Deposit Protection is a scam, they stopped responding after email saying "I am escalating your case to the Trust and Safety Department".

I need to tell you a sad story that just happened to me, and that is making my dream to study masters at Solvay Brussels School harder. A couple of weeks ago I started looking for rooms in Brussels, and after many attempts, I was able to book one at Spotahome/Erasmus wesbite, which I thought would be safe because Spotahome is a partner to Erasmus, but to my unpleasant surprise, the landlord started to ask for more money than was previously advertised on the website and in the confirmation email sent by Spotahome, this happened on a private chatroom "RoomMate", so I started a long conversation with Spotahome help desk through email, trying to get some reparation because I have paid already (website policy). At this point I was losing apartments, my money was stuck with them, and the landlord was saying that if I do not have the money to pay his insane amount per month I should just cancel. It was not the best option for me, because I had a lot of trouble getting one reservation accepted and I already lost time, which means opportunities, but on top of that, Spotahome said today that they will not give back the fee that I have paid them for this cancelation (150 eur). read more

I have had €1500 stolen from me by Spotahome without my permission. They do not reply for days on end, or ever answer the phone to call. A good customer interface but the customer service is beyond awful, the worst I have experienced of any company. Particularly I need to point out Alessio and Giorgia, who have been completely heartless and insulting towards me during this process, not once did anybody pick up the phone to call me and these are the people who were supposedly 'managing' my situation. They do not reply for days on end and when they do they do not answer any of your questions. I am disgusted that this is allowed to happen and have issued a chargeback with my card provider so hopefully justice will prevail. Spotahome will always take the side of the landlord no matter what and do not care about their customers. Avoid at all costs. If I could give zero star I would. (Explanation of situation below) Made a booking through Spotahome and couldn't get in touch with the landlord even though the letting was starting in 10 days. Sent over 50 emails and calls to the landlord and after 5 days asked her if they could cancel the booking so I wouldn't lose my deposit of €1500 paid to Spotahome as it was outside of their 30 day window. The landlord agreed in the only message I received which I informed Spotahome of. At not one point did I EVER give Spotahome permission to cancel my booking if I was not going to receive the refund amount and specifically said not to do this. However, on the day of the booking after sending email after email to Spotahome trying to resolve the situation as the landlord still wasn't getting in touch with me I was automatically infomed that my booking had been cancelled and I wouldn't be receiving a refund. It seems they chose to call the landlord and not even bother to speak to me before doing this. I have asked multiple times to reverse this however, I still haven't received anything back 24 hours later. Just a disgraceful way to treat customers read more

I booked an apartment in Brussels via Spotahome.com and after having paid, I found out that: 1) Landlord demanded 250 euros extra deposit, 2) Adress cannot be registered even though the listing said "possibility of domiciliation: yes", 3) Landlord requested registration fee 4) Apartment is not pet-friendly Landlord's rental contract included unfriendly clauses such as 1) Tenant is responsible for repairing windows whatever broke them 2) Tenant is responsible for any damages due to a theft or an attempt of theft 3) Tenant is responsible for vandalism by a third party 4) Tenant can be evicted in one week 5) Tenant will pay a six-month penalty for cancelling the contract (a fixed term contract for the duration of three months) 6) No compensation even if the apartment is under repair work for the whole duration of the lease 7) Landlord has the right to evict any visitors - so your mom cannot visit you. etc. In short, the contract was unacceptable. Landlord was unwilling to make any changes to his policies. None of the policies were listed on Spotahome.com and Spotahome was unable / unwilling to solve the issue - they simply said they are not party to the contract and ignored the fact that they had given misleading and inadequate information on their platform. They were also unwilling to refund anything. So in the end, I did not get an apartment and lost 2202 euros. Spotahome's business model allows situations like this to occur as it combines lack of transparency on landlord policies with strict cancellation rules. read more

I got scammed by Spotahome! Stay away from this site. They will tell you to request to book more than 1 apartment to increase your chances and they will automatically cancel once one is accepted. Well they don't. They charged me for 2 apartments booked for the same dates in the same city. When trying to contact them to resolve the issue NO RESPONSE! It is impossible to cancel and they provide no help. The owners are now mad at me because they were also charged and no response on their end either. read more

