Vrbo Reviews 119,004

Their website was built by a second grader and their agents have a first grade education. As owner of a property listed on VRBO for 15 years, everytime I call they don't recognize me. They finally told me it's because they had one letter in my first name misspelled. This frustrating issue where they would not speak to me because the had misspelled my first name is the least of the issues they have.

I booked a house in a city for over 2 weeks because my son had major surgery in that city, and we needed a place for him to stay during the surgery and recovery period that was close to his surgeon. I chose a property that advertised very specific things that we needed: private parking, full private access to a washer and dryer, a full kitchen with all items for cooking meals, a usable bath tub (as in not just a shower, but a tub for filling and bathing) and renting the full house, with no tenants or other parts of the home rented to others. I chose this property because we needed privacy and quiet for my son’s post-surgery recovery.

When we arrived, the property was far from ideal. We initially had no access to the washer and dryer, as it was in the basement, which we were told not to access under any circumstances, and which was behind a deadbolted door for which we had no key. We also arrived to find that there is a downstairs tenant. This was just the beginning of the nightmare.

The owner responded to my concerns by telling me we could use the washer and dryer, but only during restricted hours, and that it is shared with the tenant. We still didn’t have the key, and he finally told us where this was 3 days after we arrived.

I was extremely uncomfortable having to go down into someone else’s space to access the machines, and uncomfortable leaving my belongings where someone else has access to them, but we have no other choice. I have tried 3 times so far to use the machines and they have been occupied all 3 times.

The downstairs tenant is extremely loud. We can hear their conversations and laughing way into the night. When I expressed this to the owner, he told me “they will go to work, no worries.” Except the tenant (or maybe multiple people?) has been here 100% of the time, and we are on day 4 of being here.

The kitchen is a whole other nightmare. There are 3 pots/pans, all unusable. The dishwasher was full of dishes that had been washed but left there, as a pan in there was rusted and dripped rusty water everywhere when I emptied the dishwasher. There are zero cooking utensils. I had to purchase a set of pots and pans and kitchen implements to use while here, which cost me $65.

The bath tub won’t hold water- the drain stopper is not functional. So, I had to purchase a drain cover to make that usable.

Our second night here, I plugged in a space heater that was provided in one of the bedrooms, and it blew a breaker. Every overhead light in the house went out, as well as all power in the bathroom, and the microwave in the kitchen. Apparently these are all on one single circuit, which is illegal and hazardous. Of course the circuit breaker box was in the locked basement. I notified the owner, and it took multiple messages and a phone call and more than an hour to get this resolved.

And there are several other issues. The dishwasher is not properly attached to the counter and tips out when you open it fully and try to load it. The “game room” advertised is a shed in the backyard that the owner set up for the ad photo and then threw a bunch of junk into and shut, so it is certainly not a “game room.” The desk light in one room falls over when you try to use it, because it is in disrepair.

I reported all of the above to Vrbo within the first 24 hours of being here. They contacted the owner, and he denied it all, so Vrbo closed my case. I reopened it, they re-closed it. I reopened it and they sent me an email asking for all of the details again, but they sent it on the day of my son’s surgery, and I didn’t see it until the next day, when they sent me another email telling me I didn’t respond quickly enough, so they were closing my case again.

The owner is refusing to return any of my money at all. Vrbo says they can’t do anything. This is beyond unacceptable.

I had used Vrbo before without any issue but my confidence proved to be misplaced. I was given a healthy chunk of 'One Cash' last year which I thought I would put towards a booking this year - all good as it made a big difference financially. I booked the time off, prepared for the holiday etc. And then I got an email saying that the client had sold the property so I was going to get a refund. A bit annoying as prices have gone up as we get nearer to the date, but not the fault on anyone really. I found a slightly more expensive place for the same dates, thought I'd just pay the little bit extra. But oh, it seems Vrbo do not refund the Vrbo cash. Now Vrbo cash isn't unicorn tears - I'm pretty sure allowing me to reapply it to a new booking would be straightforward. But no, this isn't allowed so I suddenly find myself with a much bigger bill. The lesson is do not use Vrbo, ignore any cash incentives and observe the Trustpilot scores.

