I have been a VRBO user for years, and this is my first negative review. The condo needs a deep cleaning and maintenance. When we first arrived at the condo, my toddler was crawling on the floor while we unpacked. After he crawled on a rug in the bedroom, his hands, feet, and legs were black with dirt, and he needed a bath. We cleaned the tub and shower before we would use them. At one point my kid wedged a book behind the couch, so we had to pull it out to retrieve it, and found it was very dirty behind furniture. The finish on the cabinets is peeling off. Some rooms look like they were painted in the dark. There is duct tape on the ceiling fan. There are big cracks in the hood they have covering the kitchen ceiling.
On day 2 of our stay, the power went out, only in our unit, not the rest of the building or road. I had been running the oven and the clothes dryer. When I called the owner, it was evening, so he did not answer and I left a message. When he called me back the next day, he treated me in a very condescending and sexist manner. He explained that we needed to access the main breaker, which is outside of the unit. Then he told me to put my husband on the phone so he could walk him through it. (The condo was rented in my name, the owner and I had spoken previously to coordinate check-in, and I had given no indication of being unable to open a closet and flip a switch.) I told him he could walk me through it. He asked if it was because my husband wasn’t awake yet, and said my husband could just call him back. I said no, he is awake, but I can do this. As he talked me through it, he lamented, “I don’t normally have to explain this to ladies,” while also saying that the power has never gone out like this. (The oven clock was blinking when we arrived.) He also complained that the power goes out because women come in and run the hair dryer, iron, and vacuum at the same time, and then they don’t understand why the power goes out. Finally I flipped the main breaker, and power came back on. Power went out twice again toward the end of our trip, and I fixed it again by flipping the breaker. Normally I would have texted the owner, but I just didn’t want to talk to him again.
We barely used the pool because it was closed for chemical use at some point every day when it was supposed to be open.