HomeAway

This is my second time booking with them. The first time around everything went smoothly thankfully. However, the second time, I needed to cancel my reservations which I did with enough advanced notice to qualify for a full refund. The property owner refused to refund the full amount despite it being stipulated that they must do so on their own rental agreement. I contacted HomeAway several times to help me mediate the situation, and their response was that it was not their responsibility to solve this type of issues and that I needed to contact the owner directly. I did, in fact, contact the property owner and their solution was to hang up the phone on me at least 3 times and to promise to call back; which by the way never happened. I contacted HomeAway yet again to explain the owner's inappropriate behavior and, once again, they said it was not their issue to deal with. Agreements exist for a reason and professional and ethical business should be forced to observe them even if they ultimately must provide refunds from their own gains. Let's stop businesses that do no abide by these rules from succeeding in our country. DON'T BOOK WITH HOMEAWAY!

I have been an owner using VacationRentals.com a member of the HomeAway family since 2007. I have loved it up until the recent buy out by Expedia. In my opinion they bought the competition so their hotel bookings would sell better.
If it had not been for one of my inquiries responding back to me that he would not book because of my No Cancellation Policy I would have never known that they had changed my cancellation policy from full refund up to 14 days before arrival to No Refunds on Cancellation. And that's not the only change.
They have done something to the way charges show to guests they now get 3 charges on statement instead of 2. It appears to have something to do with the refundable deposit being charged last instead of first. I require deposit on booking then full rental fourteen days before arrival. So they bill portion of rental equal to deposit amount first then on second billing divide it into the balance of the rental and deposit amount. Sound confusing? It is.
They are charging my customers a booking fee on top of doubling the fee for service that they are providing me. And what do I get for this extra fee? Customer service that stinks, less flexibility in my terms. Now I MUST give 50% refund at 7 days if I offer 100% at 14 days.
The worst part is they have bought out all the competition.

The only good thing is I am getting more international interest, and bookings are coming again since I fixed the NO REFUND ON CANCELLATION issue.

We were unfortunate enough to count on reviews for a particular rental by a woman named "Vera" in Rome, not thinking that so many 5 star reviews could be fabricated. As it turned out, once we booked and the owner received our 50%, the pinned map point and the real address/location were 2 very different streets. We even got the HomeAway app instant email that said "thank you for booking cerchi" (the street name) but when the owner sent us the street address it was a few blocks away and not something we would have booked.

Now, we are stuck with having my credit card company go after the deposit as the owner will not cooperate and HomeAway claims no responsibility. The owner has now even changed the "pinned" location to a wide circle on the map instead of the pin she had before. She has good reason to not place the pin where it belongs. We can't be the only ones surprised by this ruse but there is no way to comment on a rental until AFTER you have stayed there. So there is no warning unsuspecting travelers buying into this rental with no recourse until it is too late.

Too bad Homeaway doesn't want to help right this wrong. They claim they have nothing to do with receiving payment which is a lie. We might as well have taken our chances with Craigslist.

I have used Homeaway since 2005 and cyberrentals, which homeaway purchased in 2005, for the previous 20 years. Homeaway's exorbitant Service Fee effectively adds to the cost of my rental and discourages customers with limited budgets. Inquiries for my cottage rental have been reduced to zero for the past several months; I discovered that homeaway had blocked my rental site after I circumvented their Service Fee which was never a part of the original agreement anyway. Homeaway has stolen my list of nearly 700 customers by eliminating both the telephone numbers and the email addresses so I am unable to make contact with prospective renters. It is no longer possible to discuss the rental property with prospective renters who must pay in full up front. My understanding is that homeaway is losing thousands of customers because of their new policies, as well they should. There are better and more effective options becoming available for rentals of personal property, and I urge folks not to use the homeaway system.

In June 2015, my family and I (who travel frequently) rented a house called Cascade Mountain Retreat in Colorado for several days and it was nothing like described on their website. In fact, upon arrival, we thought we might be at the wrong place. We contacted HomeAway who quickly told us we had to take any problems up with the owner (who we never even knew their name). The crooked woman (Julia) we had dealt with to reserve the place finally texted me back after 8 hours (the wifi and phone service were basically non-existent) and started arguing with me, pretending to not understand what I was saying and actually trying to convince me that I liked the place because others had! She said nothing else was available and she had our money so we were totally at her mercy. It cost us $2260 for 4 people for 6 days at a 50 year old house that stunk and didn't even have any movie channels on the only television in the place. We had to buy our own toilet paper, paper towels, clean the place before we left and were instructed to take our trash to a nearby business and put it in their dumpster! We were charged a "service fee" of $50 and a "cleaning fee" of $150, yet were given strict instructions about how to clean the place before we left or we would not get our deposit back! When I tried to talk with Julia, she only argued with me and said there was nothing she would do about it - our tough luck. Beware of anyone associated with VRBO, HomeAway or Julia W! They are crooks and should be investigated and prosecuted.