It is not possible for me to give a −10 review.Or I would definitely have done. You\nGuys are ridiculously unprofessional and ineffective , and that's no overstatement. I rented a home or thought.I did in New Orleans for a birthday celebration.For a Vietnam, war, vegan and basically received the home pass code and the address from the host.But we could not get in. We contacted VRBO it was hard enough to get through.And then we could not understand your representatives and i'm a black woman who is not racist but where they even in the united states , because they don't spend english well , not good for customer service , i'm sure I don't have to tell you. It was a rough neighborhood.We should not have been stuck out there at night.With all of the unsavory things going on around us , we ended up having to book ourselves into his two star hotel , which was all that was left for the. Fortunately, without your help, we were able to have a great event at Drury y plaza. If I could send you to hell , I would

Avoid booking through VRBO. The listings do not match the photos, are misleading and false advertising. There is no quality control even after issues are raised, reported and documented. It is irresponsible to continue to allow units to be rented that are clearly hazardous to customers. The customer service is ineffective and the reps are not empowered to provide solutions. You will receive different responses with no consistency and poor communication with no resolution. Completely disappointed in a very horrible experience with VRBO.

Absolutely hate the new commercial with the daughter in the hot tub with the wife and the dad asked if he could join in and relax. The daughters comment is terrible. Hate it!!

Absolutely deplorable. I booked reservation #HA-L8K4YW for a rental which was clearly listed as pet-friendly. The owner reached out via message stating the area AROUND the rental was pet-friendly, but that my small dog would need to stay in a crate outside or in my car since my pet was not allowed INSIDE the rental. I am not leaving my fur child in 30° weather outside, so I asked him to not proceed with the booking. The next morning, he booked it anyway, and I spent an inordinate amount of time on the phone with VRBO customer service who could do nothing to get my money refunded, or remove the 'pet-friendly' tag from the listing. Absolutely disgusted and will never use this app again.

I booked a house to rent and homeowner cancelled it so vrbo said they would cancel and give refund. Found out never cancelled and no refund so I had 2 reservations now and put out $3,000 in credit card charges. Now I have interest to pay

No response from Vrbo. Clearly the customer means nothing to this organisation. Still waiting for the Supervisor from the Resolution Team to respond to an outstanding issue, this behaviour is unacceptable!

I was trying to rent a furnished house near Salem, OR for several months.

My experience:
1. Airbnb: If you do a little internet homework you will find that Airbnb has many problems and has a poor reputation. On Google use the AI mode and enter "Airbnb problems". When we investigated an Airbnb rental, the owner of the property called us and said to not use Airbnb and do a deal directly with them. They admitted this was unethical.

2. VRBO and many property management firms: The price quoted on the web is not very related to the price that is actually quoted to the potential renter. Typical hidden costs are an application fee, taxes, renters insurance, service fee, property management fee, high cleaning fee applied periodically, and a high non refundable pet fee. This list does not exhaust the innovative hidden fees that these companies have come up with. The quoted prices will amaze you.

3. Zillow and dealing directly with the owner: Some references by Zillow are directly to the owner, and doing a internet rental search can also result in dealing with the owner. In my experience this is the best way to go. Typically there are not the hidden fees, and many property management firms have to get everything approved by management (delaying the whole process), plus many of the property management employees have poor English and don't understand the whole rental process. I found that dealing with the owners, or the owner's small property management firm, worked for me, they are usually straight talking and get to the point rapidly.

I found what I wanted by dealing directly with the owner.

They pretend to be Air BnB but they are nothing like. They split payments between them and the hosts, some fail, its painful trying to get this stuff resolved via thier customer service, no one seems to know what to do. Thier app is APALLING, constantly sends you round in loops, just dont use them

Customer service is poor and they scam you by quoting one price and charging another and allowing hosts to dictate / mandate partial payments (we didn’t want to do this - we wanted to pay all up front), but then got charged another additional fee for a partial payment. We also had a substantial rewards credit that we tried use for our next booking and they’ve made it pretty much impossible to redeem. When we called to try to have it applied to our next booking, we were told that it couldn’t be done and to try again next time. Airbnb is far superior and we’ve never had issues with them, so it looks like we will only book through Airbnb in the future.

