Village Realty — Local services in Nags Head

Last year in 2017 our entire family stayed in Ohana. We had a issues with our rental for the week of Aug 5-12th 2017. First of all the ac was broken when we arrived and we didn't notice until the second floor was about 80 degrees but someone had cut the fan on instead of auto to try to circulate the air. As soon as we noticed we contacted maintenance and they came out and corrected the problem immediately. But I feel like that should have been checked on prior to arrival that the fan was on auto and not on all the time. Some of our guests had woken up the second to last day of our stay with swollen eyes and congested sinuses, then noticed there was mold growing on the ac vents in some rooms including the upstairs family room. My grandmother and uncles took Clorox wipes and cleaned most of the vents off, but again I feel as those that clean the home should have noticed this issue not to mention it's a health concern. The upstairs sofa had ants trailing when we arrived with dust, food and whatever else anyone swept under there for what looked like the past summer, the house was not cleaned, the kitchen counters were sticky when we arrived as well that attracted ants prior to us even unpacking. The tiki bar was overgrown on the windows with vines, the bathroom had vines growing in it. We cut these when we arrived as we had children in our group. A few days later the landscape crew came out and cut some stuff but we had already taken care of the larger items that shouldn't have been an issue to begin with. There were multiple nails sticking up out of boards and multiple loose boards on walkways, decks and stairs. The stairs outside for the three stories also had mold and mildew on them that was so slick when it rained and someone fell. The pool also was filled when we arrived with a hose and was freezing, which was fine but a few days later the pool was cleaned Wednesday we let them know the pool was leaking water somehow because we had filled it up Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday the pool was below the skimmer again, the pool cleaner advised us to just keep the pool running and they would send someone out, we waited, filled the pool each day as it was below the skimmer to keep the pump from burning up. No one ever came while we were there. This year in 2018 when we decided to try again in a different home, we rented One of These Nights from August 3rd to August 10th 2018. When we arrived this year the home was in better shape than last years home but you would think paying $20,000 for a home for the week rental would be better taken care of. The dishwasher was broken and leaking in the floor (maintenance came out said they were going to be back, we never saw them again), the garbage disposal was broken and rotting food was in there smelling each time you walked past the sink, the downstairs ice maker leaked into the floor. I called maintenance as well due to the trash not being dumped said they'd be out that day, 2 days later they came. All around the pool there were weeds/grass growing through the fence and all around the pool deck, there was mold growing on the deck door frames/green and dripping, and the gate to get down to the beach my grandmother had a hard time getting through, well we all did as it looked like maintenance had not cleaned the sand from behind the gate since the home was built, if you were carrying a beach bag you had to toss it over in order to get through the gate, and we are all relatively small people. There was an outdoor shower/foot wash out on the deck near the beach before you entered the pool area, however the knobs were rusted off to cut the shower/foot wash on so couldn't use that. The maintenance on the homes is just not happening, and when you go to the beach for a week and pay what they are charging for the week, you would think the homes would be kept in better condition and you wouldn't have to take care of things or worry with certain things while you are there. We go to Nags Head every year, but will not be renting from Village Realty due to all of the issues we've had in...

We have been going to the OBX for about 30 years now and have used all of the rental companies there at one time or another. This year we rented "Hotel California" from Village Realty for a family reunion vacation. We made the reservation a full year in advance and Village Realty was very prompt at getting our deposit and then the balance of rent on the exact date it was due. About a week prior to our arrival date, VR sent us a text asking for our ETA on the arrival date so they could plan the house cleaning schedule accordingly. We responded by stating we would be arriving early. They responded back saying it was noted and we would be notified if our house was available before the promised 4pm check in time. We did arrive in Southern Shores around noon and went to our rental house to see if the cleaning people were there. This is a really large house and we knew it would take several hours to clean, so we thought the cleaning crew would already be working on the house. There was no sign of a cleaning crew there so we called VR to see if the house was ready. We were told the house had not been cleaned yet and a crew should be there shortly. We went to have lunch and then to the grocery store and returned to the house around 3:15. Again there was no sign of anyone at the house so we tried our code for the keyless entry but it did not work. We again called the VR office and was told the cleaning crew had not yet been there but this time we were told they had no idea when a cleaning crew would arrive as they had a severe staffing shortage. We had 18 bags of groceries and asked if we could at least get them inside the cooled house until it was ready for our use but the customer service agent refused our request. We could not understand why we wouldn't be allowed to do this especially since there was no way the house was going to be ready on time at that point anyway. We requested to talk to a supervisor and the situation was explained to him. We again requested to just put our grocery bags inside the house since it was 95 degrees outside and we had so much food that was sitting in the heat in our vehicles and we did not want them to spoil. The manager said also said NO, we could not do that and also stated he had no idea when the cleaning crew was actually getting there. He did say that our code to enter the house would unlock the door at 4pm and then we could put our bags inside the house. We still couldn't put anything away until the "crew" had finished cleaning the house. We should have been told ahead of time that they did not have adequate cleaning people so we could have planned appropriately. And, since they knew the house wasn't going to be ready on time, why wouldn't they just let us in the 45 minutes earlier to put our groceries inside the house so the food would not go bad. The customer service was awful!! They didn't care at all that we were inconvenienced because they already had our money. Finally at 3:45pm, the cleaning crew (2 people) arrived and they did allow us to bring our bags of food inside. After about an hour of cleaning, another 4 people arrived to help finish cleaning the 7 bed, 10 bath house and they eventually finished around 5:30. The cleaning people did a pretty good job of cleaning that huge house so quickly but the house required more cleaning than just changing bed linens. sweeping the floors and having the bathrooms wiped down. The grill outside was simply disgusting and we had to take it apart to clean it appropriately before we could use it. The pool furniture was old, worn, falling apart and had significant mold on it. We understand it is difficult to keep things clean and in good repair at these rental homes at the beach, but this house is renting for almost $11,000 a week and we expected better for that price. We would never use Village Realty again! Why bother asking people what time they are arriving? That actually made us feel worse. Just tell us up front the situation and WE can plan...

