HomeAwayReviews 1,751

In the past, Homeaway was a great place for homeowners to advertise their properties. Now, all Homeaway cares about is expanding and making a lot more money. They have just started blocking the emails and phone #'s of guests and homeowners/property managers. The information is not available until someone actually reserves the property by paying through them. This allows for NO screening of future clients. We used to talk to each one before accepting a reservation. Now, we can't. This is horrible!

To whom it may concer,
I would like to inform people about the following. A man calling himself Rafael Alcacer has offered me an appartement to live in Amsterdam. He has an account for several years at HomeAway. This man told me to book the appartement thrue HomeAway and transfer an amount of 1900 euro's as a deposit. Then he would send me the keys, without ever meeting me or showing me the place first. I could later decide If I wanted to keep the appartement or not, but the money needed to come first. I tried to connect with him thrue skype or calling... but he put me off by saying he was travelling. I didn't fall for it, but I would like to warn people for this man. Do not send him anything and listen to your gut feeling. If somethings sounds to good to be true, it probably is!

Dear Vacation Rental Owner,

Are you disappointed with the HomeAway and VRBO lately? Do you feel that you own your home, take care of it, bear the liability for rentalsand HomeAway is in control and making lots of money off of your investment. In Texas, HomeAway / Expedia are facing a class action law suit over the new fees being charged to the traveler. The current effort to bar communication between the owner and guest is both controlling and leaves the homeowner with no way to screen guests to ensure suitability for their hom.

Please check out HomeEscape.com! It is free to the homeowner; money is derived from advertising. Support a new team to advertise your vacation home.

How can HomeEscape be free?
We take pride in the fact that HomeEscape does not collect any processing or listing fees from either owners or travelers.
HomeEscape was created from the idea of having an affordable peer-to-peer online vacation rental community. We believe that our main source of revenue should be from paid search results advertisers, without skimping on design, functionality, or usability. This is why we are committed to being a free to list and book community.
Their management team brings many years of experience from the vacation rental industries. The core commitment is to give both exceptional service to our users, and to provide an affordable alternative to the expensive listing sites. Being an internationally oriented vacation rental team, our goal is to help our guests realize the best possible vacation rental experience.

Leadership Team | HomeEscape
https://www.homeescape.com/company
How it Works - Owner | HomeEscape

A now unhappy HomeAway subscriber / member since 2006

I have been a owner for the last 10 plus years and have always had summers booked by April. This year I still have summer weeks left! That is unheard of and now I get the notice they are going to block you from talking to guests tell they book. Are you kidding me I was told my guests could book through me well that's done and now there is 4000 properties in my area up from 700. Next they will allow hotels to adverstise. I hate to say it I am going to be forced to sell since there is no site for owners left and I can't compete with 4000 properties. It's for suppose to be vacational rental by owners not every frickin management company in the world! God let there be somebody who can stop these guys from screwing all owners and guests with extra fees. We need another option out here!

E booked through HA for our Stagecoach trip 9 mons in advance (you have to because it sells out fast). 2 days before trip we called to make arrangements for keys... We were informed that the property we booked was no longer available and it was double booked and that the person that booked it no longer worked there. There was 10 of us (5 college students with limited funds). We were able to reach person that booked us because of his name on contract. He basically told us he could put us in another house for $800 more after we already paid $3k or refund our money. We were in shock that this was happening to us just two days before our trip that we all had planned and paid for in advanced. We felt he owed us some kind of explanation. He was completely smug about the whole thing. HA took no responsibility for the situation either. Best deal he gave us was he would eat $400 of the $800, which was BS, he should have ate the whole thing. We split the $800 with no other choice. He already had taken a $1k deposit. The house we got was amazing but was with another manager whom was doing him a favor. She even felt he should have paid the full $800. We were given no notice of the over booking and Home Away didn't care either. I don't understand how they were so senseless, heartless and careless. We will NEVER book again with HOME AWAY!

June 14,2017 at 11:10am, I submitted a $473 deposit for Galveston property # ******* to the owner Napoleon Velasquez. I received a confirmation and was told the remaining $899.00 balance would be due by June 28,2017. After getting home and showing my husband the property he disagreed with the space and asked that I cancel the reservation before 24hours. I submitted the cancellation at the same day June 14,2017 at 739pm. The owner Napoleon Velasquez agreed to cancel the reservation but he adv me I would not receive my $473 deposit back because HE GIVES NO REFUNDS ON CANCELLATIONS!
I was and still am appalled that Home Away would allow a property owner to treat their traveler/customers this way! I have rented and referred friends and family to your website. I could understand Mr. Velasquez keeping a convenience fee, but for him to keep the whole amount is very hurtful.
Not only did he take advantage of me and my family but Im sure this has happen to someone else! Every owner should have a 24-48 hour window to allow the travelers to confirm the reservation. We saved money for the past 6 months to take this trip! This situation has caused my family and I to cancel our mini summer vacation. I definitely understand I should have read the cancelation policy but I NEVER thought Home Away allowed owners to do something like this to the travelers.

