Spotahome

I had a terrible experience with SpotaHome. They approved and charged my account before reviewing or requesting any necessary documentation. Only after debiting the money did they ask for documents, which were then not approved — even though I complied and submitted everything promptly. Later, they informed me that the only way to proceed would be by paying the full amount upfront, which I did not agree with. After many follow-ups and delays, I finally received an email saying the booking had been canceled — but with no refund of the service fee. Let me be clear:
🔹 I did not cancel the booking.
🔹 The landlord declined my application.
🔹 I was never obligated to choose another apartment on the platform.
🔹 The cancellation was not my choice, so I should not be penalized. SpotaHome failed to provide the minimum level of protection and reliability that any housing platform should offer. Instead of support, I only experienced stress, unanswered messages, and unreasonable delays. Their service caused me to lose time, money, and the chance to secure alternative housing. I demand a full refund of the platform fee. It is completely unacceptable to keep this fee under these circumstances. I will continue to share this experience on every consumer platform available until this is resolved properly.

The situation is as follows: in March, I applied for an apartment in Dublin when I was looking at a house on spotahome platform, and the moving out time was not adjusted, so it was in the same month. Then I filled in my credit card information and applied normally, and the fee was automatically deducted when the landlord confirmed according to the description on his interface, the rent was 1,950 plus the agency fee of 639 euros. And then I tried to reschedule, and this $#*! platform wouldn't let me submit, and then I wanted to cancel and reschedule. As a result, on the cancellation page, he said that he would cancel the rent two months in advance to give a full refund, but the agency fee is not refundable!? His platform does not even provide the service of changing the time of residence, charging an intermediary fee of more than 600 euros is to give you the landlord information so that you can contact yourself, and the application page never mentions how much the intermediary fee is, deliberately counting it together with the rent in the remarks part of the line of sight, and he will never mention the reservation fee is not refundable, you read it right! He says the reservation fee is non-refundable and you're told it after the application is successful. It's a bully clause. This broken platform belongs to the money spent on Google, and then hard to earn user money, but gives you no security or even false comfort. Continue to avoid lightning, spotahome and the landlord's City Break Apartments are very unprofessional and perfunctory. I have been sending emails every day since March 4th, but they refused to solve my problems and kicked the ball back and forth. The landlord said to change the time to find the platform, and the platform asked me to apply from the website. Your web page can apply, the system does not do $#*!. Then there is a big speechless thing, the platform can book time is 10 months to New Year, the landlord held a week to tell me that our policy is up to 6 months, I said that it will be changed

Thieves for both landlords and tenants. As a landlord, I chose the Plus Plan to have tenants with reduced risks (deposit, insurance, etc etc).
However, as a landlord, if they cannot themselves do the due diligence necessary for Plus Plan, they propose you to go ahead with the booking but taking all the risks yourself (Standard Plan), and if you refuse, they don't give you anything for the inconvenience of losing the booking you accepted (Plus Plan).
On the other side, as a tenant, they still charge you if you didn't cancel within the given time or if you don't give all the information for the due diligence.
So, they keep the money of both landlords and tenants.

I recommend to avoid Spotahome; they do not protect tenants and use unfair practices. The rating on Trustpilot is manipulated to remain steady at 3.9 (great), because negative (genuine) reviews are counterbalanced, using an algorithm or AI, by a number of fake or bought positive reviews.
Bookings are based only on pictures and videos, which often misrepresent the state of the property, there is no preliminary contact with the landlord. There is no way to read reviews about the landlords, because there isn't any feedback system, which is very important on platforms like Airbnb and Booking, and listings from unscrupulous or fraudulent landlords remain online.
Once the booking is confirmed, the commission and the first month's rent are immediately charged, with no possibility of a refund, even when the contract contains illegitimate clauses.
In my case, the apartment in Brussels was different from how it appeared online. The landlord included illegitimate clauses, such as requiring the deposit to be paid into his personal bank account (which is illegal in Belgium, although I was not aware). After the contract ended, he did not return my deposit for a full two months, continually postponing it.
Spotahome's customer support simply sent a request to the owner and then just disappeared.
In the end, I sent a formal notice threatening legal action and reporting the issue to the tax authorities. He finally returned my money, but without any support of Spotahome, which continues to keep his listings online, potentially deceiving other tenants.

I rented a room in Warsaw for my son through Spotahome, and the experience has been extremely disappointing. After the checkout, the landlord refused to return the security deposit, and despite repeated attempts to resolve the issue, Spotahome has failed to take meaningful action.
Their responses have been generic, repetitive, and unhelpful, with no clear resolution or accountability. Even though the landlord still lists multiple properties on their platform, Spotahome has not suspended their listings or enforced any consequences.
This shows a lack of responsibility in ensuring fair practices among their landlords. Their platform feels unsafe for tenants, and I would not recommend it to anyone. My advice: DO NOT USE their services.

Hello, this might be the worst customer support that anyone could deal with. They take days to answer your emails and messages on whatsapp. I have delayed my flight twice because of how unreliable this company is. They promised me a credit of their service fee so I can make another reservation, and they sent an official email stating that, but after one week of endless attempts and sending 30+ emails, they do not give you any answer. My advice to everyone is to try avoiding renting with Spotahome as they take ages to reply, and their reply is never effective, rather robotic and unnecessary.

I made the mistake of booking an apartment with this company. After whipping the 1st month rent and service charge out of my bank immediately they failed to confirm the booking. Relentless emails and spam texts but zero response when I was trying to find out what's happening. After several weeks I cancelled the booking and had to raise a claim with my bank (Nationwide) for fraud as they refused to refund the 'service charge' for the non-existent service. It wasn't hard to prove fraud and the bank agreed and upheld my claim refunding me in full.

