Let me preface this by saying the reason for this trip: Both my sister and her family and my family flew to Vail for the funeral of our brother. We both rented houses for our families. Call it the Tale of Two Rentals.
I want to be clear; as reflected in the individual ratings, the issue was not with the house. It was comfortably furnished, spacious, and in a convenient location.
The issue was with the owner(s) We have stayed at many vacation rentals on VRBO and never had an occasion to negatively review any of them.
In the past, we have experienced welcoming, accommodating, gracious and prompt communications from owners.
I requested an early check-in since our flight arrived at 11:00 a.m. This was important since my husband has celiac disease and cannot eat out. It also requires us to shop for groceries and have a place to store and prepare the food. As it was getting very close to the arrival day, I sent a message asking when we would hear about the early check in, I was eventually told we would not be able to check in early, but we would be contacted when the cleaners were done. The guaranteed check in is 4:00 p.m. We received a text at 4:28 p.m. saying the previous guests made a mess of the place and the cleaners were still trying to get it clean for us. No apologies, no effort to compensate for the inconvenience, nothing to alleviate the concern for our safety, just a nonchalant response. This doesn't seem to fit the business model on VRBO.