant flooding in the area of the property. The homeowner refused to refund the cleaning fee ($200), although the property was not used. Home Away would do absolutely nothing. We didn't even ask for the property rental to be refunded. Home Away did charge me $101 for a Service Fee. A ripoff all the way around. I had used VRBO (Home Away) for years, but in recent years, I am seeing a very negative trend with them.

Been using home away for 10 years and it was great until recently when everything changed. They made a lot of changes in their listing site, but the worst thing ever is they now add a service fee to renters. I pay for listing the property and without my permission or even notice are now adding about 10% to the cost by fleecing the renters. I have just lost one potential renter over this and I am furious. No one to speak to, no managers just the usual run around baloney. Good bye VRBO, home away and whatever else you call yourself. Plus you don't have the balls to respond to these complaints because they are just scams.

My experience with booking my vacation rental through this site was effortless as far as contacting the owners, booking and making payments.

HomeAway has a vast variety of properties to choose from as well as prices. You have the choice of going with a luxury villa, cabin in the woods, high-rise condo or a bungalow on the beach. There really are some beautiful properties made available through this site.

Our house was exactly as pictured the only problem I had was the bed in the master bedroom, my god the beauty of that bed and room did not match the ten days of hell I endured sleeping on that bed of perpetual torture, but I can't be blame HomeAway for that.

All in all my experience with HomeAway was good and I fully plan on using their site again in the future if I'm not up for a hotel.