HomeAwayReviews 1,751

Joke. Joke Joke... Scam Scam Scam... Just seconds ago I lost a renter that used my home last year because of this fee. $1500 bucks gone because of a $120 service fee. And sometimes you wonder why people snap. Someone please do the math on this scam. Here is my guess 35 million properties on VRBO. Each property rents approx. 100 night/year at lets say $100 US/night. I'm probably low on that. Total scam at 10% of approx. $350,000,000... wow to have some knob answer the phone... Maybe we vote Trump in and this will all make sense.

Here is how it worked at Home Away; a home owner paid an annual fee to get a web template. The owner did all the work loading all the information, responding to potential guests, managing the reservation system, etc. Both the loyal property owners and the loyal guests helped grow Home Away to be a extremely profitable company. So profitable that Expedia bought them for $3.9 **BILLION in Nov 2015 (Thank you loyal HA owners and guests!). So for the home owner, the credit card company takes a % of the booking revenue -- even on transactions that are refunded like security deposits; the local City taxes you on the income, the State taxes you on the income, you have to pay a CPA to file required forms, you pay all utility's, etc and manage that stupid web site -- depleting much of the income. Now HA imposes a HUGE service fee (more than a resort fee would ever be!) just for guests to book through the HA web sight, REALLY. I thought that was what the $600 or more annual costs was for and that was what they sold to me.

I have seen my listing drop in half due to this new service charge and they could care less. They say its for 24/7 service, but what service? When you call the number for new sales, they answer right away, but it has always been a 10-20 minute wait for PAYING owners (I have complained about this for 2 years). The agents are the rudest people ever and HA culture is that they really don't care about their customers, only locking them into a worthless contract. This is corporate greed at its best folks. Everyone should DUMP HA and bombarded their "sales" lines with complaints. This was the worst bait and switch company ever. As a local Austin resident, I'm embarrassed they are an Austin company!

Just got the e-mail tonight about the service fee HomeAway starting charging last month! That is absolutely crazy and doesn't seem legal that you start charging a fee without proper notification. HomeAway says it's for marketing which is a lie to try to justify their greed. Even if. 0001% ends up going to marketing I think we need to say NO out of principle for the way HomeAway handled notifying their loyal homeowners and OUR guests! I recommend dealing directly with your guests even though now I loath paying the annual fee to HomeAway - I can't wait for another company to squash HomeAway! I had a guest request to book and would have paid the "greed" fee. I couldn't get a hold of them right away so I had to accept but I cancelled it right away once I spoke with the guest and the deposit AND the "greed" fee was refunded too. Hope this helps. Thanks to everyone for posting helpful information too!

Been using home away for 10 years and it was great until recently when everything changed. They made a lot of changes in their listing site, but the worst thing ever is they now add a service fee to renters. I pay for listing the property and without my permission or even notice are now adding about 10% to the cost by fleecing the renters. I have just lost one potential renter over this and I am furious. No one to speak to, no managers just the usual run around baloney. Good bye VRBO, home away and whatever else you call yourself. Plus you don't have the balls to respond to these complaints because they are just scams.

I am outragged as a homeowner that HomeAway is now charging our renters a service fee to maintain their website and support their 24/7 Customer Service. What customer service?
I waited 40 minutes on the phone to ask what this fee was for so how can HomeAway profess to provide such a service. I already pay $1200 a year for their service and now they are charging our renters for the privilege of calling them. This is another example of corporate greed. The poor renter already pays occupancy tax and state taxes in California.
There is no service that Home away provides that merits ths additional charge.
Anyone up for a class action lawsuit?

So as a homeowner who has used their site for the past 3 years, I came upon this service fee when I was sending someone a quote. To my surprise I saw a $59 service fee for a $550 rental. Obviously I called homeaway and had to wait 40min to talk to someone. I assume they were too busy fielding calls with other homeowners.

Now lets look at what they call a service fee which is supposed to help with 24/7 customer service and maintaining their website. A fee would be fine if it were a across the board fee such as $10, but when you charge 6 to 10% depending upon the rate with a max fee of $499 that is not a fee but a commission. Who in their right mind would agree to pay $499 to rent a house. This makes no sense. My auto renew kicked in February 5th, 10 days before the change so I will be arguing to have a refund and taken off the site.

Finally, assume each owner pays $350/year to use the site which many pay much more. With over 1 million houses that's at least 350 million in revenue. Somehow 350 million can not keep or maintain that site? This is nothing more than greed and I hope this comes back and bites them in the $#*!.

I guess Expedia has figured out how to recover their 3.9 billion they spent on Homeaway by charging this fee. I do like the lower fee for higher rental properties. My properties are at the lower end cost wise, so my customers get to pay 10% additional booking fee. Even the mob wouldn't be this greedy. I am making it a point to tell all my friends not to use Expedia and am hoping another company starts to compete. I see a few hundred homeowners ready to make the move on this site.

Since Expedia purchased Homeaway in December 2015, they have made changes that were not communicated to Homeowners until we discover the software no longer works as it has in the past. For example, the 10% service fee they have begun (Febr 15,2016) to charge our guests, in addition to the annual fee we as homeowners pay to use their match service is over the top! Homeaway is no longer providing the qualtiy software/service marketing they once did. I will be leaving them after my last current booking. If they plan to use homeowners to generate secondary revenue from guests as though we are their booking agents, they should provide a wage and benefits for all the additional administration time and expense these changes have landed on my desk. Homeaway - Farewell.

HomeAway used to be a great service but then they bought up the competition and started screwing it to the users on both ends - owners and renters. Turned the "service" they offer into nothing but a money making proposition for HomeAway by charging outrageous fees, now to renters in addition to owners, and controlling listings more and more to force owners to pay more for aspects of the service that used to be included or considered unnecessary. This is why we have anti-monopoly laws in this country!

Surprises like this kills our business, I have not had a rent increase in 4 years and need to have one in order to stay in business, now that home away is increasing fees in under "booking fees" of 5%, my rent increase can't be realized and I still have to pay yearly subscription plus 3% credit processing. Way to kill small business homeaway! Very dissapointed of the control and limits this has put on me and my customers. Flip key is looking better in my eyes. Booking fees, ok, but 5%? Excessive. I get that home away brings the customers who make it possible for me to stay in business, I get it, I appreciate it, I do. But this is WAY excessive to do to homeaways customers and mine. Shame on you homeaway!