Had the worst experience with Spot a Home. They don't care a single bit to tenants, and they don't even try to hide it. At the end of my 1 month stay at the rented property, I got the confirmation from the landlord at the day of check out, that everything was fine with the apartment. After one month of the check out (time limit enforced by Spanish law "artículo 36.4 de La Ley de Arrendamientos" to any landlord return deposit to tenant if there was no damage cause to the apartment), I was informed by the landlord that she would not return my deposit, giving me NO explanation why she would do such thing. I contacted Spot a Home for help and guidance on the issue, and the answer I got from them was "I can assure you this case has been reported, but no further actions can be taken from Spot a Home in this case. Your case is closed". Incredibly unsafe platform, making absolutely zero effort to help the tenant. I now have to open a law case in court to get my money back. It is a very disappointing, careless and unprofessional action they took, specially for knowing that Spot a Home has their main biggest propaganda as "HOW SAFE and SECURE you can feel using their platform, and how great their CUSTOMER SUPPORT is to help you with anything". I would never recommend it to someone, and, also clearly, will never use it again. read more

If I could give 0 stars I would!! I was ready to study abroad in Spain on 9/1 and had booked my apartment in May. I went to Spain a few days before class began when my roommate and I found out that spotahome had double-booked us!!! We contacted spotahome numerous times and numerous ways, even contacting the landlord of the place we thought we had. Now we are currently stranded in Spain with no place to stay! Spotahome's complete lack of customer service and attention to detail is completely unacceptable! Use a different agency! Do better Spotaho(m)e!!!!! read more

the only pro: sometimes you get lucky. otherwise this service is a piece of . be very, very, very careful about taking screenshots of all the contracts and pricing structure as it will completely change once things are booked. their commission structure changes, and the customer service help is a bot. these people fucking SUCK! read more

Awful customer service. I have been 45min of call with just the waiting music on, and no one picked up the phone. I have been 3 weeks trying to get something fixed, I dont understand how they take so long, do they only have 2 workers? read more

Since this review requires at least 1 star, here goes the 1 star. Please, please, please, please, please, please, X100000000, avoid Spotahome. I booked a room because I was in the States and was deceived by the "checked" and the pictures of the room. The apartment I was given was literally horrendous. The entryway stunk when I entered the building--like something had died there. The tiles were broken. The promised elevator was not visible until after walking three flights to the first floor--in the dark. The elevator was dusty and looked like a death trap. Spotahome had the audacity to tell me that this horrible apartment was not an issue and therefore not refundable. Honestly, book with them at your own risk. read more

Terrible service. I arrived at my place and it was ridiculously dirty. Other peoples stuff was still in the room and the bathroom was unusable because it was so gross. The landlord was rude and yelling at me on the phone when my key didn't work for the first door. Then I get to my room, and there was not the promised lock on the door-- I couldn't leave my stuff there! The ceiling was cracked, and overall, it was terrible. I didn't even spend a night there and I contacted spotahome immediately. They took MONTHS to respond just to tell me a room being a little dirty is nothing to get a refund for. AVOID this crappy company that takes advantage of students. read more

Such a bad experience Dear Sirs, unfortunately, my experience has been totally negative. It looks like I am not clever enough to have understood the apartment you proposed was so far away from the expected destination, not clever enough to understand you information. I asked for support and Mr Alessio from the assistance proposed me to keep the booked apartment for one month, while Spotahome would have supported me in finding another, more fitting, location. He also assured me my booking (for which I had already paid the fee and one month of rent) would be mantained. The day after I received and email telling me that your company is sorry because I canceled my booking. I have never canceled my booking. I have never clicked on the CANCEL option. Spotahome did it on their own initiative and without my consent. Plus, Mr Alessio, of Spotahome assistance, two days before made me a proposal and assured me that my booking would be maintained. Since Spotahome acted on their initiative (I confirm I did not cancel my booking) and without my consent, your cancelation policy do not apply. I have emails to prove it. I kindly ask Spotahome to refund me the fee and all the money that I anticipated. The way Spotahome company has behaved is causing me personal troubles, Sirs. I hope Spotahome will put attention on this matter, honestly understand what happened and provide me with the proper support. Thanks. Regards. read more