Pelican Breeze is not great.

Positives

Perfect location. 2 blocks from the beach (5 min walk) in a quiet neighborhood. Absolutely HUGE. Lots of room. They were pretty good about contact with us over a holiday. Beds were not uncomfortable. Well-equipped game room and hot tub for everyone to enjoy.

Now for the rest of it:

This house is not maintained well by the owners. It's not been painted in a while, which made us feel uneasy about mold and whatever else might be lurking. Very dirty. This includes drawers full of kitchenware with stuck on food from the last renters. Cabinets were covered in grease. Bad smell in the house. Village Realty sent someone to help tidy up, and she was very nice. However, she was visibly embarrassed by how dirty it was. MANY nonstick pans were dirty and the Teflon was scratched off (which is a health hazard). The housekeeping person took them, promised to return with proper pots and pans, and then didn't. 2nd refrigerator was not functional at all. First refrigerator has broken shelves. Village offered to take $25/day off the rate and provide us with coolers. The coolers might have helped with some of the refrigerated items, but not the frozen (ice cream, meats, etc.), so we declined the coolers. But this was time and money spent at the expensive Corolla grocery stores that we all would have preferred to skip. The two dishwashers were the loudest any of us have ever heard, and they were also poorly installed into the kitchen cabinets. To close it, a large adult had to wedge it under the warped wood. 6.The sand volleyball court has no sand. Just unmaintained grass and beach burrs. So. Many. Stairs. We knew it didn't have an elevator, and all of us live in places where we are used to climbing stairs every day. But this was really strange. Many TVs didn't all work or didn't connect, and the wireless internet was really bad. Also, someone needs to be checking the remotes. Half of them were missing, had dead batteries, or no batteries. The pool table in the game room was not properly maintained. Dirty, pieces falling apart, and not even any chalk for pool sticks.

The really sad part is, they could make this place very nice. Needs some paint, wood replacement, potentially a new roof. The bigger issue is it's obvious neither the owners nor Village inspect properties in between stays. And I'm understanding to an extent because it was during Christmas and it's probably hard to find available people. HOWEVER, we did not arrive until one day AFTER our lease was set to start. I alerted Village to this and told them they would have plenty of time to turn the property over. This means despite the extra time, they neglected to walk the property, make sure it was to a proper standard. This is the reason for the review. Village is responsible for managing, and they were either negligent in letting the owners know the property needed repair or contracting unqualified cleaners.

And, while I’m sure Village would have been as accommodating as possible, some conditions of the house were beyond what they could fix. If they were proactively looking at their properties, I would hope they would either make some adjustments to their own cleaning service or tell the property owner that some changes are necessary. We were on vacation and have no desire to take on the responsibility of sending them an email every time something doesn’t work as expected. In my opinion, this is why a property owner hires a property manager…to PROACTIVELY report and resolve issues related to the property BEFORE a renter arrives. My limit on contacting them is two issues. If there are more than that, I assume it isn’t managed properly.

This is our second time renting from Village Realty, and the first experience was fantastic. Unfortunately, Pelican Breeze's current condition is apparently within their "standard." There were 13 of us who stayed at Pelican Breeze, and it wasn't...