Villa being sold - we fly next month. Help!

[Holidayaddict]

Just woken up to the following message from the owner of the villa we're due to go to in a month's time......

I wanted to give you the heads-up. X villa has had an offer accepted and will be sold. It may take a month or two; it's hard to know.
The people buying it are also planning to AirBNB it. So you can still come and stay, but it would not be me looking after you.
Totally your call, but my advice would be to cancel the booking to avoid any disappointment.
Sorry to cause you such inconvenience.

It took us ages to find a villa that ticks all our boxes (we're fussy!) so know it won't be easy to find an alternative at such short notice. I've replied to ask if he can put us in touch with the new owners. He said he'll try to get their details from the agent but as he doesn't know them he can't vouch for them. I find it all rather odd, the villa appears to be booked for most of the summer so surely they'll want to honour existing bookings?

He went on to say we shouldn't have a problem finding somewhere else as "loads" still available for our dates on Airbnb. I've started looking but nothing as nice we can afford so far 😪

I'm so stressed, we were SO looking forward to this holiday which we booked months ago. This is the last thing I need. Any words of wisdom?

Thank you x

Have you looked at villa plus? I've always used air bnb previously but I've used villaplus this time and they've been very responsive with any queries. They were also good value.

It's unfortunate but these things do happen, my friend bought a holiday cottage a couple of years ago and it was fully booked out for that summer, they had bought it for private use only but suspected the previous owner had been avoiding cancelling the lets in case the sale fell through, probably telling people the new owners would take on the bookings even though they had made clear they weren't going to. Hope you find something.

Have noticed that the property is still on airbnb advertised for way more than we paid. Have reported to airbnb.

@Holidayaddict by the existing owner or a new name?

@MabelMaybe existing owner but has since been "turned off".

Good for you for reporting @Holidayaddict that's a real shits trick by the landlord. I'd ask airbnb to escalate your complaint to management and seek more value on your "rebook" voucher.

Wankers.

Ooh what a sneaky shit. Be glad you’re not staying in his villa!

Most countries handle real estate sales as individual transactions - depending on local specifics, no reason whatsoever it couldn't go through in a month.

I've gone back to airbnb to say I'm not happy with the compensation and wish to escalate but no reply so far. Meanwhile, I've spent all evening searching and it's clear we're not going to find anything as good for the price. I also see the property is on booking.com & TripAdvisor showing available for our dates. So so angry 😡

This is outrageous and exactly why I'm nervous about booking on Airbnb or Booking.com these days especially for peak season. I did it last summer and was anxious until we got there that the host would cancel despite good reviews. Good luck with finding an alternative

@againmaeve Booking.com are incredibly punitive to owners so no one in their right mind would cancel if they had any other option. I stopped using them as every reservation request would give me a heart attack.

Thank you. They've increased the compensation to £240 and are investigating the host. Still not happy as we haven't found anything suitable as yet. Absolute nightmare!

Time to rejig completely. At least you've got a refund. Travel agent?

I've noticed the listing on booking.com appears to be a different host so I've tried sending a question asking why my cancelled dates are being sold. No idea if it'll get through!

Good to know that re Booking.com @Wallywobbles. Glad compensation has improved @Holidayaddict but still doesn't nearly reflect the inconvenience

@Holidayaddict If it's available on booking.com can you provisionally book it, without paying a deposit? and does it have free cancellation: To buy you time while you speak to the 'host?' who may be the new owners? Lots of stuff on Booking.com have 'free to book' accommodation? Once it's provisionally booked, you can contact the owners directly

@Silvers11 unfortunately it's not free to book. I have tried informing booking.com what happened to us to stop it happening to one of their clients but don't seem hugely interested so far. No movement on compensation as yet from Airbnb but I'm still trying. Suggested they recover from host who caused all this. They did say they've fined him and removed the listing from Airbnb. They're trying to find me something else but not much joy so far, not surprisingly as all the good stuff got booked months ago when we first booked our holiday!