To think many people have confused their paying holiday rental with house sitting?

[HeleenaHandcart]

Back from a week away and I’m starting to give up on UK holiday homes.

I obviously am happy to respect the property and be generally clean and tidy, but more and more I see higher and higher costs and higher and higher cleaning expectations. As well as earlier and earlier leaving times.

I don’t want to work as an unpaid house keeper before a long drive, nor generally add towards upkeep of the house I’m paying a ton for. I used to strip beds for example, but not with kids and an early leave time as well as wanting it all bagged up it’s a bit much before 9am. Frankly I’m not watering anything either. Now as well more and more places say you must leave by 9am, yet can’t enter until 5/6pm due to ‘cleaning’ but you must clean the place fully. Bins out and a list of chores for you.

Last week I was asked to be in for the washing machine repair man even (I said no). It’s not a bloody holiday- it’s house sitting and paying to be a house-sitter. My particular annoyance is stating ‘all surfaces to be cleaned and wiped, including the bathroom’ and they don’t leave a single cloth or cleaning product in the property. It’s like they also expect you to either purchase or bring a house cleaning kit.

Oh and ‘quirks of the property’, stuff that generally requires extra work to use stuff like ‘each day the windows all must be opened for 10 min’, ‘the shower cubicle has a daily water mark spray’ or ‘the boiler needs x, y…’

Its time to go back to hotel stays

Many people would love to jet off but its not always that easy

That's why I mentioned those who prefer to stay in the UK, Chevy, as opposed to those who sadly have no choice
I'm the first to appreciate some can't holiday abroad, and actually it makes the exploitation in the UK even worse

scj96 I probably would have cheekily assumed the list was for the cleaner, and just left it!

I do prefer to tbh :)
So much of the UK I want to see/visit!

I wouldn't expect to do any cleaning or maintaining property while on holiday. I'd make sure it wasn't left a mess and dishes were clean and dirty towels were in a pile like hotels ask, but I'd expect them to be doing a clean, vacumn, stripping & remaking beds especially if had to pay a separate cost for cleaning but hotels usually factor in cleaner wages as part of cost of stay.

9am check out is far too early and would put me off booking there.

The problem is in some areas housing has become unaffordable for many due to holiday let’s and second home ownership - combine that with ever increasing fuel costs and other price rises and some businesses are finding it hard to recruit staff (into typically low paying jobs e.g bar and kitchen staff, shop workers, care workers etc.) because they cannot afford to travel to the area.

It is killing off local communities!

We always look at the cleaning cost when booking, if they charge especially a higher fee then we do the bare minimum - no dirty dishes (will definitelyleave clean ones on the draining board!), bins out and beds stripped. I'm not paying for the property to be cleaned for me to clean it beforehand if they take on too many cleaning of properties then they need to hire people in to help!

I have never used airbnb (DH is against it) but now I never would. I thought the point of a holiday was a break from normal life and surely that would mean a break from cleaning...I mean, I do see the appeal in having a kitchen...

Time for more aparthotels. I didn't have a great experience at my last aparthotel in Munich (adagio) but I did have an amazing experience with the same chain at brussels. To be fair, the whole visit was very pleasant until a staff member disabled our key card before we were supposed to check out. I had no complaints about the apartment; it was clean and cosy and comfortable and at a good price. I mean, it was a bit annoying cos there was a chihuahua next door barking incessantly but for dog owners, this could be a draw as they allow pets! They have apartments for up to 4 people so not great for bigger families.

I have never understood airbnb

If I'm going away, I don't want to do domestic work. If going away involves that, I won't go.

They don't contribute that much and much less than people staying in hotels, campsites etc as most tend to do their Waitrose shop on the way and hole up in their lovely little bolthole without spending much. Many airbnbs are not paying business rates or registered for tax or insured either.

I'm not sure what people who come to lovely little quaint villages are going to think when the village they love for its atmosphere and little boats in the harbour and lovely little restaurants and cafes and fetes find them all shut down and abandoned because no one can afford to live or work there but they are actively contributing to the demise of these communities.

Tourism is eating itself in the beautiful but poor parts of this country, loads of people have left hospitality and they're not coming back for £9.60 an hour, however "competitive" business owners think that is.

