VRBO alert
 

When I began to plan my Hawaii trip months ago, I encountered a problem pertaining to a VRBO listing. I E-mailed a person in regards to their property in the Puamana community. When I requested referrals, the owner became indignant that I would even ask for them and suggested I was questioning her integrity! It seems I was to mail a deposit check for hundreds of dollars to a person I had absolutely no information about!!!
Luckily,she mentioned Whalers Realty Management Co. as a company who used her rental property. I contacted them directly and eventually rented a different unit in Puamana from 6/29 thru 7/6. The community was delightful and the unit was only about 50 feet from the ocean.
Have any other posters encountered similar problems?

I've never run into that problem, but a lot depends on *how* you ask for these referrals. A good tactic, even though it's silly, is to be a little apologetic when asking, and tell them a family member (wife, husband etc) asked *you* to get referrals for the rental.

That should be enough to take the edge of the awkwardness. If the owner is still indignant, that should raise a red flag about the property. The bottom line is, any owner or agent with a worthwhile property shouldn't hesitate to provide independent references for it.

Having used VRBO, I think the plus and minus of this stems from same source - you deal directly with owner. So it is usually less expensive - that's the plus. The minus is that as with anything, there are good owners/properties and bad - and you have no one to complain to other than the owner.

As far as references for anything from job applicants to painters to VRBO - one never knows if the "reference" is their brother-in-law anyway.

I have had luck renting using direct rental sites like VRBO. There are advantages and usually you pay a little less than if you rented from an agent.
There are disadvantages too. Yes, you are sending a deposit to someone you do not know--and you will have to send a deposit. I have never had anyone steal my deposit. Always read their contract and cancellation policy---if there is a substantial cancellation charge, I do buy trip insurance.
Also, if you arrive at the rental and it is not what was represented, you cannot change units.
I never ask for referrals, but I only rent properties that have pictures on their site and I do ask when the pictures were taken. I do ask if there have been any upgrades--usually these are noted on the website.
We have rented from at least 10 owners on VRBO, were very happy with our rentals and never had a problem.

I have used vrbo several times & never had a problem. Many of the persons on there also use rental companies on site & etc. as well if they are absentee homeowners. I've had everything from secret codes on boxes, to neighbors delivering the keys, to its under the pot around back. I also have never asked for references. Hopefully if someone is going to take the time & effort to put that out there, they are legit.

I guess my theory is that any owner who becomes indignant about being asked for referrals has something to hide. Period.
I never have asked for them, thinking hey, all they need to do is get a friend to write one for them, and they obviously won't provide you the name of someone they had a problem with. Nevertheless in most cases the owners offer referrals without asking. If they hesitate providing some, I'd run, not walk to another property.

How about a little equality here?

"the owner became indignant that I would even ask for them and suggested I was questioning her integrity!"

To which I would reply: How dare you demand a deposit--are you insulting my integrity?

Judy,

I think the owner will have no interest in dealing with any person that responds with....
"How dare you demand a deposit--are you insulting my integrity? "

As an owner..My response would be..." I don't think that this is the right property for you ..but thanks for calling".

Dick, my comments were made tongue-in-cheek. I thought that was obvious.

Renters are expected to ante up a deposit. No one gets insulted by that. It's a standard business practice.

Owners are expected to provide references when politely asked. No one should get insulted by that. It's a fairly common business practice.

My point was that this is a two way street. You have two parties to an arms length business transaction that are total strangers to each other. Each side is entitled to certain upfront assurances, such as deposits and references, and neither side has more right than the other to get all huffy about it.

Dick, I think you missed Judy's point. Saying that demanding a deposit is questioning the renter's integrity is no worse than the owner saying asking for referrals is questioning his! I would think if an owner said to me that I was questioning his integrity when I asked for a referral, I would have already decided that wasn't the place for me and putting the ball back in his court is only logical. After all the whole deal is between two strangers. Why is the renter supposed to have total unquestioning trust in the owner, but the owner is allowed to have no trust in the renter? Kind of one-sided don't you think? I stick with my original thought that if the owner doesn't want to provide referrals, he has something to hide.

Judy, I was typing as you were posting. Didn't mean to steal your idea, but clearly you and I are on the same wave-length, here.

