I am writing to complain about a property that I rented through vacationrentals.com. The property ID is 17804 and it is located in Long Lake, IL. I rented this property for the weekend of Mar 26-28, 2010. When I arrived at this property on the evening of Mar 26, the thermostat was set to 45 degrees. We had to sleep in hats and coats the first night. Typically when I rent a property in the winter, the owner turns on the heat at least a day before. In addition, the home was completely unsanitary. There were used maxi pads on the floor in the upstairs bedroom and hair in the shower in the downstairs bathroom. A toilet was used and unflushed. The towels on the rack in the downstairs bathroom were also covered in dust. The sheets for the beds were also stained and had holes. The owner refused to refund any of our money, and denied that the house had any dust (!) or was unclean.
We found a home for rent on vacationhomes.com. Dawn Barker (not real name) emailed us dates, rates, contracts and bank info for a wire transfer. Everything seemed legitimate until he emailed me to pay for insurance. since he never mentioned it before I said I would call him back. we later found out the phone number he calls from was out of nigeria. the rental house was not for rent and belonged to someone else. We lost $4,900 in the wire transfer to a credit union in massachusetts. be aware of some things that are too good to be true.
We should never wire money to an uknown person. Also look up the adress to see if the adress is real. I hate to say this but, the wary of foreign accents.