Do not EVER use Spotahome unless you want your money stolen. I will post my experience on any site that will have it until SpotAHome is shut down for good. I don't even know where to begin with how unprofessional and dishonest this company is. First of all, they are incredibly shady with payments before you even get in touch with a landlord. If you apply for a house just to see more info about it and the landlord accepts, you are automatically charged. No time to look over details, no time to think about it, and no refund possible. But fine, I found a place through them. The first issue I ran into was they tried to charge me first month's rent twice. The landlord demanded I send it to him, but Spotahome was also charging me the same amount upon move-in. It took weeks for them to tell the landlord not to charge me because they get all rental payments (which is weird considering he supposedly has listed on their website for years and has multiple positive reviews (which you can't actually read or verify)). Then, when the landlord starting making up lies and trying to charge me for problems that already existed at his property, Spotahome said too bad, we aren't responsible for the landlord's behavior. Which is absolutely insane considering they list his properties on their website and make money off of him, but if he does anything unprofessional or illegal, they're not responsible. Fine. Then, someone broke into the flat where I was living and I wanted to move out early. But, due to Spotahome's policy, I would've had to pay an additional 30 days of rent so I had to stay there. At the end of the day, I was looking at all of the rental payments they had taken from my account and realized they had overcharged me almost $2000 in rent. I had to point that out to them, and I am still currently fighting to get my money back. I have spent hours and hours trying to resolve this and they simply do not care. They will rob you blind. Look literally anywhere else for a place to stay. read more

One of the worst agencies out there. I rented a room for 3 months. They helped me out with the search. Soon as I moved there and I stayed over a week. Problems occured with the landlord he was rude, constantly picking on my water usage told me I can't take a shower. I tried asking for help but no help at all. They told me your on your own after 24h stay. Never again! read more

My experience started off bad and has only gotten worse. I've had a very disappointing experience engaging with customer service which was, despite the long waiting periods, responsive but thoroughly unhelpful and dismissive. My landlord experience was also unpleasant. I'm still in the apt I booked which was not cleaned well when I arrived, the sheets had stains, I'm having to deal with cockroaches and other insects crawling around mainly at night, I'm pretty sure I spotted a bed bug crawling in the room the other day, I have out of pocket expenses for bug traps to put in the apartment since the landlord has ignored my requests to provide them (also was lied to about receiving them by the only person who I've been able to talk to associated to the apt), the landlord has been non responsive, I have lights on while I'm home and when sleeping to help prevent cockroaches from entering my room which will end up increasing my bill at the end of the month, and worst part is I'm dealing with physical reactions and symptoms from the bugs and state of the apt. I reached out about the issues the day after I arrived and was told nothing could be done in response to my concerns aside from reaching out to the landlord since the apt matched the images displayed online. The first response I received from the landlord when I reached out was that nothing could be done, and I'd need to deal with the roaches in the apt, which for one, is not true because I know at the least bug traps exist and two, is a health concern. The response I received from Spotahome, after several emails sent out about my issue not being resolved was this: " Hello, I hope this message finds you well and that the situation has improved with respect to your arrival. I am sure that your landlord was willing to help you to make your stay more comfortable. We hope we have been helpful and do not hesitate to contact us with any questions or needs you may have. Thank you very much for your patience and collaboration. Best regards, Andrea González" I now have a couple more weeks here and the only emails I'm receiving are about payment requests, after I was told I didn't need to do anything further by the last representative who reached out to me about money and nothing else. It's the most they've reached out thus far of course, while none of my concerns have been resolved. I don't expect anything will be done regarding my concerns. They've even begun closing tickets I've sent that haven't been addressed. I'm sure from the many reviews, people have had good experiences using Spotahome and with their landlords, but my experience has been and still is the worst I've had with any 3rd party housing site. It's been terribly unpleasant and I will not be using their services again after this. read more