Thanks, Patrick. GMTA

I guess I was just in a literal fram of mind when I read Judy's post....but i do see your point.

I don't ask for references for the reasons stated...would probably just be a friend. I've been burnt by dealing with owners and my solution is to work through an agency.

Personally, as soon as an owner suggested I questioned their integrity, I'd run...the discussion would be over.

By the way, I was amazed that last summer for three different one week rentals in Italy, none of the three required any deposit at all. There seemed to be a far greater feeling of "trust" there. But as they all said, they haven't been burned yet, so they like operating that way.

I'm glad to see my post stirred up some opinions from other travellers. In dealing with the owner of the property, it appeared to be a one - way street. The owner actually did provide referrals. Would Judy24 feel confident in sending a considerable deposit to an owner with these referrals and comment-I copied them verbatim from her E-mail:

1. Just a note to let you know how much we enjoyed our stay at your place in Maui. We had a great time. We left the house very clean. All of the laundry was done(in case they try to charge you.) Again thanks for the opportunity to stay in your house. When we go to Maui again, we certainly want to stay in the same place

Don


2. Hi, XXX, I want to thank you for the opportunity to use your Puamana townhouse last week. My family couldn't have had a better vacation. Hopefully we'll be able to do it again one day. I have a couple of friends who may be in touch in the coming months for 2005 rentals. You have a beautiful place and again thanks for renting to us.

thanks,
John

(her E-mail comment)I must confess this is the first time I have had a request like and will have to read the vrbo site more carefully.

She then went to great lengths to explain how she does everything by E-mail and that E-mail is legal.

Were the referrals bogus or legit?

Is she a legit owner or a scammer who takes advantage of too trusting travellers?

I decided to be prudent and dealt with a legit rental company. The price was about the same and it was so nice to see a letterhead at the top of correspondence.

Was I overly paranoid or justly cautious? I'll never know but at least no money was lost.

Hmmm. What is weird is that she would have hesitated sending you any referrals if she already had those two.
On the other hand, she'd be pretty clever to have included that "in case they try to charge you" unless she just wanted to emphasize that they need the laundry all done.

Overly paranoid? Well, my belief is that things are pretty well checked out and/or followed up by VRBO. So I use them with a pretty good deal of confidence. My biggest concern, and I check this out thoroughly before going is the cleaning process. When an owner tells me I must leave it completely clean for the next renter, then I back off. Why? Because that means that when I arrived, the cleaning was done by the previous tenants who 9 times out of 10 were in a hurry to get to the airport or only worried that they got it clean enough not be charged. Did they really wash the sheets or did they do them the day before and say "no one can tell we slept on these last night"? I want a place professionally cleaned between tenants and I'm willing to pay that as an extra charge. The alternative gives me the willies.

There are lots of reasons to be careful when renting directly from an owner. I've done it myself twice, very succesfully, and have good relationships with the owners involved to this day. I didn't find either place on VRBO.

Your heading gives the impression that VRBO did something wrong. Your problem is with an individual owner, not VRBO.

I've rented from directly from owners 3 time and each time wa disppointing.

I have rented many times from agencies and each time the property was exactly as described.

We wanted to rent a condo in Poipu through VRBO for our trip in September. I read through many postings there, and picked one that looked and sounded to be exactly what we wanted (and was available for our dates on the site calendar).

I called the owner number provided, and got the answering machine. I left messages over several days, and also sent a couple of emails. NO response, to this day.

In the end, I gave up (disappointed!) and rented what we hope will be a similar unit from Suite Paradise instead. The transaction has all gone smoothly to date, and we're looking forward to our visit.

The experience did turn me off a bit: if the condo is no longer available for rent, at least they could take down the link.

Once again, you do not rent *through* VRBO. They just provide a list of rental properties. You rent from the owners. VRBO isn't responsible for the way the owners behave.

It is possible that your owners weren't just bad at returning calls and emails, but had some emergency or something themselves. These are not professional rental agencies and sometimes life gets in the way.

I have a beach property that I advertise through VRBO. I've jsut about decided to drop them, not because of any problems with VRBO but because I realize now that I don't want to rent for 2 months in 2006 at this time. And of course everyone wants to rent ahead of time.

