HomeAway

VRBO and HomeAway used to be the go-to site for renting a vacation rental, but I guess all great things must come to an end and it happened when Expedia bought them out and completely changed everything about this company. We try to search four properties that we know are there and they won't show up, they charge an excessive 12 to 15% extra on top of the owners rates, and now they've hidden all phone numbers and contact information until you input your credit card number and pay for the booking. Completely ridiculous. I've been having good luck doing a Google search for the property name and location and find that a whole bunch of owners also feel this way and have set up individual websites to take direct bookings. This is such a great solution, to a problem that really doesn't need to exist except for corporate greed. One other way we've been finding Great Rentals is to Google vacation rental and then the name of the area island or town you're looking for. You'll have to scroll past the first two three pages to get to the individual owners that have websites, but saving the fees makes it worth the trouble!

As a property owner I have been advertising our property on what was formerly known as Holiday Rentals since 2006. Brilliant. No fuss. You simply contacted the holiday maker and got on with it. Along came HomeAway. I can only describe it now as a shambles. The "dashboard", through which we communicate is a minefield and they have introduced a "service charge" payable by the guest on top of our advertised rates. For us to advertise at one rate and for HomeAway to charge a significant increase is immoral, unethical and money grabbing. They then have the brass neck to charge the property owner a fee for money transactions paid by the guest. All of this without any consultation or warning. I have spent a long time talking to their "customer support" which has been a total waste of time. Answers to questions, when you can understand them, are scripted, they are not allowed to say where they are based and no access is allowed to any form of manager. I'm hoping to find an alternative website but in any event will not be renewing my near £300 fee with these scammers.

Avoid using Home Away if you can!

I have been renting homes abroad for 25 years. I manage several homes and am extremely experienced in this business.

Nearly all my dealings with Home Away have ranged from mediocre to extremely dreadful.

Their payments system does not function properly. I get demands to pay guests their security deposits even though Home Away have the money.

They refuse to refund guests after a guest cancels. Their payments to owners NEVER equate to the amounts due.

Their customer service is awful. They send out threatening and unpleasant letters for no good reason. A guest recently complained to Home Away about their management of his booking and they wrote to me saying that the guest had made a complaint against me! The guest and i were on 1st name terms and he has only extolled my virtues for the way I managed his reservation, his only complaint was with Home Away and not me at all.

Their call centres are in the far east and the telephone operators are obviously working from a script. They are not actually able to assist when anything that is even in the slightest bit off their system!

This is a company which should be avoided at all costs, especially to the inexperienced rental home owner.

Rubbish site. Just rented out my holiday home. Still awaiting payment. They claim your first payment will take 30 days AFTER your renter has booked or 1 day after they move in. Which ever is later.
31 days after the hoilday renter is in my home no money!
The webiste says "it may take an additional 5 -7 business days for the money to get to your account." I assumend that was a disclaimer for those people who us building society accounts.
Not the case. What Homeway mean is that it WILL take another 5 -7 Business days... ie 37-41 over a month after the holiday maker books you will get your money.
A joke in this day and age of instant money transfers.
Try Airbnb or Tripadvisor.
Will see if I get paid... then removing my home from this site. No wonder it has such awful reviews.
Holiday home owners prefer any other site. Hence they cancel on holiday makers.
Do yourself a favour book using another site!

First and foremost, 4 bedrooms 2 with queen size, 2 with 3/4 beds (3/4 beds are 48" wide x 75" long). The pull out downstairs is a twin size from a love seat. I would say this home would sleep 7 at most, no way can it sleep 10.
The upstairs bathroom is very outdated and has rust on the shower head, I would not use it

Under couch cushions there was food crumbs and dirt. Surface looked ok, but it was not really clean at all.

Broken chair in the sun room with fire place, and love seat in the sun room was just tossed on fancy wooden blocks the couch fell off of one block and BOOM! Sideways couch that we had to pick up and reset on the fancy looking wood blocks.
Two different wooden chairs fell apart during the stay.

The fire pit is a large truck rim tossed in the middle of the tiny beach front. And I think the bugs enjoyed the water more then the guests.

