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Review by
arbyel
(date: 18-Jun-2010)
Subject: Saguaro Canyon House Tucson
Comment: Saguaro Canyon House, Tucson - Apr 2010
Can be found on a number of websites: homeaway.com, vrbo.com, great rentals.com, ultimateluxuryrentals.com, sunbeltvacations.com.
First of all, this house is not luxurious, in fact is falling apart. The pictures on the website are years old & don't show what condition the furniture, walls, doors, carpets, pool, spa, really the whole place, are in. The windows are dirty, both inside & out. It is only superficially clean.
The gourmet kitchen is laughable; not even a set of measuring spoons. No kettle; one must boil water in a saucepan on a gas stove that does not light properly. The dishes are mismatched, chipped & are at a bare minimum. Lots of mismatched & rusty cutlery, though, (with warnings not to steal any), and the knives are indeed dull. Rain poured in through the air-conditioning vent in the ceiling in the kitchen & obviously had done so many times before as the ceiling is stained & peeling.
The air-conditioning is pretty much non-existent, set to 76 degrees on the main level & 74 degrees in the bedroom. If there is a cold snap, which there was, you cannot adjust this in any way to obtain heat, either. No fire logs were provided, as specifically promised. There are no blinds on any of the windows, so the sun & resultant heating cannot be controlled.
The master bathroom shower is small, dark & mildewed & the showerhead cannot be angled properly so that the floor doesn't flood. The downstairs tub has a big chunk out of the fiberglass & is inexpertly repaired. The plastic shower liner is ripped at the holes. Poorly repaired holes in the walls of both bathrooms. One of the master bath sinks is blocked with years' worth of hair, so unusable. "Luxury" towels that have bleach marks & holes. After dropping something behind the master bedroom night table, was disgusted to find a thick layer of dirt & dust behind it & the bed. The curtains are stained & do not fit the windows properly. Carpet is dirty & stained, burn marks in one corner. Back of walk-in closet doors is shredded.
The pool is filthy, black scum on the walls, rocks & dead insects in the bottom. The owner does any cursory cleaning, seen once in 2 weeks. The "state of the art" heat pump is ancient & constantly trips the circuit so there is no heat. For the privilege of having a cold, filthy pool you are charged $200 per week. The pool attracts many insects so it's necessary to skim it constantly; however, the 2 skimmers provided are broken & completely filled with holes, so useless.
On the 2nd day, the spa spontaneously drained & could not be stopped except to unplug it. We called & left a message, but no reply. The owner showed up the next day while we were out, attached a hose to fill the spa, turned it on, & departed. When we arrived back, water was pouring over the top of the spa, across the porch, down the hillside & had been doing so for some time. So we turned it off, whereupon the spa started to drain again. We called the owner, once again leaving a message. He casually turned up a couple of hours later to say he'd have the pool guy in to fix it. We called again after a week, but no reply & needless to say, 2 weeks later the spa was still as he'd left it.
Porch furniture is in bad shape. Only 2 stained, cushioned chairs & one has the stuffing missing from it & is full of holes. The bbq is old, difficult to light & rocks back & forth. If you run out of fuel, it is your responsibility to replace the tank at your own cost.
The back yard lights are on a timer, but are on during the day & off at night, at least those that are not broken. Should one care to use pool in the evening, there is no choice about it as the pool light is burned out as well.
Several of the indoor lights are burned out: over the kitchen table, one going up the stairs to the bedroom, master bathroom, front hall. There are no table lamps in the living room so one is essentially watching tv in the dark with just a row of halogens recessed into the ceiling.
The front door has a huge gap at the bottom corner, looks like there was some damage to it, certainly large enough for scorpions, snakes or rodents to gain access. All window & door screens are ill-fitting, so the same problem would exist there, too.
The livingroom tv is big, but very old. The tv in the master bedroom is broken; the one on the lowest level not connected to cable, one fuzzy station available. The 2 in the other bedrooms were unplugged; we did not try, but assumed they did not work either.
The house is directly under the flight path for the Tucson airport & also the military airport. Planes & helicopters fly over several times a day & sometimes at night, & are occasionally intrusive.
There is very little to say that is positive about this rental. There was never an apology about the pool/spa problems & never an offer to reimburse us for the lack of amenities. Just warnings & threats posted around the house that leave a bad taste in your mouth. The owners are not particularly pleasant people to deal with & their property is completely misrepresented, so choose somewhere else.
Rating: 
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