Absolutely appalling customer service. I had to telephone on numerous occasions as the owner of a property I was staying in called the police as they hadn’t been paid. After many messages throughout my holiday I was assured I would receive compensation but I have sent numerous emails and no reply. DO NOT BOOK ANY HOLIDAYS THROUGH THIS CORRUPT COMPANY

Our last experience had convinced me to never use VRBO again. Customer service is absolutely worthless. They just run you around in circles and never actually do anything to help with your issues. I was told three different times that I was being transferred to the team that would relocate us to a different property and each time the person I was transferred to would just tell me there was nothing they could do. The trip insurance is absolutely useless. Never again!

Booking cancelled as host has sold the property. However, at the time of booking host had property on the market but not mentioned in listing. This is a meterial fact which should have been included. Vrbo customer service do not want to know and will not offer any credit towards increased cost of new rental as limited choice remains that meets requirements and specification of original booking.

I booked months in advance, paid fully in three installments, confirmed my virtual check in and spoke with a "Leavetown" customer service agent the week before, made plans with three family members to travel to 1039 Virginia Avenue in Cape May, NJ, and had the property owners cancel without explanation less than a week before our planned vacation. Furious. Will never use VRBO again.

My experience is far too long to even adequately describe. I booked a VRBO for my daughter's soccer tournament. That host had to cancer listing weather issues as the reason. I mean, it was sunny and warm the whole time but things happen, no big deal. I booked a subsequent VRBO to take the place of the one that was cancelled. Approximately 5 minutes after I received my confirmation for the property rental (and paid), I received a call from an unknown number. The voicemail stated that it was the property host. Her message was "I don't know how you rented my house. It is not available. I told VRBO my dates and that it has a one month minimum for rental". Odd right? Anyway, as weird as that was, getting a call from the owner while I'm literally looking at my confirmation from VRBO and they never communicated anything at all about the place being cancelled. I contacted VRBO. After an approximately 1.5 hour wait on hold "to speak to a supervisor", they did not even know that the booking had been cancelled. So at this point, I have no reservation for the soccer tournament and they STILL HAVE ALL OF MY MONEY. The process of being refunded ultimately took almost five hours. Multiple times I waited over an hour "for a supervisor". Zero of those times where they helpful. They kept my money for well over a week for reservations I had not even received. After five hours of dealing with them because they had over 1K of my money, a week later I finally got refunded. The last of probably 5 "supervisors" that I spoke to offered a $100 VRBO care payment to me via Venmo for my trouble. That's hilarious given I've spent over five hours dealing with them, due to absolutely no fault of my own. Now for the best part. THEY NEVER EVEN SENT THE $100. I am so exacerbated by the experience I don't even care anymore. I'm cancelling my account years of booking through VRBO for all sorts of occasions. I gave 1 star in my review because negative 5 was not an option. They are honestly an enormous joke. The fact that they even mention "customer service" is borderline criminal. I'm not a complainer and I was fine with the first cancellation because it came via email from VRBO and was official. The rest is joke. They are a joke. All of the bad reviews are entirely valid.

I'm a host and experience constant unanswered and uncorrected issues. . The only time I received a call from a helpful individual was when I deactivated my listing.

While I was financially compensated for a host absolutely ghosting me, I had to sit on hold for an hour after I was advised to call at a specific time. This host had done the exact same thing to a guest the month before, but VRBO didn’t pull their listing. The quality of properties at the price they are charging, I’ll start going back to hotels… it ridiculous to gamble on vacations…

VRBO allowed users to create booking on properties that were already booked and then made it extremely hard to get full refunds. They fought me, and the property owner at every step of the way. Their customer service wait time was in the 2+ range in English so I decided to speak to the Spanish line. Mostly incompetent people who could not care about the owners that sustain the company that pays their salaries. Awful customer service, awful policies and I "I got your money so I do not care" attitude from pretty much everyone I spoke to at VRBO.

Stop giving your dollars to companies like this.