Overall, we enjoyed our trip to Mission Beach. The house was nice and clean and ready for us upon arrival. However, there are a handful of reasons why we would never book again with Eddie and his Mission Beach vacation rental. First off, we booked this trip in September of 2019, before the Covid pandemic. On March 26th 2020, we reached out to see how Eddie and Marv were handling cancelations due to the virus. We were met with rude and unaccommodating responses. Here is our conversation:
Haylee
"Hey Eddie, I am sure with the current state of things you are getting a lot of questions about people who are booked with you. We are from Colorado and the state is currently in a stay at home order. I am wondering, if we decide we need to cancel our trip are you offering refunds to people? I don't know yet what we will decide to do but I wanted to reach out and see how you are handling things. Also, if we did decide to cancel when would we need to make the decision by? Thanks so much Eddie I hope you and your family are safe and healthy!
Eddie And Marv
Hi Haylee, thank you for your message and your well wishes. This is obviously an unprecedented situation and we are monitoring it very closely. Airbnb has allowed cancelations between March 15th and April 15th without penalty. However, Airbnb does NOT give us any compensation, so it is a complete loss for us. The tourism industry is completely decimated. The cost of this pandemic cannot fall on the shoulders of a few industries. We are not a big company and cannot afford to bear all the losses. At this point, until airbnb allows us to cancel all of our reservations without penalty, we cannot even attempt to put our homes on the regular rental market. Do, we need to wait on airbnb. Yes, Colorado has a stay home order but it is only March 26. You reservation is not until August. We cannot make decisions about August at the moment. We urge you to practice some patience and see how this all plays out. I can't imagine there will be stay at home orders six months away. But who knows.
Haylee
Hi Eddie! I understand that you are not a big company, we truly hope that it still works out for us to come in August. I was just trying to be proactive to see how you have been handling things. If it came to it and either the government asks us to remain home or we decide we are uncomfortable traveling, would it be possible to change the dates of our vacation until next year? Again, I’m just trying to be proactive and have an idea of our options. I am so sorry that this has hit you so hard on your rental. We are very familiar with the financial devastation of the virus ourselves.
Eddie And Marv
In our initial communications with you we strongly advised you to buy travel insurance. Unfortunately only a traveler can purchase travel insurance. If we could do it as a host, we would. Let's just wait and see where all this goes. I'd say by the way beginning of June we'll have a better idea of what August will look like. If anything happens in the mean time, we'll let you know."
I can definitely understand that COVID has been catastrophic to Airbnb owners. However it felt like we were reprimanded for reaching out and inquiring about how they had been handling reservations. The comment he made that 'The cost of this pandemic cannot fall on the shoulders of a few industries.' felt strange to receive from a host. Also the fact that he stated 'We are not a big company and cannot afford to bear all the losses.' felt ironic, because if we had not been able to go on this vacation and Eddie would not give us our money back then our family would have been taking the financial hit of $4,578 without actually going on the vacation which would have been devastating. At the time of these messages we had paid half of the trip which was $2,289. After these interactions with Eddie if we were unable to go on the trip we were fully not expecting to get our money back.
We were charged the second half for our trip a month before we were suppose to go. Others in my group wanted me to reach out to Eddie about waiting to charge us until we were certain we would be able to go since CA covid numbers had been increasing. I did not want to message again since the response I had the first time around was so unhelpful. We just crossed our fingers that we would be able to go.
During the trip, there was a fly infestation in the front and back of the house that made using the back patio that had the dinning table and chairs impossible. We’re talking hundreds of flies camping out on the back patio and in the front dumpsters (which were filthy). Also, the Homeowners across the way (not vacationers or renters) hosted 3 parties during our stay that were very loud, one of them lasting until 2am. Obviously this is not within the owners control but contributed to our overall experience. Also of note, in the email that you receive a week before your trip there is a disclaimer "We want you to have a good time but, out of respect for the neighbors please understand that we cannot and do not allow parties. If you are contacted regarding a noise problem you will be asked to immediately vacate the property and will forfeit all rents and security deposits." This was not an issue for us as it was a family trip but knowing that Mission beach is somewhat of a party scene you may want to