To have expected that the owners of this holiday let would not be living in the building.

[WatchingCometsLand]

^https://www.vrbo.com/en-gb/p1975005a^

We spent 3k on this holiday (our first in years). Turns out that we get the top floor and the owners live below. They enter and exit with their vans via two garage doors immediately below our bedroom windows, through the garden.

Were we unreasonable to have expected this to be stated in the advertisement?

The noise is particularly problematic - we have been woken late at night and then first thing in the morning.

I would screenshot the VRBO add now in case they change it. Email / contact VRBO in the first instance. Do they have the property listed on another platform with a different description ? It’s very odd that none of the other reviews mention this and have rated so highly.

Agree with others, screenshot the ad before they can change anything. Good luck, I wouldn’t be happy with that at all!

I managed to find the description in French and it's longer with
'les hôtes seront sur place ' in it. I'll try to attach.

Could it be an unintentional clipping of translation? Not great to hide that down at the bottom of a long description though.

Oh well you obviously know better than me having read something on Reddit. I bow to your superior knowledge.

This does sound quite possible.

OP perhaps let the owners know that the English listing does not make it clear that the property is shared, and you booked it for peace and quiet, not anticipating that this level of early and late noise would be part of your stay 😕

That’s appalling. I’d be seeking a refund and leaving a poor review.

Whilst the French version states that the hosts will be on site, it doesn’t say they will be making early morning and late night noise every day.
This information was not in the English version that OP relied on. If it had been she would likely not have booked, or at least could have asked for more details.
I wonder if the current work is a recent change. The previous reviews said the owners were unobtrusive.
The timing of the noise is not really compatible with a holiday let of this type.
Fair enough to expect noise in a flat in a busy city, but not what OP thought was a detached house in a quiet location.

I would be really unhappy with being disturbed early and late at night. Their response is unacceptable.

And the "entire home" with pictures of a whole house vs the actual first floor flat is totally misleading if it's not clear the owners are on site as well.

Definitely yanbu.

We saw something similar on gites de France where the ad made it look like you got the whole house, but the owners had the other end of it for rent on another listing! And no it wasn't a terrace. Similarly one Airbnb said "me and my children may also be staying in the house at the same time"-non merci. I think french people might be more comfortable with /used to owners or other tourists on site, but noise disturbance is awful and you've paid a lot of money so shouldn't have to put up with that.

About 10/11 years ago, so pre-AirBnB. My mum booked it all. Since then, we have just stayed in hotels when we have gone there.

we stayed in an Airbnb in France that charged €120 for cleaning and laundry, but when we arrived we still got given check out instructions which included stripping beds and cleaning 'all sanitary surfaces' whatever on earth that means. I took photos when we left so I could hold me ground with Airbnb if needed.

What a peculiarly aggressive response. Your experiences conflict with reports by many others online. This is clearly a fact, irrespective of which anecdotes are more representative of reality. Which is something I didn't even comment on.

Yes, I'd get onto VRBO. The listing in English is much shorter. They may refund you the rest of your dates but obviously you'd have to leave and find somewhere else.

Another vote for thats absolutely appalling definitely try and get a refund of some sort ...this is not what you were sold...you'll have this thread in support:)

Well,you asserting that VRBO routinely remove bad reviews actually has the potential to damage people's businesses doesn't it? People read stuff on line, think its fact and act accordingly. So they see my listing in VRBO with only a few reviews and assume I've had lots of terrible reviews that have been removed, for example. These things become urban myths.

As it happens it looks like this listing has been badly translated into English by VRBO. The French listing states that the host lives there. So all the French people who stayed ( and probably Dutch) read that the hosts live on site. The English listing reads as generic and AI generated.

If anyone's is being aggressive it's you, pushing a narrative from something you've read on Reddit with no real knowledge of on line travel agents or how they operate. Whereas it is my job to work with the OTA's.

i have experienced vrbo removing bad reviews, we left one last summer ( see my post above) having spent circa £4k on the accommodation alone. There is no sign of the review on vrbo, and the description remains misleading.

The angle that the main photo is taken from makes it look like a single storey house. They’ve positioned the camera deliberately to hide the garage and the ground floor. It’s really misleading.

Yes, the garage isn't even visible in that main photo. One of the aerial views hints that there's more to the property, but you can't really work it out. In the other aerial view, the house is conveniently hidden by trees!

Please quote where I said that? Cos I didn't. It might be true, but I didn't say it.

Yeah this is absolutely not on and I'd be looking for recompense as what you have booked is not as advertised.

Absolute cheek! I’d be furious.

Oh and it’s discreet not discrete. Discrete is something that stands alone discreet is being quiet or keeping secrets

Op, that is outrageous!

Even on the French site where it says the hosts live in the basement flat it says they are discreet and there to help. Neither of which are fitting descriptions from the sound of it!

Stay in app-

'there is nothing on the listing warning of noise disturbance late at night or early morning. The listing was £3k and described an entire, private house, which I have not received. I would prefer to resolve this without contacting vrbo. Thank you'

See what they say. Assuming they don't play ball then i'd just contact VRBO and explain everything

So, I generally agree that it looks like the main issue is with the English translation of the listing. Had we been given all the information contained in the French version (maybe the Dutch version too?), we just would not have booked this property. But the question is, who's responsible for the bad English translation? Who wrote it, or generated it, who confirmed it was acceptable when it clearly wasn't, etc. I'm going to try and speak to the owners tomorrow, and then I'll write to Vrbo. @crosscross @LumpyandBumps could one of you link to the French version that you found, please? Sadly, I'm not really optimistic about getting anywhere with Vrbo or owners. @Cloudsandbees could you give any more info on credit card chargebacks? How do these work?