Do not use. They charged me for a room in Barcelona as much as it costs in new York because of so much hidden fees. Worse is that I had asked up front about total including all hidden fees and I had a shock when the actual added up to be much more. They took zero responsibility for giving me the wrong amount and told me I can cancel for a 50% refund and they gave me 1 day to cancel or pay the extra. Both of which are not acceptable options. They are an extremely irresponsible middle man for finding you a place to stay. All they do is find you a place, charge you overheads and then offer no protection or accountability. I would NOT use them again. I get it if they are a middleman whose hands are tied sometimes but the issue here is the complete lack of any empathy from their customer service team, even when they clearly made a mistake. It is extremely frustrating to be told "sorry, take it or leave it" and expect me to pay $300 extra fees or lose my $500 deposit. If the company now has so much time to care about its negative reviews online, maybe all of this would've been avoided if someone had bothered with the original complaint to begin with. read more

Spotahome is company that is not to be trusted. They charge hefty hidden fees once you arrive at the apartment and if you refuse to pay, they take all the money that you paid for the reservation. As a student and experienced traveller who has visited over 30 countries, I never had such a bad experience with short-term rental. On their website they claim to be "reliable and trustworthy", but nothing could be further from the truth. They are masters of deceit, continuously posting hundreds of fake positive reviews to compensate for the continuous flow of negative reviews that they receive. Don't look at the first ten reviews, go down and read the real reviews. The price that they advertise is never the real price, as administration fees and other hidden fees will make the apartment much more expensive. In my case I booked a room in Madrid for 650€ per month for 3 months, plus a service fee of 153€. However, at arrival they charged an administration fee of 650€, and 300€ for entering before the start of the new month, so the real cost per month became 1.017,66€. I refused to pay for this, and as a result they stole the 803€ that I had paid as a reservation for the first month plus their service fee and was left on the street without a place to stay and without the 803€ that I paid. Do not trust this company, read the negative reviews, always at the bottom as they have teams continuously searching the review sites for negative reviews and spamming these sites with fake reviews once they detect a real review. All they care about is taking your money. I hope that this review will help other students and young professionals to not get scammed. read more

Spotahome is the worst renting site I ever used. They add fees after you have paid, they take advantage of you and then their customer service does not answer you, they pretend they cannot help you, they have no right to give your call to the right person and they avoid your mails. Be careful, with spotahome the total amount to pay is wrong, when you arrive to your apartment they ask you for more money. Futhermore, when in the booking confirmation it is written "no admin fee" it is a lie, there will be admin fee. Definitely, spotahome is not a correct site, we pressed charges against them !!! DONT GO THERE, NEVER read more

- IF YOU WANT TO END UP WITH NO PLACE TO STAY IN A FOREIGN COUNTRY DUE TO THE LACK OF EFFORT FROM SPOTAHOME, THEN YOU ARE GOOD TO GO! - If you want to end up in an airport still waiting for Spotahome to find a place for you to stay, this is your chance to experience that awful and horrifying feeling. - Last July 2021, I hired Spotahome to assist me with getting a place in a foreign country for September (2021). Everything appeared to be going smoothly and even better when they received the full payment. By the way, it was not cheap, quite the opposite. Mind you, I hired them in July of 2021, and up until September 1, 2021, they did not or could not find a place for me to live. They came up with an excuse about the owner, the owner that agreed to rent the unit to me stated, "the place is infested with bed bugs" The Spotahome crew kept apologizing but I was still left with NO PLACE TO STAY! Upon my arrival in a foreign country during that time of year, 99% of the hotels were booked due to a holiday celebration. I was alone, not knowing anyone, and still no place to stay. - I'm also handicapped, in which case it did not make a difference, it was quite the opposite. I kept getting the run-a-around over and over, with senseless apologies and no solutions for their error and negligence. Yes, the run-a-round was over email which made it more difficult than it needed to be. - I asked the Spotahome staff to give me a telephone number, and they said, "We don't make calls or accept calls, sorry". - I have approximately 50 emails written to Spotahome in trying to resolve the issue and to get my full refund. It took Spotahome over six months to reimburse me. - I asked my attorney if it was in any way possible to file a lawsuit, he said it would cost me a great deal of money because the company is based in Spain. read more

