The Sea Village — Local services in Hawaii

Booked this place because of a late breaking refurb at our usual spot that made it unavailable. This place seemed fine in the ad from the rental company. Possibly missed some gotchas in the fine print, I suppose.

Just checked in to unit 1205, which from the looks of things is a pretty typical condo, if maybe more recently refurbed, so others may be less satisfactory than our unit.

Piece fell off the refrigerator the first time we opened the door. Back patio door handle is bent from people pulling too hard to open it.

The place was HOT when we got here and a frantic search for the thermostat came up empty...because there's NO CENTRAL A/C. Further research revealed a minisplit system that serves only the bedrooms (probably 20% of the place). The entire rest of the place relies on one dinky, undersized, noisy "portable" A/C unit that is literally poked through a louvered window and kind of jammed into place. The vent hose was broken off from the flange, so hot air just ran back into the room, a laws of thermodynamics problem if ever there was one. Running the unit just made the room net-hotter.

The switching cost to ditch this place and take our chances against the same or worse has us probably staying put but we will NEVER book here again and our recommendation would be that nobody else do so either.

In Kailua-Kona, A/C is pretty much a necessity and the omission here is glaring.

We reviewed the listing again and the mini-split system is indeed called out, just not its inadequacy to do the job it is there to do and that it only serves a small part of the unit. There's a relatively small heat pump on the patio, which is probably why the owners put the portable into the main room because it can't handle the whole unit. It's just far too small to do the job but since A/C draws a lot of Amps so maybe that's all they can run, who knows? Most people would not catch this from the description in the listing, so I'm making it clear here.

To be fair, the floors and kitchen are newish and clean, the furniture is basically island-standard Walmart stuff though functional and clean, but given the unpleasant climate control situation, we're feeling more than a bit ripped off.

The place is advertised as "Kona Sunsets" but given the orientation of the patio, it's not a great sunset view. You need to really lean out and crane your neck to see around a pillar and a patio next door. Add to that, the heat exchanger for the minisplit blows right onto the place you sit on the patio buffeting you with hot air...just a total failure to plan for the obvious...making sitting on the patio to watch the sunsets (a main reason for renting right on the coast) kind of a ripoff, too.

For what we are paying for this unit, we've stayed in much, much better accommodations along Alii Drive.

In parting,...

Rats! Sea Village #3214 My wife and I had long planned a Hawaiian vacation to celebrate our 40th birthdays this year. After much planning we settled on unit #3214 at the Sea Village in Kona. The complex itself is well maintained and great pool and BBQ area and amazing view of the ocean and sunset. We chose the unit primarily because it appeared to be a clean and modern condo and was a place we could spend our evenings with our two year old toddler and enjoy the sunset. When we arrived we were immediately struck by the uncleanliness of the unit. It was tidy however needed a serious deep clean and some TLC. It felt like a layer of grime on everything. We cleaned as much as we could and tried to overlook it. A few days later we noticed a bag of bread we left on the counter had a hole chewed through it and we started noticing what appeared to be mouse droppings around the kitchen. I am not overly picky but with a 2 year old constantly putting things in his mouth we decided we had to reach out to the owner. They were very responsive and had someone come out the next day with a trap. The next morning I woke to my wife crying that there was a rat caught in the trap (pictured). We called the owner Jennifer who apologized. We asked for a full refund as we would have to leave and find another place on short notice but she refused and only offered a partial refund for the days remaining since we didn't complain earlier!! Unbelievable. Not wanting to lose the partial refund by pushing too hard, we took it and left the same day, checking in to another place in Waikoloa which was properly cleaned and tried to enjoy the rest of our trip. It was a major inconvenience, not to mention the additional expenses and it basically tainted our entire trip unfortunately. When we got home I reached out to Jennifer to ask if she would reconsider the full refund and in exchange I would avoid writing reviews in an honest attempt to save her from losing business while she hopefully took this experience as an opportunity to clean the place and avoid issues in the future. She accused me of blackmailing/extorting her and threatened legal action if I posted reviews anywhere online! I won't be intimidated by someone willing to rent out a dirty condo with rats to unsuspecting families with young children just to make a buck. It's sad because it's such a nice place, but just poorly maintained and that's what happens. Renters beware of this place and the owners! Date of...

Upon arrival, I'm greeted by a roach running on the kitchen wall. Then when I go look for the unit to turn on the AC its nowhere to be found. So I call the front desk and I am so disappointed when I am transferred over to Gabby, the manager, and she explains that it never stated on the hotel features that AC is available. So as I tell her well I assumed it would be available since all hotels have AC. She then tell me rudely, that not in Hawaii. I mentioned i have been to Maui and Honolulu and I never experienced this problem before. Then she says Kona is an older island and many places dont have AC. So i tell her they should state that on their publication. She mentioned to me that they make it clear they have fans but no AC and i see it nowhere. All she says if the feature is not listed, its not provided. I also explained how i assumed since I paid extra for a view to the ocean I would get this, not a view to the pool. So she says its what the picture shows. Well by their picture posted, I assumed i was getting the view I uploaded. I also explain how my son has a disability, being in a very hot unit can trigger his epilepsy. We have to resolve this issue before I end up in the ER with him. At the end, all she tells me is that she has a unit with AC that is about $1,200 or more(can't quite remember) than what I had paid but I'm not getting it if I dont pay this amount. So she says the only other thing they will do is fully refund me if I find a place within an hour and leave, but it will take about 10 days to reflect back into my account. Fortunately I find a resort about 5 minutes away that suits all my sons needs and I book the hotel. I received a call after from another lady who I believe was her supervisor, apologizing for how Gabby treated the situation and offered to move us to another unit with AC, but I had already stressed enough with Gabby, I also went through the frustration of finding a resort in less than an hour, and paying for another room since I won't get refunded until days. I no longer wanted to deal with this place. They made this trip such a terrible experience...