VRBOReviews 2,004

This site has no protection to the customers so these home owners can scam as much as they need. I had an emergency so I requested to cancel Friday, my reservation starts on Sunday afternoon so I asked to cancel, they said If I cancelled I will get no refund except he cleaning fees, I requested to change the dates, the owner was very sneaky and said that I can't reserve any other time even if it's in few months ahead because some of he renters are contractors and might renew, however, there was spots open for public to reserve, so how come people can reserve br not me? I used to book with them but not anymore. Shady and tricky, stay away..

Cameio stated it best:
VRBO has failed to pitch in on this pandemic crisis! They are allowing home owners to refuse refunds when beaches are closing, travel restrictions in place. Our family lost hundreds and many other families are losing with no regard! Air BNB stepped up and made sure their travellers we're refunded. I will never book VRBO again!
In addition to the way they conduct business, HOURS on hold, then disconnected, then escalated to Trust & security, the more HOURS on hold. I think their strategy is just to wear you out. Meanwhile, the property manager won't respond to my several phone calls and e-mails, and has my rental, cleaning fee and REFUNDABLE security deposit.

Can't give a negative 5 star for the system will not allow me. I have been with vrbo as owner for 4 years and every year they get worse. I am current still on hold with them while I write this review (over 45 minutes, hung up 4 times and on 5 call attempt) to speak with a rep. They auto charged me while I didn't approve the charge on my credit card. I am also a premier client with vrbo and they treat you worse. Supposed Premier clients are the best status you can be as a customer but we are traded the worst. I highly do not recommend VRBO! Run far away from this company. AirBnB is alot better for i have properly in big cities and use AirBnB! I will drop VRBO completely and go with AirBnB!

I rented a property for memorial day and took the 6 hour drive there just for the owner to fall asleep and not tell me how to get in the property for over 3 hours... so I ended up booking a hotel and by this time it's after 8. P.m. I was traveling with a child it was memorial day and everything was half capacity due to covid. On top of paying over 2 grand for a rental I couldn't get into I now paid over a grand for the hotel! Vrbo didn't offer me any help in getting a refund instead between them and the unprofessional property owner a two day trip at 5 grand somehow is my fault and problem. Be careful with vrbo there may be honest renters on there but there's always a scam artist ruining it for the honest people and vrbo will take absolutely no responsibility for allowing it to happen.

I booked a house for memorial weekend and everything was excellent! The day we checked out vrbo took the money for the security deposit out of my bank acct. Instead of just leaving it as a hold. The owner of the property filled out everything for the deposit to be returned to me. Except VRBO is holding it for a month saying it is a refund and using covid as an excuse. It is my belief that VRBO is holding money to make money on interest! My money shld hve been released to me over a week ago! This is unacceptable! I will never use this site again!

Read ALL the fine print. VRBO is effectively just an advertising, booking and payment processor website. They advertise vacation rental properties and collecting your money and hand it over most of it to the property owner at the time of booking before you receive "the benefit / the goods". 60 days or less from Check-int the reservations become non-refundable - NO MATTER WHAT - including situations like COVID-19 or acts of GOD or acts of Government. You are at the mercy of the property owner/manager. Do not be fooled - - this is no small mom&pop type of business, some of the property managers like Vacasa are billion dollar business, well covered with contracts, lawyers, multiple LLC's in every state! Read the rental agreement contract carefully! Make sure you are covered!

This was a SCARRING first time experience with VRBO. When we first called to try to get our refund back due to the event being cancelled, COVID 19, and due to President Trump's stay home announcement where he states "we're asking everyone to work at home, if possible, postpone unnecessary travel, and limit social gatherings to no more than 10 people." we were first told we would get the "FULL refund" of our payment back with no problem but then, the following day the primary renter messaged us apologizing and said that they couldn't refund the full amount therefore would like to stick to their cancellation policy even after you guys agreed to issue us the full refund. This really ticked me off because it is their jobs to communicate amongst one another as the primary and secondary renters. If I could have given no stars I definitely would have given this experience no stars. In the end, after multiple phone calls, we only got back the half of our payment even with everything in place, everything that was going on and everything that had happened. It was as if they didn't care if we came and infected the community which mostly consists of older people in the area where we booked or each other. It was a very disappointing experience for all of us that were planning to attend the booking and unfortunately each one of us will probably never book with VRBO again due to this terrible experience.

I rented a condo on Vrbo and as normal procedure i paid a $200 deposit which was taken out my account immediately and was to be returned to me with in 5 to 7 days. Well now i am being told by Vrbo it will be 2 to 4 weeks to get my money back. They tell you to call the property manager which i did and was told they refunded my money back to Vrbo after my departure from the condo. VRBO IS HOLDING MY DEPOSIT! DO NOT USE THIS COMPANY! From what i am being told alot of people are in my position to include the owners of the properties who is not getting the money we pay VRBO for our stay. This is not acceptable! Vrbo is just a website to show property rentals they are the middle guy. There are plenty of websites you can go to that you deal with the owners use them. Right now not even the owner can get VRBO to release my money. Deal with the property owners these website exists and it is much easier. For example if you wanted to go to alabama go to Alabama vacation home rentals.com you get the same condo and deal with the owners. This stops companies like VRBO from holding our money hostage.

This is now our second disaster rental with VRBO. The first was a "Suite on the Grand Canal" in Venice. I'll just say it was a room within a flat with a padlock on the door and the guest must enter through another family's rental (in this case while they were quarreling loudly). There was no one to give us the key, the owner is in Panama and it got worse from there. VRBO did not issue a refund and were of no help.

On to the current failure. We rented a $1000. 00 per night home in Minneapolis for a wedding in June. Covid has closed the venue so we are not having the wedding then. Initially we contacted the owner through VRBO (the entire email chain is there) to ask to reschedule in Aug. He clearly stated the home would be sold by then and he would issue no refunds. We signed a no refund contract so we decided to have a family party there in lieu of the reception. When contacting the owner for next week's arrival details we were informed that "since we had rescheduled (the emails clearly show he refused a reschedule) there were now major renovations to the property in progress". After contacting VRBO and learning that there "Book with confidence" is exactly as travel guru Rick Steves states "a deceptive travel practice, at best" I see why VRBO has a 1 star rating. We have been on hold for hours, shunted from one person to another, lied to, told to wait, told they will contact us, told there is a 48 hour deadline for the property owner to respond... crickets! As it stands, the owner has lied to VRBO, they have stalled us to the point that alternate travel arrangements have to be made and we are out $4000. 00 with no help from VRBO.
There are many other travel sites, please do yourself a favor and use any one of them.

I came into my last day of work before the big holiday weekend celebration to find an email sent at 7:22am 5/22 that my vacation home was cancelled. Less than 24 hours notice... I was in tears! Luckily we contacted another home rental company, Casiola... they were helpful and quick to find me a house in less than 6 hours before I was due to check in. Any other normal circumstances we would have had to pay a caterer, musicians, and cancelled the party! How unprofessional can a company be; you cant trust them... now I wait for a refund! Im not going to bother calling, since their hold time is upwards of one hour! Buyer beware!

We had been with VRBO for years and then a few years ago they were bought out by Expedia. They now charge an additional service charge to the tenants that adds no value. They also are not paying out reservations in a timely manner. They claim with the pandemic they are having to issue so many refunds that they can't pay out the rentals on time. I have had tenants that have come and gone and I still have not received any money even thought the tenant paid well in advanced.