I was almost mugged upon checking in. Reported the incident within 24 hours but told that there's nothing they can do! Stay away from this company!

This is the worst housing agency. They lure you into contracts with lies and take no responsibility when you complain. Expensive agency fees are of no help. Their only goal is to scam and take money from international students. There are many better options like Uniplaces (although their agency fees are high too), HousingAnywhere, Aluna.it, so never use this agency. Many others have suffered like me, and they haven't even received replies to their emails. I'm stuck in the worst house for the worst six months. I'll say it again, this place is the worst, so look elsewhere.

Booked a stay for 2 months in a supposedly very nice and clean shared apartment, move in date was supposed to be on the 1. No, 1 week before arrival they said 2. Bc they had to clean, had to book a night in a hotel because already booked my ticket. Apartment was super dirty, bathroom full of mold, kitchen a biohazard with a fly-infestation. They told that the landlord will take care if it, but they didn't. They only thing they did was removing the moldy shower curtains.
Anyways, was supposed to get the deposit back end of October, after several reminders and waiting for over two months, nothing. Only after hiring a lawyer they finally transferred the money. So if don't have any legal back-up don't even bother!

I feel like I got scammed. I booked a listing and trusted the pricing overview and payment summary. The spotahome fee is barely visible as well and not shown clearly. It is also quite expensive, at about 30% of the rent price. Then all of a sudden I have to pay an additional 480€ because it was listed at the near bottom of the page in grey characters under landlord policies. The fee was nowhere else but to be seen there. I know I should have looked more carefully but honestly it was all quite misleading and intransparent for me.

My Spotahome experience starts smoothly, two months before a work trip. After supposedly everything is checked and approved, payments made and booking agreed, the Landlord (supposedly approved by Spotahome) ghosts me. After several attempts, he reaches back saying that he is a bit unsure about how the service works through Spotahome - that this was his first time doing it (note: the listing shows he had rented it out 6 times before. This was a lie). After that, and one day before my departure, he cancels. Leaving me basically homeless in one of the hardest cities to find housing.
Spotahome response (despite all the "warranties" in their website) was to send me a listing of housing options (that I had find myself before) that are both more expensive and worst located than the one I've booked.
After this, and having to find housing by my own while staying in a cheap hostel that I had to pay myself (despite the fact that they are supposed to cover it by their own "Warranty"), they took forever and to refund where I had to cover the costs of refund and banking fees. It took sending them an email EVERY DAY for them to do it though, because they just kept "making an error in the process". Every time I contacted them, they would take several days to respond. Them keeping my money made difficult to pay for the alternative options I had found.
Not only this wouldn't have happened with a proper check of the landlord and the property; but the fact that the listing lied about the landlord's experience is just outrageous.

Not only they deceive people,but also do not get back the deposit. I've paid for the whole month and lived there less than month, the landlord decided to keep deposit for the period in which I didn't live. The landlord doesn't answer the calls and emails, and lied the agency that I lived the second part of the month. Even though he knew in advance about my staying and that I have to check out much earlier then I was supposed to.
And spotahome agency also knew that I checked in later because of them(they knew my day of arrival and nobody answer for my call) and checked out earlier.

After booking a cohab space with them in Brussels, and then realising that there were 40% extra charges on top of the list price, and exclsuions that one can asusme are normal for cohab space (like a TV), I asked (less than 24 hours later) for a refund and to cancel the booking. They refused, saying the cancellation is less than 30 days before taking up the room (since I booked 14 days before the date, it is physically impossoble for me to cancel in more than 30 days notice). They refused to refund my substantial deposit. And I have had to take it to the Belgian consumer protection agency. They show no interest in any need for an aimcable or fair resolution. Greedy, unfair, and ruthless company.

BEWARE
You are about to enter an eternal black hole of spam. There is no way out. No magical button to make it stop (they do not work). Horrendous customer service.
Enter at your own risk, you have been warned.

I would not recommend this site at all. I booked a room by accident (i thought it would Show me payment Information, but instead it confirmed and completed the booking. I cancelled 2 Minutes after I realized my error, but they already charged my credit card 900€ for rent and service. I cancelled, but only got 300€ back because of „service fees". The customer service doesn't give a $#*! about the people and is really greedy, I lost 600€ because of 2 minutes reservation. Don't use this site! Absolutely horrible people ripping off students and young people. I wonder how they sleep at night, rotten hearts.

I stayed in their apartment and it was left it a good condition. However, now they sent me an email claiming that something was damaged or even stolen, which is totally untrue. For example, the host said we stole a microwave (literally what the hell, why on Earth would we need it if we didn't even use it). I have no clue how they came up with such nonsense and now they refuse to give me the deposit back. Stay away from this scam! This fraud must be punished

Really rude and felt gaslighted when I approached them with problems I was having with my landlord. They take 3 business days to reply to complaints - that's their way to shake off the blame and hope you run out of energy. Each response is vague, unhelpful, and written to kick the can down the roead.

Avoid absolutely Spotahome
It is Spotahome, not you, who confirm your reservation request. Spotahome charges your credit card immediately for each request.
Spotahome charged me for two rentals in the same city for the same period when I had only wanted to know if one of the apartments was available. When I asked for a refund for the rental I would not be using, they refused and told me that it was their usual policy, most likely to increase their profit. I strongly advise against dealing with Spotahome to avoid getting ripped off.