I'm honestly not sure if anyone even works at this company. Do not use spotahome, no matter what. I have tried contacting them for weeks now and nobody has responded to me. I even went into their office and there was nobody there to help me. They have charged our account $2,000 for a booking that I never confirmed or moved into AND ignored our requests to cancel the booking. And now there is nobody who will respond to us to try to clear this up. As a teacher who is making a very minimal salary this is devastating, and I feel extremely taken advantage of. read more

STAY AWAY IF YOU WANT TO HAVE BACK YOUR DEPOSIT! They say that they have no responsibility for the deposit from the landlord, but it doesn't make sense.... I have not received my deposit since 4months. All that spotahome have to say in all this time is that they are waiting for an answer from the landlord while they are still renting out for them. STAY AWAY! read more

Fraudulent advertisement - DO NOT TRUST IMAGES Very unsatisfied with property reliability and customer service. My husband and I just arrived to an apartment that we rented through Spotahome in Madrid for a full month. After living in the property for a bit over a day, we began noticing several issues such as strong smoking smell in bed room and living room, a big water leak over the fridge, broken objects (lamps, light bulbs, torn towels, kitchen ware, broken light switches, etc). All of this on top of the hallway's wood floor buckling due to a pipe leak. Wrote an email with evidence this morning (1 day and a half after move in), and no reply yet. Came back home to the leak and decided to chat with customer service. The person at customer service has been incredibly unhelpful. They just provide the same information on the website, which is to write to the same email we have already written and received no answer from. I DO NOT RECOMMEND WORKING WITH THEM. If there are no problems in the flat, things might go well, but they have proved to be ABSOLUTELY unreliable when problems arise. The place feels like a stinky cheap motel, and not the expensive vacational rental that images and video in their website shows. read more

I booked a room in an apartment in Seville through Spotahome. Once there, it turned out that the Spotahome pictures and videos of the apartment were very old, because the apartment was in a very bad condition. I complained it directly after arrival and sent pictures to spotahome. They did not answer me for 3 days. It wasn't until the fourth day that they finally contacted me. They had already made the mistake and transferred my money to the landlord. That's why they suggested a deal that I only have to pay for the first week and get the rest of my money back from the landlord. I have been waiting 3 months for 1100 Euro and the Spotahome costumer service still react to my complaints as follows: "He [the landlord] informed me that there is no problem with your refund. He is going to refund the payment as soon as possible." What an insolence... I advise everyone not to book anything on Spotahome. read more

Spotahome is a company that is not to be trusted ! I booked an apartment in Seville which initially I liked. The location and amenities was amazing however I had many issues with my Landlady Akiko Cristal. I have witnessed several people leaving the apartment where I had to call the police on two occasions. I did not get back my deposit and she has been refusing to give back tenant's deposit on many occasions. Although Spotahome have verified their landlords they don't seem to have done a very good job of this as many people have complained about Akiko. I am very frustrated that she is able to get away with this. I have video evidence of calling the police. I appreciate that Spotahome tried to contact the Landlady with regards to the deposit however it shows that the landlords that they work with cannot be trusted. Spotahome are purely and advertising agency. Ultimately in this case Spotahome should be held partly responsible as I booked the property through them. I would not recommend booking through Spotahome purley on the basis that they do not have adequate and sufficient power to arbitrate such issues. read more

We were staying in their apartment for less than a month and we left it clean and tidy. All of a sudden, I received an email from the landlord who is claiming that we damaged and even stole numerous items and furniture in the apartment, which is completely untrue. He even stated that we stole his microwave (what nonsense???) and he said we damaged an AC, a TV, and an iron which WE NEVER EVEN USED. He claimed that his precious lamp has disappeared, yet it was left untouched in the living room. The host said that the flat was a mess when in reality we cleaned it thoroughly and even washed the towels. The landlord did not meet with us in person when we were checking out as he simply told us where to leave the keys and now I understand why. If we ended up meeting, he would see that the flat was in an ideal condition. Without providing us with any proof of his false allegations, he is now refusing to give us the security deposit back! Avoid this company because it is an absolute fraud. I have no idea why this company continues to operate, remaining unpunished and stealing money from innocent people. The worst experience we have ever had... read more

