Oh how I wish I could attach pictures, but words will have to suffice. We searched VRBO for many, many hours over the period of several weeks to find just the right place to take our 80 year old mom on a special trip with her children and some of her grandchildren for a Mother’s Day gift. We thought based on reviews and listing photos this was it! Within a few hours after arrival we spotted a German roach in the kitchen. We thought maybe we brought it in on the luggage cart, but we made sure all of our food was protected just in case. During the night we saw one in each bathroom and about ten in the kitchen! They were in the pantry, dishwasher, counter tops, and around the fridge. I messaged Tonya at 6:30AM, who said she’d never had a complaint before, but she’d call out a pest company. Six hours later, we had not heard anything about a pest company coming. We bought a can of Bengal roach spray and did our own crack and crevice treatment in the kitchen. Within a few minutes we had roaches crawling everywhere! We stepped on about thirty and lost count. We filled up a dustpan. The infestation was so bad, there is no way this just happened! At this point we told Tonya this was unacceptable and we needed them to find us a new place to stay. She said the owners would issue a refund, but that was the best they could do and we would have to make our own arrangements for a place to stay. Anyone who regularly vacations in FL knows how hard it is to find a place to stay for the weekend in May. They offered no help securing a reservation for our party of seven. As a business owner myself, I cannot fathom this sort of customer service—especially from someone who is in the hospitality industry! VRBO wouldn’t allow us to search for a reservation on the same day as our arrival, so our party of seven ended up in a hotel, paying more money per night than the condo for just two rooms.
My mom tried her best to recover, but she never got over the disappointment or stress of that horrible day. The whole trip was effectively ruined.
Tonya acted as though refunding our money was doing us a favor. Please, do yourself a favor and stay far away from Island Time Beach Rentals.
PS. We learned their pest service is provided Brian’s Pest Control. It would be a good idea to stay away from them as well.
