William O.

I have two homes that I have had listed with Home Away/VRBO for about five years. Now, the are changing our guest an obscene fee in order to book with us. I might understand a 1%-2% fee, but a fee that in many cases is in the range of 8%-9%. Can someone explain the difference in operating costs that Home Away incurs on a two-week booking, compared with a three day booking? There is none and yet the fee is significant for the longer stay. Home away attempted to justify this fee by saying it was needed to upgrade their marketing services for owners. Well, as an owner I have seen nothing in added marketing services. What I have seen is, a significant decline in inquires and bookings. I will explore what my options are before renewing with Home Away/VRBO. They are also going to eliminate the ability of guests to deal directly with owners by the end of this year, so the guests will have no choice but to pay this obscene fee. This trap will also require to owners to pay a fee to VRBO for collecting the payment from the guests. Not only is this a greedy action on the part of Home Away/VRBO resulting in added expenses for both owners and guest and reduced business, but it also result in much more work for me as an owner. Another example of Corporate Greed run amuck.