Horrible service overall, my booking was cancelled less than 24hrs before check-in. It took them over 3 days to relocate me (to a more expensive place that was in a worse location) and did not get me the full discount they promised. read more

Do NOT trust this business to secure lodging for your stay abroad--you will be left without a place to stay and be left scrambling! I made a reservation through Spotahome in July for a flat in Madrid, and they didn't respond to a single email of mine or the landlord's throughout the month of August--they were on summer holiday, and there's no phone number or any other way to contact them. Once I arrived in Madrid, I found out that the landlord had cancelled the booking because he was worried Spotahome was going out of business, since they hadn't responded to his emails in August either. What's worse, they do not honor their promise to help you find a replacement apartment in situations such as these, and I had to threaten to take legal action against them multiple times before they paid me the €300 in emergency lodging assistance. I did get all my money back, but this ruined the first few weeks of my study abroad and created much unneeded stress. Don't risk it, take your business elsewhere! read more

I had an issue with booking. They called from Spain and were able to fix it. Really appreciate the gesture.

There were several Big issues, I don't even know from which to start. So I'll just write it chronologically. Even though the ending of this story is worse. First, I searched through their website a room suitable for couples, I put a filter, so I could see real options. There were like 16, but by location and price, it went to the final number of 2. I chose the one I liked more and placed the booking, I did it with some gup before move-in to avoid stress BUT.. Spotahome answered that there was a mistake and even tho it said clearly "available for couples" on their website, in reality, it wasn't. They apologized and told me to take a look at some other option. Which I had and I asked for that one. After some time, they got back with another apology saying that landlady like a month ago changed it and it isn't available for couples anymore. Ok. But why is that on the website then? I'm a really methodical person, and I like to plan and think well before making a decision, but how is that possible when there is false information on the website? 2nd they suggested to help me with the choice and sent a few links, which I saw of course and didn't even consider it. Simply because apartments were located on the other side of a city. I can't understand how they can call that suggestion when they don't even care to pay attention to what the person was booking. Adding to everything, time was passing. So I decided to take a look at their website and choose what is "less bad". I sent two links to not lose time again - and funny but from the first landlady, there weren't answers. On the other side, the second one answered promptly. Even tho they charged a special "landlord fee" which was even bigger than Spotahome fee, but by everything and by losing time I even thought that I was still lucky. I couldn't imagine what will wait for my boyfriend and me. Because it is this special policy of Spotahome that you book before, pay everything and then it's like "Surprise!))" what is waiting for you there. On the other websites like Badi, Indeed, Idealista (even Facebook) you can establish an appointment and go and see, and if you don't like it, you simply don't want to take it. Well with Spotahome you have to take it. Plus they even have this policy that they charge in advance just Full month, but interestingly the apartment was from 2nd of Feb., so that way the payment will be in advance for 2nd month and when we will move-in we will pay + 1st month and everything else. Which would be the probability that we can pay it? So I suggested that I'll pay that one day to them, which I wasn't staying, just to make it by their policy "Full month". Certainly to pay 17-18 euros for nothing was still better than the first scenario. After the booking was confirmed Spotahome sent me contacts to start arranging move-in with the landlady. When I saw the email I understood why there was that Big fee, because it was another hidden agency. So, a normal person needs an apartment to rent and already has to pay the rent in advance, deposit + pay one agency, then to another, just to get the place to stay.?? Well but even this wasn't the worse. I contacted "landlady" by WhatsApp and email. And I was waiting for an answer for more than a week. It was already 2-3 days before the flight, (because I was booking from another country as I was moving for Erasmus) I wrote to Spotahome impatient and really worried "What's happening?" And just after that the 'landlady' finally answered me and said that SOON someone else will contact me about the apartment. So we were waiting again. I was waiting till the last, like 36 hours before move-in, and then contacted Spotahome support to cancel my booking. They told me to log in and in the section "my bookings" I can cancel it. I did as they said, but there was nothing in the section. And after that, a person from the second agency wrote to me. With no other choice we just went to an established hour to check-in. And there it was, the Surprise... The zone we were supposed to live in is full of criminality, and 20-30 minutes from the apartment we were robbed, we went to the police station, and they said that it is kind of usual there. Terrified I contacted like 4 different persons from Spotahome that I have to cancel my booking and expect my money back, but they say "that it isn't enough reason" to get a refund, while on their website they say that you have 48 hours to cancel the booking if something isn't good at the day of your move-in. So they protect themselves behind everything they put in their policies and totally don't care about the customers. They even didn't want to establish any agreement and took all the money. Totally inhuman. For such a monster company it is nothing, and we had to be on the street or from place to place till we got some help to get another apartment from other website of course. To go through something like this I wouldn't wish to anyone. And that's why I highly don't recommend Spotahome. read more

