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Top > United States > South Carolina 
| Vacation Rental Complaints |
| 1. |
Charelston/ James Island, SC
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We recently used VRBO.com to book our vacation to Charleston, SC for May 29-June 1, 2008. We booked a rental with Dina Del Rio (VRBO #139947) at 1546 Patterson Ave James Island, SC 29412. We paid a total of $744.55 ($200.00 deposit) by May 1.
When we arrived on Thursday May 29 we realized we had become victims of False Advertising. We initially did not feel safe, there were cockroaches in the apartments, the air conditioners were not ready to be used and there was trash/junk all over the backyard. The whole place did not come close to the pictures or descriptions on VRBO.
One of the apartments had a door that connected to Dina’s house. This door could only be locked on her side of the house. We had no way of keeping anyone from coming in. We would go to sleep at night hearing her television and wake up in the morning to someone in her house snoring. When we arrived Dina was cleaning up cockroaches but through out our stay were would find cockroaches in the bed, sofa and on the floor. The apartments had window units and the downstairs unit stopped working on Saturday night. We had 1 night without air conditioning. When we first arrived the apartments smelled of mildew and dust like they had not been opened for months. The coffee maker and blender did not work when we got up in the morning. They turned on but the bottom of the blender did not have a seal and the coffee maker did not filter the coffee.
The worst was the back yard. This was not a private area. The deck in the backyard had been turned into Dina’s kitchen and TV room. Then there were the piles of junk and trash everywhere. The pictures are disgusting.
I do not know where to go with my concerns. When we arrived at the rental we were in shock. We had already paid $744.50 and had tickets in 2 hours for a ghost tour. We called several hotels to see if they had vacancies but could not find a place with that short of notice. We decided to deal with trash and bugs so that our vacation to Charleston would not be ruined. But I do not want other renters to be shocked when they see the rental in real life, which is nothing like the pictures. Other renters will save for years, plan for months, travel for hours, and have all their excitement for a vacation destroyed in a few seconds when they realize that they have been deceived and left with no options.
We depart June 1, on June 25 Dina emailed me that we forfieted our deposit because of dog hair (the place was dog friendly) and items that were already broken when we arrived.
Date Added: Jun 25, 2008
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| 2. |
McKown Properties, Surfside Beach, SC VRBO #31960
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I was part of a group that rented VRBO #31960 from 7/5 - 7/12 under the impression i was renting a top quality beach front property for nearly $6000 a week. I what i was greeted with was much, much less.
I have rented at least 10 properties off of VRBO in the past and every one of them was exactly as described or better, until now.
Upon booking Bill McKown of McKown Properties informed us that they upgraded the place to 5 King Beds instead of the configuration listed on VRBO and this was his signature property that he built for Cale Yarborough and that it would no doubt exceed our expectations. I would have settled for just meeting expectations.
First off, the pictures of the house on VRBO do not match the actual house. The only picture that are correct are of the exterior. All the interior picture are of another house. The bedrooms photographed are not the bedrooms we stayed in. The living room, may be the same, but the furniture shown in the photo is far better than the junk we had to cover with bed sheets to sit on. The view off the deck, was not taken from this house or the pier was photoshopped out of it and the removed that jetty that's shown
Also when we arrived, the place was filthy, there were dead jellyfish, beer bottles and cigarette butts all over the deck, the living room carpet was a stained dirty mess that no amount of vacuuming could remedy and the garbage cans were full.
The hot tub was not functioning and hasn't been for at least a few weeks according to one of McKlowns employees. They sent a repair guy out, but he had to order a pump, so we had a hot tub that did not get beyond 80 degrees and had only a few jets working. So no hot tub for the entire week.
We had order a grill from McKlown that we had to call 4 or 5 times to finally get delivered on Tuesday. That wouldn't have bothered us much id the piece of junk stove fully worked. Only 3 of the 4 heat elements functioned.
All rooms are supposed to have wall mounted TV's according to the listing. Not even close, the living room had a decent standard TV and 2 of the bedrooms had crappy discount brand standard televisions with more static than reception. None of the other rooms had televisions. There was one super low quality DVD player in the living room. Also there was no stereo system as stated in the listing.
Addressing these issues with Bill McKlown was useless. When we arrived we were greeted with the bed configuration that was shown on VRBO, not the one he insisted it was upgraded too. Not a huge deal for us, but his attitude was harsh and stand offish. He did not return any phone calls or emails from us the remainder of the week.
I doubt I can get refunded any money, so I feel I should warn other travelers who may be renting in this area.
Stay away from McKown Properties
Date Added: Jul 13, 2008
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| 3. |
PAWLEYS ISLAND SC VACATION HOME SWINDLE
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I paid $550.00 towards a stay in a gated comunity called Pawleys Plantation, in South Carolina, to a condo owner named Ron Bartlett, 9 Country Wood Landing, Rochester NY 14626.
Planned for the last two weeks in March, 2011.
I asked for, but did nat receive, a rental agreement.
Due to a serious health situation in February, I advised Bartlett that I perhaps should cancel our stay. This was 3 1/2 weeks before our arrival date. No response. When I enquired as to a refund, I was told curtly "No way".
I then decided, at my doctor's urging, to go anyway (since I wouldn't receive any refund) and was prepared to pay the remaining $350 due. No response. When I enquired, it was clearthat our visit was cancelled...and by HIM. Money back? "GET LOST".
