Dear Allison, I would like to bring some things to your attention. First, with regards to your criticisms about our swimming pool area. Evidently, you did not completely and thoroughly read the Short Term Rental Agreement, which you signed and agreed to. Because, if you had, you would have seen on Line 13 in the “Rental Rules” section that renters are not allowed in the swimming pool area, and that it is to remain locked at all times. This should have been obvious to you, as well, because all entrances to the area were locked and/or blocked by furniture, when you moved in. However, it seems that you took it upon yourself to move the furniture, unlock to doors, and go inside. For your future reference, just because you are renting someone’s home, it does not give you the right to wander around in places that you are clearly not allowed to be in.
Secondly, our home, as with most homes in the area, use a well for its water supply. I simply informed you that any well, in general, can have traces of things like sediment, odor, minerals, arsenic (or similar), in the water, but that we have a very expensive ($3,500.00) Reverse Osmosis system, which filters our water for drinking and cooking purposes, and that it is dispensed by an individual spigot located on our sinktop. My point of explaining this to you, was to inform and instruct you to use the R/O spigot for your cooking and drinking water purposes, and not the sink faucet spout (which would be for washing dishes, etc.). Of course, you could have used bottled water, if you preferred. Anyone who uses a well for their water supply understands this. However, this can be something new to people who are on a public water supply. But, these days, many people who are even on a public water supply, use a filter system.
Thirdly, when we receive a booking inquiry from a rental party for the first time, we like to “know” who we are renting to. We like to confirm the number of people, pets or not, etc. Lastly, we always ask the Primary Renter if they have any questions, and if they have read the Sample Short Term Rental Agreement which we have posted in our listing. While we always respond immediately, sometimes it takes time for the Primary Renter to respond, which can tend to drag out the process a little, such as in your case. In addition, as owners, we believe in meeting and greeting our renters, showing them around, and personally handing them the keys. We feel it makes for a better working relationship and our guests really appreciate it. However in your situation, when it got to the point that you were an hour late for check-in (3pm), I called you to find out your ETA, so I could plan my schedule accordingly (I had a 5pm appointment). At that time, we spoke for 17 minutes. As you know, I ended up meeting your son and his friend at 5:45pm (since they drove separately), and ended up showing them around, and handing them the keys. Evidently, you showed up at midnight. On the next day (Sunday), I called you at noon to make sure all is well. However, you weren’t able to speak at that time. So, you called me back 20 minutes later. At that time, I offered to walk you through the house by phone. You said, “that would be great”, and our conversation took 34 minutes. Sorry, but to say that I called you “early on a Sunday” and that the “communication process was painful, and required hours of phone calls”, is purely an exaggeration and not the truth.
Fourth, to say that our home was not clean before you moved in, is an outright lie. I know this because I personally inspected every inch of our house before you arrived. I always clean, fix, test, and straighten out anything that is below my standards. So, if you felt that something in our house was not clean or otherwise deficient, why didn’t you mention it during the entire week that you were there, as indicated in Line 20 in the “Rental Rules” section of the Short Term Rental Agreement?
Fifth, our Short Term Rental Agreement clearly specifies in Line 19 of the “Rental Rules” section, what is to be expected upon move-out with regard to the bed linens and towels, and the house, in general. Our Rental Agreement a full disclosure document, with nothing implied or ambiguous, and all terms are spelled out clearly. Since I personally inspected our home after you left, it was clear that you did not feel that it was important for you to abide by these terms in the agreement. So, although you agreed to the terms in the Rental Agreement, you decided not to abide by them. And now, you are complaining that they were “ridiculous”. I’m curious. When it comes time for you to make your mortgage payment, do you call your bank and tell them that you don’t want to pay them because it’s “ridiculous” for you to send them money every month?
Most of our renters do a great job cleaning, leaving nothing additional to be done. Sometime, they will miss one or two items. However, you did not even make one bed, and the sheets on every bed still had crumbs on them. So, they obviously weren’t washed. In one bathroom, the sinks were dirty and the countertops still had your dried toothpaste drippings on them. The top surface of the toilet seat was filthy and the underside of it had feces on it. There bathroom floor was dirty, and the tub bottom had dirt and grime on it, combined with hair on the area where the glass door slides open, and in the drains. This was just one bathroom and the other rooms were not any better. Should I mention the food stains on our furniture, the drink stains on our TV stand, and the food crumbs in the beds and on the floors upstairs? How about the food stains and dirt on our kitchen floor? Is this the way you clean or the way you live? It’s obvious that you didn’t feel the need to clean up. We make it very clear (in our agreement) that our home must be restored to the same condition, as when you moved in. We have a responsibility to provide a perfect (or as close as possible) environment to every renting party and your negligence caused us tremendous aggravation and stress.
You are lucky that I did not give you a negative review that you deserve. Rather, I preferred to not give you a review at all. We have had so many people rent from us and leave our home in excellent condition. However, it seems that you felt that you are above all of that. For the same reason, you felt that disposing of your trash was not important enough get done. However, you did have plenty of excuses why you couldn’t do it. In the end, I had to clean up your mess for 4.5 hours and dispose of your trash before the next renter was due to arrive (only 4 hours after you checked out). In fact, we had to request that they wait an extra half-hour for us to finish.
Lastly, anyone reading our reviews can see that we always score between 4 and 5 stars, and that your low review score is merely your way of retaliating for not receiving your cleaning fee deposit. In all of our years, we have never had to keep a cleaning deposit, until you came along. Please do not make a booking request to us again!!