Paying for a VRBO rental

I always feel it is a leap of faith when I've paid for a VRBO or AirBnB rental, but have never had a problem. If I was asked to do a wire transfer, I would do it directly from my bank not through MoneyGram or Western Union though.

Given that you don't have to pay the 80% until 6 weeks before your rental you can still keep an eye on his reviews between now and then. With his current 5 stars ratings, I'd feel comfortable paying the deposit.

I just did a VRBO. It allowed me to pay by CC but when the owner called her said they only take a check. When you pay through VRBO they add a bunch of fees too, it increased my payment by a few hundred dollars.

He emailed me a rental agreement, which I was to sign and send back with a check. He first "refused" my rentall, which canceled the CC payment so I wouldn't get charged twice. And now my payment is back where I expected it to be.

This guy is in NJ where I am. I felt comfortable sending a check in the mail. I don't know about wiring funds out of country. I only shared to say all owners don't do exactly what is spelled out on the website. They do what works for them.

We've used VRBO/HomeAway a couple times now. Both owners accepted CC payments through VRBO's system. I don't think I'd rent from them without that ability. You can't dispute the charge on a check. You'd be hard pressed to get your money back if the rental isn't what you're seeing on the website. 

NBC ran a story a couple months back. Vacation rental scams are becoming common:


www.nbcnews.com/nightly-news/video/how-to-protect-yourself-against-online-vacation-rental-scams-652507715511

I would only rent a vacation property that accepts payment through the VRBO payment system. The extra fees are worth the peace of mind.

There is a difference between a check and a wire. As I understand it, once money is wired out (or at the point it is received by the other bank), it is GONE. Your bank can't retract the transfer. If you got wind that something was fishy, you could put a stop payment on a check or possibly even have the bank recover funds. I would do a cashier's check before I would do a wire in a case like this.

We haven't used VRBO since there has been a CC option I guess. But we've done 2-4 rentals where we sent a check directly to the property owner. Both contracts gave rental insurance for free through HomeAway. Which meant if we paid and the property wasn't as listed, 100% of our money would have been refunded.

We never had issues. But VRBO has majorly grown and obviously now there are more options. That said, I would expect convenience fees of at least 2-5% (if not more) due to CC fees and bookkeeping fees that would add to your end price.

We have a property listed on VRBO and we only accept payments through the VRBO system.

That being said, VRBO just instituted a new few imposed upon the renter based on the overall rental amount so the fee can be quite high. Some owners are attracting renters through VRBO and then doing the actual booking outside of the system to avoid that service fee for the renter. VRBO has caught onto this and beginning soon will be charging owners that book renters outside the system high service fee than those that book inside.

Hope that helps.

I just came across this article and remembered that someone had recently asked about wire transfers as a method of payment for VRBO. I hope everything is aboveboard and that you have a great vacation!

link


DETROIT - Travel rentals obtained through online websites are becoming more and more popular as an alternative to traditional hotels and motels.



Alexandra Berry of Birmingham said she has used one of the most popular sites, VRBO, or Vacation Rentals By Owner, many times over the past eight or nine years. In late 2015, she thought she had found the perfect rental for a Florida vacation during the Christmas season.


The house in Key West wasn't inexpensive, but it would hold four adults and four children and the holidays are a busy time.



"I mean, Christmas time in Florida, it's like, you're not going to be by yourself," Berry said with a laugh.



She said she found her dream rental on VRBO, received an email from the property manager through the site and made the arrangements. She believed everything was happening through VRBO and felt confident in her negotiations.



Berry was asked to pay the $4,500 via a bank transfer. She didn't consider that too unusual; she's done it before with smaller sums of money. This time, things took a disturbing turn. When she didn't receive a confirmation of her payment and further instructions about the property, she kept emailing the "property manager," but couldn't get a response. Then, she found a phone number for the property and reached a woman.



"She calls me back and she's like 'So, what exactly is your name?' So, I give her my name and she's, like, 'We don't have any information from you,'" Berry told Help Me Hank. "Apparently, the email address got hacked."



Berry said she was told the email address she used was very similar to the real property manager's address, but it was the wrong address. She contacted VRBO customer service and was offered $1,000 compensation. She didn't feel that was fair. Instead, Berry filed a lawsuit in Michigan, arguing "VRBO promotes fraudulent behavior through its online services by not offering the proper security to its customers."



"You put on there, yeah, we're a trusted and secure website, but how secure are you? When, you know, someone hacks your system?"



HomeAway, the parent company of VRBO, released a statement saying in part, "HomeAway has made significant investments in processes and technology to help detect, prevent and mitigate suspicious activities."

We lost $1000 doing this. Found the house on VRBO, got the dates scheduled, wired the payment to get a discount blah blah blah. ABout 2 weeks before our trip the REAL owner emailed to ask us if we wanted another date since the house was booked the week we wanted it…wait, what? 
Anyway, we got duped big time. BIG time. The real owner's email via VRBO had been hacked, and we fell for it hook line and sinker. We had to cancel that whole vacation. 

PLEASE be extremely cautious about wiring money. I will never ever do it again. Use a credit card and do it through VRBO so you have some measure of protection. We had none.  By the way, VRBO did exactly shit to help us out. We'd also bought the insurance for protection in case something came up…but guess what? They never got the money of course, so there was no insurance to fall back on.

These scams are making me sick. We are looking for a car for DD - the first one I saw that i was interested in to buy for her turned out to be a scam. Looked legit at first but then it all took a weird turn and I caught on. Really pisses me off.

no. no. no. no..... NO.... don't do it.