I have never had a more terrible experience in years of using VRBO and AirBnb. My family is a local family who needed a place to stay last minute for 2 nights because of an issue in our home. I searched online for a next-day opening and saw this place which seemed to fit our needs and booked it. Somehow during the booking process the listing became unavailable for the second night, and our booking was made for just the first night. The host (who is not the owner, simply a management company) emailed me within 30 min of the booking, and we spoke for a bit and it became apparent to me that a mistake had been made in the booking. She informed me that the second night was not available, and I asked to cancel it as I had just made the booking and we had to have two nights. The management company flat-out refused to cancel, rudely informing me that it "wasn't their mistake". I tried to explain that we were urgently looking and the booking had changed to just the one night, and it was an honest mistake. She told me to "take it up with AirbNb, a multimillion dollar company" and that it was my problem, not theirs. At this point I'd held the booking for less than 45 minutes and I called AirbNb who also reached out to the management company but to no avail.
Finally they agreed to refund me the pet and cleaning fees, but this amount totaled to less than 1/3 of the total price, and I said I simply couldn't accept that for such a small mistake. I am a small business owner myself, and I would NEVER have treated my clients to the level of rudeness and disrespect that this host showed towards me. They were completely inconsiderate, and I wonder if the actual owner has any idea how they are managing the rental.
I would beware staying here because if they are willing to treat someone like this for such a small mistake, I would wonder how they would act if any damage or small event happened to the property. I was so worried about their vindictive nature that we actually refused to even stay in the property; I just kept the reservation and paid the money so that I had an opportunity to write a true review of the listing. Book at your own risk...