I am looking to rent a villa in spain (on the costa del sol) and want to know about the reliability,etc of www.rentvillas.com. Has anyone used this?

I am looking into villa rentals also and there are so many websites. A good recommendation would be appreciated

We are renting from rentvillas.com in Italy in June--so far all arrangement have gone very smoothly and they've been very helpful. A woman I know has used them several times and had very good experiences with them (all in Italy).

We've used rentvillas.com twice to rent in Italy. We were happy with both properties. Received good directions and instructions along with other useful information.

We rented a villa through Holiday Villas website last year. We dealt directly with the owner after finding his villa on the website. The house was not at all as advertised, and actually was pretty unsatisfactory. I should have been suspicious when I asked him for some people who had rented it that I could email for references and he could only give me one person (she lived in Ireland and thought it was fine; we didn't...)<BR>At least as far as Holiday Villas, I think it's just a website and the people who list their villas can write whatever they want and submit whatever photos they choose. There's no personal endorsement (as, for example, there might be with the website for Italian villas, The Parker Co., where they personally inspect what they list).<BR>I have no direct knowledge of RentVillas.com but recently found that another house in Spain we rented a few years ago directly from the local agent is still listed on her website for about $300 less per week than on two of the big villa rental sites. I'm not sure how they work, i.e., the bigger sites, but if you find a house you're pretty interested in, I'd recommend using a search engine like Google and entering the town and a few key words for a search to see what other websites come up as hits. When I did that with our old rental, I found it listed at a number of different prices (WAY different).<BR>Buena suerte,

I hear good things about them but haven't used them. I do know they are a California-based company.<BR><BR>If you are looking for a direct link to the property, once you see it recommended on one of these agency's sites, try www.agriturist.it. It isn't user friendly but does seem to be comprehensive as far as finding the direct email or website for the owner directly. I do, however, think there is alot to be said for using a company that has viewed the property, as the above poster's experience will attest. Another one (San Francisco based) that a friend highly recommended is www.vbella.com. (Vacanza Bella) They show you a sampling of their places but then want to speak with you to really get an idea of your needs. They tend to favor Umbria but do have lots of Tuscan properties as well.