It seemed like a good idea but we get soooo many responses from one ad in the newspaper. And I've had a few people get REALLY snooty about stuff to the point that I just tell them it's not available and we both move on. And there's always a gazillion people who query and then keep hinting that it's too expensive and finally they back out.

So rest assured, it's not easy for the owners. The ones who don't call back already have it rented out -- I always try to get back to people. That seems like the least I can do.

As for referrals, I suppose I could give a few referrals if needed. Hey, terpster -- what if the rental property said to you, I'll give you referrals if you give me some for you! I've had a few bad tenants in my time and maybe I should have asked them for referrals. Their deposit barely covered their damage and the time it took to deal with them.

Hey, Tandoori girl, what a great idea!!
I would have no problem in supplying stellar referrals to an owner.

Barbara, do you have connections with VRBO? It seems you're taking a very defensive stance for them.

Dick, thanks for your comments on having a place professionally cleaned. Now my wife will forever worry about the cleanliness of the sheets we slept on during our week in Maui!!!(Just kidding!!!)

No, absolutely no connection with VRBO and I have not, at this point, rented any of the properties listed there. I just think it's unfair to slam them, which is the implication from your title, when your problem has nothing to do with VRBO.

I've rented from owners that posted their properties on VRBO and for the most part, it has gone well. We communicated via e-mail and the phone. The first owner was top notch all the way and I'd rent from her again in a heartbeat. Owner #2 (we needed a bigger unit that trip) was great the first time, no problems.

The next time my friends and I rented from Owner #2, we did hit a snag. She thought we were leaving a day earlier than we actually were. I was alseep alone in the condo that morning when the cleaner came to clean the condo. A new group was coming in that afternoon. I called the owner ASAP.

Fortunately, the owner lived nearby and she came over. She blamed her husband for "putting the wrong departure date" on the calendar. Our e-mails were proof that we were in the right about the date. Fortunately, her daughter owned the unit directly below us. It was not being used so we were able to stay there for our last day/night.

However, it was a major pain to have to rush to move all of our stuff downstairs because of this mistake. I don't like to think of what might have happened I had not been there amd not out at the beach with the others or gone for the day.

Regardless, I'd still rent from someone posting on VRBO if the photos of the unit were good and the rapport between myself and the owner was good. Sometimes errors like ours happen and you have to roll with it.

Barbara, no need to be snippy -- I do understand the VRBO setup, and continue to make use of the site. I just think some owners should do a better job of responding to queries. It's a web site, so not hard to update the calendar: nor is it hard to update your voice message to say you are unavailable until 2007, or that the condo is no longer for rent, or whatever fits the circumstance. Unanswered queries just leave doubts.

Atlswan, LOL about your date mixups. Reminds me of renting a lovely cottage in England this spring. DH and I were just sitting down to breakfast when a car pulled up and the caretaker came to the door to clean for the next guest, arriving that afternoon. Fortunately I had my email confirmation that we were booked there for three more nights, so they were able to switch the incoming guests to another cottage. Lesson learned is, always get it in writing and have it with you when you travel!

TG, where is your beach property. We can probably come up w/some renters right on here... I may have an interest myself.Back to vrbo, perhaps I have just been lucky but I have rented properties through their site probably 15-20 times w/zero problems.

The exact same thing happened to me as happened to Terpster. I phoned a villa owner in Hawaii and when I asked about references (there were no reviews or other info anywhere I could find on the web) he became slightly indignant, and commented that perhaps he should ask for my references! I was surprised, because I had rented villas numerous times in the Caribbean and had never gotten this response (there were also plenty of testimonials on the owners' websites). Anyway, the villa fit our requirements perfectly and we went ahead and booked (yes I disobeyed my gut instinct). Surprise! We liked the property, it was even nicer than it looked on the web. Turns out the owner is a Maui golf pro and gets almost all his rentals thru word of mouth from golf guests at the nearby resorts, thus his surprise at my question.

I am surprised that all three of Dick's experiences with owners were negative ones. What happened, Dick? First time I've seen that here on Fodor's.

I'm with Barbara - to be pedantic, this doesn't seem to be an issue with vrbo, but with a specific owner.

ttt