There are tent villages starting to form on the cliffs and dunes of the holiday destination where I live and families living in damp caravans and bnbs as their emergency accomodation for which they have the privilege of being charged £2000 - £4000 a month if they have the misfortune of being employed.

It'll be interesting to see what happens down here I suppose. I was hoping that with people being able to go abroad again a lot of these new airbnbs would go back to being long term rental accommodation but it hasn't happened yet and all the local business owners are shutting their kitchens a few days a week and scratching their heads that they don't have people queuing up to work all hours for minimum wage like usual. It's funny how they're so much quicker to increase their menu prices than their wages isn't it?

The solution is to levy higher taxes on holiday let’s as well as second homes. This will lower prices and make them more available to locals and also for the Council to purchase so that they can be let at an affordable rent to those in genuine need of housing - not for greedy investors…

Many are also taking the Piss as most did VERY well from covid support grants. Assuming they were registered for business rates (as they are a business), they'd have got the initial £10k grant, plus subsequent grants. They'd almost certainly also be eligible for local authority grants. I've got clients with multiple properties (one being a row in a barn conversion and another being a large detached house converted into self contained holiday flats) - despite them being open for most of the two years (due to having separate entrances), they got £28,000 PER PROPERTY in support grants, so each got £112k (4 properties each), which was more than they'd have earned if covid didn't happen! An absolute disgrace they got so much support on top of the income for the months they could open, and on top of charging guests more! It's been a licence to print money.

*I'm not sure what people who come to lovely little quaint villages are going to think when the village they love for its atmosphere and little boats in the harbour and lovely little restaurants and cafes and fetes find them all shut down and abandoned because no one can afford to live or work there but they are actively contributing to the demise of these communities.

Tourism is eating itself in the beautiful but poor parts of this country, loads of people have left hospitality and they're not coming back for £9.60 an hour, however "competitive" business owners think that is.*

Agree 1000% with this. There has to be a balance.

@Bingbangbongbash actually the local economies wouldn't suffer at all if the holiday let's disappear and local people have the opportunity to stay in their communities where they contribute 52 weeks per year to the local community.
At present people like myself are being forced out of our homes because of the shortage of housing. The day we ban holiday let's and second home ownership will be a fab day. There are discussions about new builds all having primary residential only clauses on them to prevent more holiday homes.

I'm on the fence about this. We used to be out of the house when the dc were small by 8.30am on a daily basis. The bathrooms, kitchen, was always clean, dishwasher on, floors clean, etc.

Invariably when we have booked a UK holiday cottage, especially in a popular resort we have been up and out by 7.30 to beat the traffic.

Kitchens and bathrooms are always clean at home or away because it's normal behaviour to keep them so. It takes less than two minutes to strip a bed and bung the towels in a bag.

We always pack up the night before and it's never a particular issue.

We have a house and some gites in France so I see this from both sides of the coin and disappointingly some people leave holiday accommodation in a dreadful state. I shudder to think about the state of their homes if they think it's acceptable.

It is customary in France to make up one's own beds and to expect more cleaning on departure than in England. There are different rules for letting to English people although the cost is often higher to account for higher housekeeping charges.

I suspect the rules imposed by Covid are here to stay for the domestic lettings market but the 9am departure and 5pm arrival time needs to be relaxed.

Yes!!! We stayed in a holiday cottage near Portscatho in Cornwall last year (tempted to post the name of it to warn others off as they deleted my bad review, CFs)

It was late 6pm check in, early 9am check out, each room had a repair needed “quirk”, we were asked to stop in for the washing machine repair on three consecutive days which eventually was only fixed the day before we left (it was broken when we arrived), tiny thin smelly towels, no hand soap let alone shower gel, ONE dishwasher tablet, horrible cheap synthetic bedding, no dish soap, no dishcloths, tea towels…just as tight as you can get in terms of hospitality. These are not expensive things to supply and get right and plenty of lovely rental places do them. On a farm and no fucker even came to say hello. It was £2k for a week. Never again!

Badbadbunny, yes, the grants many holiday property owners received were disgraceful.

Many pubs/restaurants in the Lake District are opening with restricted hours because they can't get staff, a lot to do with prospective staff, earning minimum wage, can't afford to live in, say, Keswick, Ambleside or Bowness. Or can't find anywhere to live regardless of rental cost. There are some villages in the LD where 85% of properties are either second homes or holiday lets. The situation is completely unsustainable.