Spotahome is such a terrible organisation who has hurt me deeply. On moving day me and my friend refuse to sign the contract in Spanish (it was agreed upon, both with Spotahome and the landlady, that it would be in English). We offer to sign it after having it translated the next working day, but instead our landlady cancels. We are left on the streets in Madrid 9 pm. We call Spotahome the following day and ask for a refund, they refuse and explain that the money had already been transferred to the landlady. Through our lawyer it is revealed that the money was never given to the landlady, and instead Spotahome kept the full payment. I have never felt so little and unheard as you made me feel. read more

My experience with Spotahome could not have been worse. I was looking for a room to rent in a foreign city -had about 6 days to move in- and I find this really nice, spacious one. I decided to take the step and booked the room. The procedure goes this way: they charge the money immediately. However, the owner is given 48 hours to approve the booking. It didn't sound fair to me, but I guessed I wasn't going to loose my money anyway. Thing is, the owner had rented the room to someone else. The booking was cancelled. And then Spotahome started trying to make me find alternatives to book, to which I replied that I wasn't interested. And it was then, only then, when they told me. Although the payment is charged inmediately, THE REFUND IS NOT EFFECTIVE UNTIL UP TO 3 WEEKS. That meant that not only I would not be able to stay in the room I had chosen, but that I could not dispose of the money in order to make a new booking anywhere else, forcing me to ask friends and family for money, and making me wait for a mistake that was not mine. Spotahome was renting a room that wasn't available in the first place. What kind of company retains the money of someone who is trying to rent a room? It's a complete paradox. Now I can't book a room because I can't dispose of the money. read more

Unfortunately, I am unclear on how this company is going to make. it in the marketplace in the shadow of legitimate booking companies like Airbnb. I found out the hard way that the newly published "available" apartment was not available because it was booked through another website? What? Are they are advertising properties that do not exist? Who is really vetting these properties and landlord relations? Next, I was put in a position of extortion for the second apartment Note: that I found because my booking agent never sent me alternative properties as listed in their value proposition, because the only way the landlord would approve a booking is if I was to cover the 19 days from that start of apartment availability to when my booking request started it on the 29th!!! Why would anyone willingly pay for something they do not need? My Spotahome booking agent advised me that I should consider this since that was my only option. Really? What kind of business model is that? Apartment rental agencies, hotels, and Airbnb not suggest/recommend/require you pay for that period of non-occupancy, that lead up to your booking request so why would Spotahome even suggest this? I wrote the CEO a note (I found him on LinkedIn and so can you!) and he was suppose to call me the following day a specifically arranged time, he never did. I am not surprised. What I received in response was a BS customer service email that after some critically discussion with management, Spotahome would cover the gap between the10th to when I requested my booking for the 29th. Like that was a big gesture?? How about not EVER asking your customer to pay for something as outrageous as that in the first place??? And they would honor the existing PROMO give me 20% off their service fee so I get a discount of 16 euros, how kind. How about I save my money and book via Airbnb and not waste my time or money with amateur start-ups who do not grasp that basic Customer Success strategy do not involve false advertising, extortion, or very poor communication that misses the placation mark and basically comes off as patronizing and excuses for why they are sub-par. read more