No trip, no money back, airline reservation changed (another $150 spent). I came to the conclusion that Ron Bartlett is somewhat of a con artist, and had no intention of actually letting us stay. LESON: ALWAYS INSIST ON SIGNED RENTAL AGREEMENT. Do not accept "your signed cheque is your receipt".
I filed a detailed complaint with HomeAway after several emails, only to discover that Ron Bartlett was no longer an advertiser. They have yet to reply; I am sure they never will.
Lesson: HomeAway, VRBO will do nothing. I will not be using them in future.
Date Added: May 3, 2011
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| 5. |
1249 Sharks Tooth Trail
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My family and I have stayed at Ocean Lakes for the past 3 years and we love it. There is plenty to do for the whole family and the campground is located right on the beach.
We will definatley return to Ocean Lakes, but never to 1249 Sharks Tooth Trail. We found this unit thru VRBO. It is listed as a '3 bedroom home and very clean'. Before we rented, we found a negative review of this home descibing excessive roaches and pametto bugs and difficulties by a prior renter in getting a security deposit returned. After speaking to the owner, Elizabeth Burrow, she assured us the review was untrue and there was no insect issue or any other issues. Well, we should have believed what we read.
The owner does not disclose in the VRBO listing that this '3 bedroom home' is a partially converted camper. The VRBO pictures ( http://www.vrbo.com/235248) show 2 of the 3 bedrooms only. Bedroom #3 is listed as a full size bed, and is actually not a bedroom at all. It is located in the 'camper ' portion of the home and is a typical camper bed, just a wooden platform sandwiched between 2 walls with a thin camper mattress on top in a passthru hallway between the back of the home and the kitchen. Not suitable for any full size adult, let alone a couple.
The 2nd day we were there, we were overrrun by roaches and palmetto bugs. They were everywhere, much more then we would expect as normal for southeastern locations.
On day number 4, we found mice living in the kitchen under the stove.
This unit is small and dark inside, and not well kept at all. The furniture and rugs are worn and stained, and we had to clean everything before we used it upon our arrival.
When we left, after weeks of trying to contact Elizabeth Burrow for the return of our security deposit, she informed us that she was keeping it because we didnt clean the place when we left. Utterly riduculous. We left this shack in better shape than we found it and 'mouse free' to boot.
We've been renting vacation homes for 20 years including through VRBO, and have never had the security deposit withheld for any reason until now.
The weekly rental on this unit is very cheap for this area in the summer and now we know why. I would not recommend this unit to anyone at any price.
Date Added: Sep 25, 2009
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| 6. |
Not what it may seem
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In June, 2009, my family and I rented the Turtles Inn on Kiawah Island. We located it on VRBO and it sounded perfect, as it had 6 bdm/6.5baths, just right for our family gathering. Unfortunately, what we found wasn't what was advertised.
Upon our arrival, we found garbage blown all over the front yard and the cans overfilled. on the inside, we noted dead/live roaches and other insects lying,running around. The house had an unpleasant musky odor to it, too. Each of the showers had black mold in them, the floors had not been cleaned and the grill was filthy (and had no propane). In addition, each shower leaked (and had a rolled up towel on the outside to prevent the water from leaking onto the floor, although it didn't work) and one shower door was hanging off by the hinges. All of the soap dispensers were empty and the air conditioner filters were black and overflowing with dirt. The owner advertised a computer and internet access and neither worked. The porches, steps and rocking chairs were in terrible need of painting and a number of pieces of the deck furniture were broken. We also found the mattresses/pillows terribly inferior and uncomfortable. And, one side of the house was missing the fireplace that was advertised.
Upon contacting the owner, he sent over the cleaning service to do its job and sent a handyperson in to repair the shower door and to install some propane, etc, all while we were trying to enjoy our vacation. Of course, he blamed all of the issues on the cleaning service.
At the conclusion of our stay, I asked the owner for a reduction in the weekly rent, but all he agreed to was refunding the cleaning costs of about $300. You may wonder why I waited so long to post this concern. I tried to post it on VRBO but on that sites, owners have the ability to block negative reviews, and the owner did just last. i just came upon this site where I could make my concerns known.
There is nothing luxurious about this property. If you are looking for a place where kids can do whatever they want (cause the place needed to repainted) and you really don't care about the quality of the property, then this is the place for you. The very best thing about the property was its location directly next to the community pool, which was wonderful for the children in our group. It was a hike to the beach, however.
Date Added: Apr 1, 2010
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| 7. |
America's Cabins charges for services not performed
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We are proud owners of a log cabin located in Pigeon Forge, TN. We placed our cabin with America's Cabins, Inc. on May 1, 2010 and terminated our contract mid-June 2010. America's Cabins, Inc. charged for cleaning that was not performed. We inspected the cabin after they cleaned it and found that the floor was not vacuumed, dusting was not done, the bathroom sink faucet was filthy , there was dirt in the hot tub and brown disgusting scum in the jacuzzi, drip pans on the stove were soiled, and kitchen flloor was unclean and sticky. For $85.00 per month (our charge), plus the $70.00 (per each rental), they were able to change the sheets and towels. Despite our having pictures of the filth and scum, Jennifer at America's Cabins, Inc. insisted that everything was done to their specifications and refused to properly clean our cabin. I would NEVER recommend America's Cabins, Inc. to either vacationers or owners when seeking a property management company. Pictures of the filth will be posted at www.americascabinscomplaints.com on or about July 17, 2010.
Date Added: Jul 14, 2010
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