Eight of us rented a home in Savannah, 207 E. Henry Street to be exact. We rented the home through HomeAway/Vrbo based the pictures posted on the site. It was total Misrepresentation! Beware of the owners rental lease. We lost out on $1,600.00.
HomeAway would not let us write a review to warn others. The Owner, knows that if you cancel the contract through Vrbo/HomeAway you cannot write a review! So Unfair to potential renters for the truth!

They don't know anything about the people they get you in touch with rent you a propriety. They just list it all Fake and real (if any is real). Booked through Homeway and when I traveled to the property with my family, the property was already rented to someone else. Called HA, Called the Police and filled a report. HW keep asking me all these kind of question and they new nothing about the real owner of that property. Wasted my money and my time trying to get a refund but noooooooh they refused. NEVER NEVER NEVER again use HomeAway for anything.
YOU BEEN WARNED HERE... it should be called StayAway not HomeAway.

I have been with HomeAway and VRBO for 10 years +. In the past, I had complete contact with the guests staying in my property. Homeaway/VRBO have gotten greedy, owners are charged now charged for listing their properties and guests are charged an outrageous booking fee. I will be advertising on Craigslist and any other website that still allows me contact with the guest that is staying in my property. I urge everyone to stay clear of HomeAway, VRBO, Bookings.com, any of these sites that charge the renter, google vacation rental companies til you get a live voice answering the phone. There are plenty of those companies still around.

I don't know how did they receive such good reviews. If you haven't used it yet, please don't! #1 reason, they charged you double of the revenue you are supposed to pay as a security deposit. Guess what? This "security deposit " was not charged by the home owner but "Home Away" service, and they DO NOT REFUND you right away. The home owner told me it takes about 10 days. Think about the day you booked till the day they might refund you. It's ridiculous! #2 reason, in the event you need to cancel, there is nothing you can do on the app or on theie website, the only person can cancel your booking is the home owner. It really sucks. My experience is that the home owner never responded to my cancellation request (my booking was 45 days prior!). I finally had to contact my credit card company to dispute the charge. I won't say more. I hope that these two reasons helped you with your decision.

I have listed my property with Home Away and VRBO for over four years. Prior to their being taken over by Expedia I had a great experience dealing with multiple issues with their customer service reps. Since they are now owned by Expedia they are terrible. They are just about putting me out of business.
They simply refuse to help with issues that are critical to my business. For more information on my horrible experiences feel free to email me at *******@inbox.com

When I sold my property, I contacted Homeaway to tell me how to easily transition the 13 future guests reservations to the new owner. I was told that I had to cancel all the guests reservations and they could re book with the new owner. I thought that was ludicrous. The new owner called himself and got totally different information. To make a long story short, between the two of us, we have spoken to 7 different customer support, who have made the situation worse, each one given us even worse advice. We were finally told to leave the bookings as they are, and as guests pay, I would just send new owner a check for that amount. That worked great until my listing expired. Now guests cannot pay... after I was assured that my listing would stay active until all monies have been paid. Customer support person number 8 told me that I need to pay for another full year's subscription for that to happen. I have gotten nothing but the run around from the start, and it's still going on after 6 weeks of speaking to an endless group of incompetent people. Worst customer service hands down from any company I've ever dealt with. To add insult to injury, I've spoken 3 times to the company that handles the payments, and I've yet to find an english speaking person. They also have wasted hours of my time with misinformation. I feel like I'm stuck in an endless circle. I'm a healthy person, but I swear, Homeaway is going to give me a heart attack!

I was traveling to Europe for three weeks with my daughter and good friend. My trip dates to start July 1 needed some changing as on June 12, my good friends father suffered a stroke. We had rented this property beginning July 10th with the remaining balance due in a few weeks from the day of the incident. I immediately contacted the property owner and she responded days later saying she will not be able to refund me the money. Home away did nothing but transfer me day after day after day to different departments that basically did nothing to help my situation. The homeowner refused the refund, or even half the refund, or even allowing me to stay at the property for the days the amount paid covered. She basically took my $3800 and there was nothing I could do about it. I am furious. I am hiring an attorney to sue home away. This is not legal.