VRBOReviews 2,004

I booked a vacation house for a week in July 2020 and then needed to either change my dates or cancel my vacation due to COVID recommendations made by the Governor of Oregon as well as the Mayor of Joseph. Kathleen Evans-Rawls the owner refused to give me a credit for a different date. She then went on to tell me if I canceled my dates and she rebooked them she would give me a refund. She stated this to me twice. I then canceled my dates and she was able to rebook them. Win/win right? Not so much. When I asked for the refund she then stated she had a no refund policy (which was addressed numerous times before I agreed to cancel so she could rebook) and she then refused to refund me my $2500. She went on to say how the Covid virus has impacted them financially, as though that justified her going back on her word and not sending me a refund. On the VRBO website every week of July and August were booked solid. And she doubled her money for the 7 nights I booked! The Covid pandemic does not give her the right to commit theft. I DO NOT RECOMMEND ANYONE RENT ANYTHING FROM KATHLEEN EVANS-RAWLS of The Evans Farm in Joseph Oregon. VRBO did nothing for me other than to tell me to contact the owner. SERIOUSLY? I am out $2500! DO NOT USE VRBO. LET'S PUT THEM OUT OF BUSINESS.

Vrbo declined to post my review because it was negative. Rented a log cabin in Sutton that the owner had filled with so much junk and kept my security deposit because we were not out until 9:10 am (after the check out time was changed to 9 am while we were there! Vrbo did not try to help us one bit and then allowed owner to post a bad review for us! On the owners section (who knew!) of Vrbo. The 'chat' on VRBO is totally for show and disconnects you randomly. Beware of reviews that only put positive reviews up. There is just no way, that at least, on our rental that other renters didn't have UN-favorable reviews. The place was a mess. I don't know if Homeaway is in the same class as VRBO because they are both part of the same parent company.
Jack Truesdale

We rented a cabin in the Smokies for a long weekend. Wrote a reasonable review stating the place was comfortable but need work including instructions on how to get to the Cabin. It was on a non identified road high up and was not easy to get there but VRBO took exception to these comments saying it didn't relate to the rental. First time I have run into a monitoring of a review that they didn't appreciate and took exception to so they won't display it.

Rented this for the weekend and was a dump! Never again this was a house in
Coeur d'Alene Idaho! Property listing *******
This is the address:
1324 N 7th st Coeur d'Alene Idaho
It was dirty! It was 1/2assed cleaned and the property manager try to make excuses for everything! Waiting for the amount of money we paid that they'd have enough money to have a landscape there and actually have people that know how to clean, and maybe put a fence up to block the neighbor that had a junkyard in their backyard! The patio looked like was going to get fleas if I sat down on a chair! Just disgusting especially for the money that we paid!

I want you VRBO to rent a room in Pinetop Arizona. Chose The Roundhouse Lodge. Made my reservations. We were very happy and excited about our future trip. I had a couple questions so I called The Roundhouse Lodge. The recording on the voicemail stated the hotel was not open and would not be open until after I reservations. I immediately went on the VRBO website then cancel our reservation for a hotel that wasn't open. Not thinking anything of it, reservations were non-refundable, surely they wouldn't charge me for a Hotel that wouldn't be open during my reservation! I was wrong. They charged me full price for the reservation. I have tried calling them I tried to feed it to my credit card and they still are charging me the money. I believe this is fraud I will not be going away. Be careful when you use the site they will rip you off and don't even think twice about it

Like many people, I had to cancel a long-planned vacation- to Paris for a 15th anniversary re-marriage. No problem getting a flight voucher. The management at Paul's Apartments, 9 Rapp Ave., Paris, however, via VRBO (absolutely no help in this matter- avoid them, too!), stated that regardless of Covid-19, EU travel restrictions, World War 3 or the Apocalypse, he could not give me a refund, OR EVEN A SIMPLE VOUCHER, to do the very same plan next September. $2500 bucks gone, after months of not working. Greedy slimebag- use Airbnb and avoid this guy and VRBO both.

We booked. We fell sick with COVID19. My wife was hospitalized with pneumonia. We wanted to change the booking but unfortunately my wife and son's positive COVID19 and the former's hospitalization occurred within 14 days of our scheduled visit. Do not book with these crooks. They will take all your money and just say no business could survive without charging you. They do not deserve to be in business - take your business to people who have a moral understanding.

We rented a townhouse managed by Ryan O'Leary in Kinsale Ireland for July 2020. We reserved with a $1000 deposit a year in advance. With news of the pandemic, I contacted Ryan O'Leary in Feb 2020, again in March 2020, finally in May 2020 asking for either a refund or voucher for future use. He flatly refused in spite of the fact Ireland was not fully open and US residents were prohibited from travel to Europe. Home Away, which changed its name to VRBO, refused to assist. There was no refund at all, not even the booking fees or cleaning fees. I have used VRBO many times in the past, but will never use them again. A scam is an understatement.

As a trusting customer on VRBO you expect them to only allow reliable owners and management companies to advertise on their site. However, this is not the case! When you phone to try and lodge a complaint regarding the management company Evolve Vacation Rentals for hiding behind emails and voice mails, they offer nothing as a recourse. When you try and explain the situation so that the owner will be aware, they just quietly hang up on you while you are trying to explain the situation. Nice touch for customer service, if you don't like what you hear, you just hang up. WOW I would never trust a listing with VRBO again... they just list the properties and don't care if they are represented by a unsavory company like Evolve from Denver. Don't book through them either.

We were so excited to plan a vacation in September with our family from England... and then COVID. We held on to our reservation as long as possible not because of negligence but because of hope to spend time together. We finally had to cancel. We couldn't go to Florida (a major Corona Hotspot) and take that risk. The owner made us feel like we were negligent in our cancellation. She offered us the same week in 2021, however that was not going to work for us. The owner stated she had to keep her "business afloat" and would not even consider a partial refund. What about our hard owned money and keeping our only home afloat? So basically she just stole thousands of dollars and left us with NOTHING! This is totally UNACCEPTABLE. Now she will take our money and someone else's for the same week and be paid twice. Totally CRIMINAL!

It is extremely, extremely rare that I write a poor review. I don't like the idea of negatively impacting someone's lively-hood. But this company is so horrible that I cannot get over it and I feel that people need to be warned. We started using HomeAway to advertise our beach cottage about 13 years ago. They were a delight. Then slowly things began to change, and when they were purchased by Expedia it turned into a nightmare. They are so shady. Like dealing with the mafia. Bullies, scammers, monopolizers. They force you to do things their way and they force you to pay them a fee for each and every one of these things, which they control. As an owner you MUST use online booking, but you must pay an additional fee if you want your money disbursed promptly. As an owner you must pay an annual fee, which is costly, but then you must pay all of these additional fees for each transaction on top of that annual fee. Not to mention the fees they are charging the renters on the same transaction. They block out phone numbers and email addresses within all correspondence between owners and renters because they want to control everything. They don't want anyone communicating directly, outside of their control. They will hold thousands of dollars of your money, whether you are an owner or a renter, and they will give you no reasonable explanation why and you will spend a lot of time on the phone with them. If you pay them as a renter, and then cancel, good luck receiving your funds. If you are an owner and your renter has paid them, good luck getting your funds. I am sure that many people have positive experiences. All experiences cannot be bad or they would not stay in business. However, as an owner I have had countless horrible experiences. So shady. The only way I can describe it. They are gross. Wish I could give them a zero.