4/10 Poor
Paul F.
14 Apr 2021
Liked: Location
Disliked: Communication, listing accuracy
Construction site
Use caution at this property if you would like a quiet week at the beach, especially if you plan to read books, meditate and talk with one another in the house at a normal volume of speech. For us, working remotely and conducting online meetings was severely disrupted from 8am to 6pm most of the weekdays we were there. Construction was going on all through the week we stayed at this house. We were not informed of this prior to arriving and would not have gone had we known.
The construction involved ripping off siding, nail guns and hammering on the roof (and loud music playing). A worker even came up onto the back porch which should have been private. Three calls to the property manager were unhelpful. They promised to get back to us but never did. They claimed the construction was on the other unit of the duplex but in fact it was on both sides (with different crews). They stated there could not be construction noise “because there was no work order.” They declined our invitation to come to the house and see the work for themselves. The property managers buttressed their argument that we must not have a problem of loud construction work outside our windows saying they called the owner who told them that he knew nothing about it. We were tempted to tell the crews to leave because it seemed that no one was aware they were doing the work and it followed that they may not be paid.
After we returned I contacted Vrbo but they told me there was nothing they could do after the fact. We found the whole experience far less than satisfying. I suggest that anyone doing business with Carolina Retreats and/or Vrbo use caution and to document any issues carefully.
Specific to this property there were several other issues, the main one being the poor quality of the master bedroom bed that felt like a half filled water bed. In addition there were no instructions on how to use the internet. It turned out that the WiFi for this house is not password protected. I ended up using a Mobile Hotspot on my phone for Internet access. Finally, the place did not feel particularly clean and we washed the dishes by hand before using them. The kitchen supplies are marginally adequate and we are glad that we brought some of our own equipment.