Carpet up stairs is probably from the 1950's, ( I remember the same old carpeting getting ripped out of my grandparents old home about 30 years ago).

I spent 2 nights sleeping on the floor and I think a bug bit me on the butt.
The place has had some upgrades, downstairs kitchen and downstairs bathroom, but the rest of it is tolerable at best.

Booker Beware!

I rented my house for Spring Break on Homeaway. The guests arrived and didn't want to stay. They blasted the AC and left doors open before they canceled with Homeaway. I was told that the guest didn't deserve a refund and I was still in good standing with Homeaway so I thought the matter was resolved. A few weeks later a company called Yapstone began trying to debit my checking account. I contacted them and was informed that they had reimbursed the unhappy guests and were charging me a "chargeback". They made 3 attempts to charge my account then began harassing my self and my children at work to collect. I had an upcoming reservation that Homeaway prevented me from canceling and they kept the earnings. I wrote it off and unlisted my property. Today, almost 2 months later I received another harassing phone call from Yapstone over the amount. These companies are the Worst. Never again, they have ruined the home sharing industry. Mary C

I've used Homeaway for our annual family cabin trips and also for when I travel out of state and have not had any problems prior until this year. Not only were we charged a 14% "service fee" by homeaway, we were charged for cleaning fees by the owners who refused to give us back our damage deposit due to "extensive" cleaning their cleaners claimed they had to provide after we left. I have pictures to prove the condition of the house when we left. Owners claims damages with contradicting stories and didn't even have the house cleaned till four days after we left the property. I thought that booking through homeaway with their "security deposit protection" will provide me with some sense of confidence but I was wrong. After submitting all the information they needed including pictures and details of the events, homeaway still denied my claim. I paid homeaway to basically do nothing. Their security deposit protection is a joke. Now I have no choice but to go through small claims court and waste more time and money to get my damage deposit back from owners who nickel and dime me for every penny that they could get even for things that are due to their lack of attention.

I have rented through HomeAway several times and not had any particular problems other than their increasing fees are not in line with the services they provide. Recently however I had a problem collecting my damage deposit back and Homeaway provided no help whatever in backing me up to get the deposit back. They basically told me it was my problem since I did not transfer the money through their system, the reason being this particular owner choses not to participate in that aspect of Homeaway and has his own contract. Unfortunately, Homeaway allows owners to use their own contracts and receive money independently. Renters who want to book those properties have no other option but to go along with the owner, hoping they are trustworthy. Often they are not and in that case, Homeaway will not back you up! It took 5 weeks to get my $2500 deposit back for no reason than the owner was lazy, greedy and chose not to send it out in a timely manner even though that time frame is far removed from what is acceptable with Homeaway. Homeaway does not put any consequences on these owners who use such practices to rip people off. For this reason, I will never use Homeaway again.

This company absolutely has the worst policies and poorest customer service of any site like this. Interestingly, they are all over you when it comes time to pay the annual fees or commissions on rentals.

For instance, if you have a life and can not reply to any and all inquiries within a 24 hour period, they will hide your listing from all searches and they will not tell you that they have done so. Yet, they will still be more than happy to bill you for the annual listing fee despite the fact that your listing has been hidden by them.

Don't bother to try and get anywhere by calling them as an owner to voice your displeasure with their policy. You'll be connected to a call center somewhere in Asia, with someone who speaks modest English, will repeatedly and automatically state "I understand" and "you make a good point" but will not do anything to resolve your complaint and will not be able to direct you to any other level of customer service. But hey, they "understand".

I have used this site for 4 years and this policy change is for their benefit. They want their customers (wait, I thought I was your customer. You're only getting a percentage for listing MY property) to have a positive experience. Frankly, I am not in the rental property business. This is for limited use when the property is not being used. Most of us have real jobs, take vacations, have holiday celebration, etc. Sorry Homeaway (and your VRBO) if it takes 30 hours to respond to an inquiry 5 months in the future.

If you own a rental property, don't list it here. This company is the epitome of a rip off.