I think a big thing the owner needs to realize is that rental properties are becoming more and more undesirable compared to hotels. This house is a good example why. It lacked many features that a standard hotel will have, e.g. hot running water, clean sheets, comfortable climate temperature, and no controlling/ threatening notes throughout the place. My boyfriend and I stayed here for NYE. Check in was quick and easy. However, the temperature was 50 degrees when we walked in and it was hard to locate the thermostat. We couldn’t take our coats off for a solid couple of hours because it was so cold. The rules are to have the thermostat at 50 after leaving, but we felt arriving upon a cold house was an unwelcome start. No soap in any of the bathrooms except one used bar of soap with pubes on it. There is a nice bathtub on the upstairs level that we were excited to take a nice relaxing bath in. However, upon filling up the bathtub not even 1/4 of the way full, it was ice cold. So we boiled our own water in the kitchen to try to heat up the bathtub. I cannot imagine how many cold showers guests would take with more than 2 people in the house..
the controlling notes throughout the house indicated to us that the owner doesn’t want to make upgrades, rather have the people abide by the subpar standards of the house. The basement has a note on the window threatening to charge guests if they were to open the window that’s apparently broken. There are notes saying showers can only last five minutes… (obviously avoiding the weird water heater situation and putting the blame on the renter) And the owner says there is a $500 fee if we lose the house key. Does she not have a copy of the key? Why would it be so expensive if we lose a metal key? Because of the frugality of the owner, it appears that she’s taking advantage of anything you possibly do that might cost her a couple bucks extra for your stay. I am allergic to dogs, and I could not stop sneezing and could barely breathe all night. And I broke out in hives because of the bedsheets. Leaving me with the impression that they were not properly cleaned.
The advice I would give is to spend a little bit of money fixing the problems throughout the house, and don’t charge renters for naturally using broken features throughout the house. Notes are not the solution, fixing the amenities are.
