Holidayhouses.co.nz

Mike from Papanui

Be careful (or avoid) using this site if you're renting holiday accommodation. We used it to book a holiday home for four days.
The pictures looked ok, it had a couple good reviews (which we now suspect were provided by friends or family). They did say it was a new house and still a "work in progress" but we assumed that would mean there was some painting to be done, landscaping, or something of that nature. Instead, we arrived to find a construction site including a sign at the entry saying "Construction site, no unauthorised personnel".
Opened the front door and it was a bare concrete slab, with no floor coverings except for a few pieces of old carpet and underlay scattered about which was worse because the pieces were not secured so a trip hazard. Bare electrical wires were hanging from the ceiling and walls, only about half the living space was accessible because of building materials and various crap. In the bathroom off the master bedroom, the shower head was broken and they had used a cable tie to secure it and it pointed straight down. So unless you were a metre tall you couldn't use it. The other bathroom had an open shower, the shower head pointed straight at the wall switch plate, which was unsecured so an excellent opportunity for someone to electrocute themselves. The outside was worse.
Then to add insult to potential injury the place was filthy. The oven had baked on food all over the inside, food crumbs and baked on food on the hob, countertops and sink. The dishwasher was full of dirty dishes and the undercounter rubbish bin was full. The fridge and freezer were so full of their personal stuff we had trouble putting much of anything in either. And there were open containers of food in the freezer......
The owner "didn't understand what we were upset about as it is a lovely home". Refused to refund us so after looking for two days (it was Waitangi weekend) we found another place to move to. Owner refused to refund the two nights and when we spoke to holidayhouses.co.nz (owned by Trademe) they said "they do not get involved in disputes between owners and guests".
So we're now going to have to go to the Disputes Tribunal to try and get our money back, spoke to a lawyer he said it was a clear case of a breach of the Fair Trading Act.
So beware!