In France, they often give you a choice between cleaning it yourself or paying (usually around 50 Euros) for them to do it. That seems sensible.

In the UK, I'll empty the dishwasher and bins, and have a quick wipe round kitchen surfaces, but that's it. Oh, and will grudgingly strip the beds and bag up. That came in with covid, and seems to be here to stay despite no other covid precautions staying.. funny that...

If there's a cleaning fee (which there invariably is) I expect that to be used to pay a cleaner to do a full clean. Which means that anything I do would just be redone. IF the cleaning fee is used to pay for the cleaning.

And people saying that it is a struggle to find cleaners to clean holiday lets. That is because people who will work for lower wages are priced out of living in holiday places by holiday and second homes.

We paid 1700 for a week in Norfolk. It was lovely, but we not only had to strip beds, empty bins etc., the dishwasher had to be emptied and all dishes returned to cupboard.
The washing needed to be left in the utility room, and separated into piles.
Linens in one pile, towels etc in another.
Showers were to be sprayed and wiped down and all windows left ajar.

We needed to be out by 9am.

The night before we left was not the relaxing end to a holiday we hoped for.

Never again.

Im just back from eurocamp and found the same thing.

I used to rep for them about 15 years ago. We never really asked our customers for anything in terms of check out. We also visited them a couple of times during a stay just to check everyone was happy. Used to take them into tents/caravans to explain everything etc. It was a lovely summer holiday job.

Fast forward to now. Eurocamp starts hassling you about a week before for an ETA (it took us around an hour to get off the ferry at Caen as only 2 officers checking passports) so ETA was massively out anyway. The rep at reception handed over some keys and a badly printed unreadable map to help us find our way to our property. Once inside there was a list of things we needed to do on checkout so that you “don’t need to worry about getting charged”. We didn’t see a rep again until last evening. The only point of their visit was to remind us of this list!

Personally, I would always do a tidy up and wipe kitchen surfaces etc. But I really think it’s a bit much to be told to do this kind of stuff but when your paying best part of 1k off season for a 2 bed caravan!

KosherDill

I've never understood the urge to rent houses or villas. Give me a good full-service hotel any day!

Because I like to have a kitchen, living room and separate rooms from the kids!!!

The last time I stayed in an AirBnB is was many years ago and seems things have changed substantially in that time. I stayed in the spare room of peoples houses then and it was win-win as places like hostels aren't present outside of most cities, so allowed me to travel cheaply and the person living there to make a little extra money. No ridiculous cleaning requirements!
At the risk of being controversial - those of you who live in e.g. SW 'holiday' locations and want to get rid of the holiday lets, what are the options?

1. Ban them all. Does this just drive more people abroad for their holiday and bad for environment? Would the local economies survive as previously mentioned - what would everyone be doing for jobs in these areas if the service economy takes a hit? I'm genuinely asking, as I don't know the answer
2. Apply to the local counsel if you wish to open a holiday let and only a certain % of properties are allowed for this at any time?
3. Only allow local residents to buy new properties being built (?runs the risk of the cute village becoming a theme park as no one local lives there, they all live on the housing estate just outside)
4. Increase taxes on 2nd properties - surely the rich will still own them and they are even more likely to be vacant most of the year, generating no benefit to locals?
5. Increase minimum wage to something that people can actually afford to live from - making service economy jobs much more appealing in these areas?
6. Or is it just the AirBnB type places that are the problem?

For central London, you can't beat Premier Inn.

Yanbu if I'm paying a cleaning fee I don't expect to have to clean the property! We'll wash up/ turn on dishwasher and leave it tidying, removing beding ok but not cleaning beyond that. Surely that's what the cleaning fee is for?!

Oh yes. Stayed in one place on the Isle of Wight. Clearly dead parents pride and joy. List of "quirks", including the fact that if you put too many lights on,they tripped and could not be reset cos the fuse box was in a locked room. There was also a lounge with every used sofa the family had ever replaced. It was a little like spending an evening in a charity furniture warehouse.
Last year we went to a lovely place and the owner said the only thing that would be helpful is if we could stack the dishwasher completely, even with clean stuff and run it as we left. She specifically said not to bother with anything else as due to covid regs she would personally clean everything and no point doing it twice