I was attending Art Basel week in Miami Beach this past December. I was told by a friend that there was a great Bed & Breakfast in South Beach owned by a private investor. I looked up the rental on airbnb which I was told to do at https://www.airbnb.com/r.... The location was perfect and it would be the perfect location for me and my guests to stay (12/1/13 - 12/10/13). I was asked not to book the rental through airbnb from the owner and he would provide daily housekeeping for a total of $2750. I thought this was a great rate and considering the location it should have been perfect. I had to idea what was to happen upon our arrival.
Day 1
We arrived in Miami after a long flight and was informed that we could check-in at 9:00am. We started to try to reach the owner upon our arrival and after multiple phone calls and waiting for 30 minutes at the front door proceeded to take all of our luggage to the first event we were attending. We subsequently received a call mid-afternoon apologizing that he was asleep and offered to pick up our luggage for us. We were finally able to check in at about 7:00pm that night.
Day 2
One of my guests returned mid-day to find the "housekeeper" having lunch in the rental with the food that we purchased and my guest was informed that this was something the owner allowed him to do.
Day 3
At approximately 11:30pm there was a knock at the front door and one of my guests answered it and outlined to me that there was a young man with a book to return to the owner. I outlined to the visitor that we were renting the house and the owner was not here so the visitor left.
Day 4
I was notified that the owner had his real estate agent bringing by prospective buyers of the property. One time I would understand but this happened on 3 separate occasions that disrupted me and my guests. The owner made no apologies or concessions.
Day 7
One of my guests noticed some cash (approximately $100) was missing from her room but thought maybe she could have spent it during the trip.
Day 8
Upon returning during the afternoon I noticed the housekeeper arriving in the afternoon. He greeted us and proceeded to enter the house. I returned later that evening and another one of my guests outlined that a $100 bill was missing from inside his luggage. This along with the other missing cash began to raise concern. This plus the fact that the house had not been cleaned when the housekeeper supposedly was arriving to clean the house was a concern that I brought up to the owner. The owner was not at all empathetic or concerned but said he woudl look into it.
Upon returning to San Francisco both of my guests contacted me and outlined that there were checks missing from the middle of their check books and one of them had three checks stolen and an attempt to cash those checks for $4800 in Miami Beach was caught by the bank and reported to the Miami PD.
I immediately contacted the owner and outlined all of the issues and was met with a run around of stories and his complete lack of concern with our experience with his rental. He outlined that this "story" was meant to get the housekeeper fired which was completely outrageous. I tried for over two weeks to come up with a resolution for this experience and was finally dismissed by the owner without any resolution.
I have filed a trip adviser report as well as reported this property https://www.airbnb.com/r... to http://www.airbnb.com.
To date there is no resolution to this issue. read more