Rented Cow Hill âHavenâ in July 2022 for my family of 4 adults and a puppy. The first thing I noticed upon arrival was a musty smell that we attributed to the house being unoccupied and the hot weather. We opened some windows and left for dinner.
Came back after dinner and the house still had a mildew smell. As we were getting ready for bed, we noticed dozens of insects on the walls of the living room and bedrooms near and around the lights.
We immediately called the rental agency, VACASA , and sent them pictures of the bugs. The situation worsened as the number of bugs kept increasing as we spoke with the agency. In our opinion, the situation was unacceptable and the house was not habitable. VACASA did not have another property available near us and recommended we go to a motel.
Now, close to midnight, we left the premises and were lucky to find lodging for 4 adults and a puppy.
The next day VACASA called and, after reviewing the photos, promptly issued a refund for their portion of the cost for the rental property. VRBO has not yet issue me a refund for the remaining amount. Iâm not sure why the delay since everyone is in agreement the situation was unacceptable.
VRBO said we should have contacted them but we had already called VACASA who recommended finding a motel. It was close to midnight and we were basically stranded and looking for lodging.
Neither VACASA nor VRBO would reimburse us any portion of our cost for the first night stay at our new lodgings even though they left us stranded without lodging.
As for VRBO, I am not happy with their customer service team, over 1 month later and still no refund.
VACASA should inspect their properties carefully, air them out for incoming guests and physically check that all is well. As far as I could tell they did not even remove this house from the rental schedule.
We were fortunate to find the Hilton Home 2 suites hotel in North Conway. It was clean, air-conditioned, insect-free, odor-free, dog friendly and provided breakfast. The staff was great, extremely accommodating, and the cost was only slightly higher than the VRBO rental, well worth it.