I am sorely disappointed with how Homeaway is managed. There is no protection for the tenant at all.

I booked an apartment with Homeaway at Tottenham Court Road, London for 5 nights from 6 to 11 June 19 for our family holiday. When we first checked in, the apartment was so dirty and it was a far cry from what was presented on the website before we booked. The whole apartment was full of grime and dirt with a pungent fish smell. We thought we could clean up the place by buying some disinfectant sprays but to no avail. When we were in the room three hours after checking in, someone tried to forcibly open our front door. Thankfully we bolted it when we entered the room. But it was so traumatic for my 2 young daughters who witnessed the entire episode. They were shivering with fright. In view of the trauma and to ensure that we have a good family holiday, we decided to move out to an alternative apartment. We informed the agent and told them the unfortunate incident and asked them for a refund of our remaining 4 nites. However, he was totally unsympathetic and said that we moved out of our own accord and claimed that their apartment is safe and no refund would be given.

The owner even re-rented our unit at lightning speed once we moved out and cancelled our rental contract for the next 4 nights from 7 to 11 June 19 because they found a new tenant.

When we tried to call homeaway support, they said there was nothing they could do. It is sad to see how such a big company would not protect tenants at all.

This is the first and last time that I will use Homeaway.

$775.00 of our $1500. 00 refund was withheld for a " chipped table" that we did not chip. The homeowner claimed we did it and decided to replace her "chipped table" with a brand new one with our money. Never do a refundable deposit. When I called home away to ask for help on this, they referred me to my credit card company Chase. Chase contacted home away and home away sent them to vacation rentals. You might ask who and what is vacation rentals. Well, it is the third party that you never hear about that processes your money. Home away says they only post rentals for home owners, they don't deal with the money. Interesting because my credit card statement says home away. So, I call vacation rentals, the number home away gave me, and vacation rentals forwarded me back to home away. It's truly unbelievable. The only way you will get your money back is to go through your credit card company and you may not then. I hope this review stops people from booking with and dealing with the run around like I have. They do not protect you. Rent through some where else!

Deceptive way to tag on that impressive "service" fee... would be nice for you to list it as a "home away" service fee at check out so when the suckers who check their bank statements and realize that "service" fee went to home away and not the owners/management they thought it was going to, they could have the option to just go through the owner or simply find a different property - it's not that I don't mind paying a fee, I'd just like the option to decide whom I pay a "service" fee to and whether that fee is justified or not. Also, a tiny question mark right by it is a pretty pathetic way to save your butts and say that you 'told us so' as it's tagged on at the end and people can easily miss it as they are checking out. That's what I think about that. I probably wouldn't have complained or even cared if it was presented in a straight forward - shall we say honest way at check out. When I tip someone I like to know I'm tipping them! What a concept right!? Not impressed... Happy new year!

We joined Owners Direct in 2004 with our holiday villa in the Algarve, Portugal. HomeAway took them over, increased the fees owners paid however still operated a good service. We paid the top tier of the subscription offers and obtained most of our rentals from HomeAway.
Now that Expedia have bought HoweAway the whole formula has changed. Now we pay a much reduced subscription but our renters are saddled with a very significant commission and we get charged a 3% fee as well.
I don't want our guests to have to pay any more than the rental advertised. Once they have enquired I don't like them being saddled with the rental commission on top and I resent not being able to contact them direct until HomeAway say I can. How dare they stop me chatting to potential guests by direct email or telephone. They are my guests not theirs.
I don't mind paying them a hefty sub and then being left to deal in my own personal and friendly way with potential clients but I really hate the new Expedia driven money grabbing scheme they have imposed on us holiday home owners.

I enquired with Homeaway about increasing my subscription and all of a sudden the enquiries dried up and my advert dropped in the lisitngs - seems an attempt to force me to pay more money, I contacted them and useless - WORST CUSTOMER SERVICE EVER EXPERIENCED, I have been advertising with them for years and only warrants a cut n paste e-mail. I for one am off, they are just rip off merchants and not interested to retain customers,

So HomeAway just posted better than expected results. Yet note that revenue has dropped when the economy is picking up and Q2 is when a lot of the vacations are booked. So how did they do it?
If you ask homeowners and guests who book through their website you will find that renters are getting bombarded by unwanted adds and offers. Hence the increased revenue. For the owners who post their properties on home away their is an uproar!
The ability to use other means of payment (via check, paypal or other means) has been virtually shut down. So Homeaway has increased their income by adding that extra fee on the payment to their coffers. On the other hand they have only one set of responses and communication that the owner can use to communicate with the renter, and it is impersonal, full of adds and scripted answers that do not allow for a personalized and friendly communication with the renter.

So while this quarter`s results are up, be prepared for a continued drop in revenue as homeowners find better, more flexible and friendlier sites to post their properties. Short term greed that has taken over since VRBO was purchased by HomeAway and will lead to a drop in future earnings unless they change their stance. Property owners are dissatisfied. I for one have 2 properties that I will be posting soon... they will not be going to Homeaway. And the current one we have will also leave.

DO NOT use this company for your reservation needs! They offer NO security to your reservation. You make the reservation with them, but it must be "accepted or declined" by the property owner. The property owner has 24 hours to respond either way. If you travel to the area with expectations of your reservation, you might be disappointed to find that it's been declined, (as is with ours) EVEN AFTER YOUR MONEY IS PENDING PAYMENT!
BUYER BEWARE! SCAM COMPANY!

There were so many things wrong with this house that it was almost comical.
1. The stove didnt work; they sent a repairman unqualified to work on gas stove, so he couldnt do anything; preventing me from baking all of our traditional July 4th dishes
2. Pool pump was broken and was replaced 24 hours after check-in
3. Was told repeatedly that could not check in before 3:00 pm; yet when we arrived at 3:30, the cleaning crew was still in the house cleaning for another 30 minutes
4. There was debris (cigarette butts, etc.) by the pool area and lots of leaves; Owners informed me that landscaper only comes on Thursdays (just too bad for us that we were in house Sunday Thursday, so we just lost out on a clean yard).
5. Nasty fry pans
6. The TV in one of the bedrooms didnt work
7. One of the showers didnt work
8. One of the bedroom closet sliding doors fell off when opened
9. One of the bathroom door lock gets stuck so hard that people repeatedly got locked in, making that lock unusable
10. Master bedroom door gets stuck whenever closed completely
11. Smoke detector outside master bedroom chirped entire time because needed battery change
12. There was a hole in the wall of the pool room
13. A towel bar was broken off the wall of another bathroom

I was scammed and homewaway would not help at all. They said the owners email account that went from their site to them was hacked and so I was communicating with someone other than owner. Home away knew it was hacked and said they sent a mass email out which I never received. They said it wasn't their problem even though the contract I received had all there logos and was the same one they use would not help us get our money back. DONT USE HOMEAWAY!

My search for a rental in North Carolina lead me to Master Diamond Properties. We rented a home in Brevard NC from August 7-21, When we arrived we deleted a foul smell coming fro the guest area downstairs. The Smell was MOLD. Whiteout going into all details, we complained to Jason at Diamond, his suggestion was to turn the air up to high as past renter have done, leads me to believe he knew of the issue. WE offered to leave and give the property back to rent, as the eclipse was to take place soon.He would have had no problem renting. He out and out said no deal. We left on the 15th of August with no refund. I have been sick from the mold since I arrived home. I think we should at least get our remaining day refunded to us. l I will never recommend Home Away or master Diamond Properties.

Cathy Cutler Property 130 Ogana Court Connestee Falls Brevard NC

Homeaway/VRBO have totally mishandled our booking that I discussed in previous review and presently they 'say' they have refunded our deposit so our booking owner is now asking that we try to re-book again through VRBO but she dropped her subscription so her property is no longer listed. She made an alternate suggestion as she is trying to help out but the alternate suggestion has been blanked out by vrbo who controls any communications we have with the owner.
We're presently here on our vacation and have no idea whether we have a place to stay that we booked with VRBO months ago, put down a sizeable deposit and it was confirmed! The actual booking takes place in two days and we are totally confused, stressed, and whatever thanks to their mishandling of this booking! I guess things could be worse but we do not deserve to be in such a ridiculous predicament due to incompetent mishandling of a booking!
What a mess for ourselves and the property owner. Not sure what we are going to do but I do not believe VRBO/HomeAway has one iota of empathy/concern as to resolving our problem. Every step they have made has resulted in an error(s)!
What an uncomfortable way to experience a holiday!