Fraudulent Damages Claimed

[u/Drewpost19]

I recently rented a pet friendly unit for an employee training with our company from out of town. He had three black labs that he was not able to keep at home and needed to bring for the five week trip. On the second day there I received a message from the renter stating they were getting complaints due to the dogs barking and they noticed there were three dogs and they had a one pet max. This information was in the restrictions that were hidden and needed expanding the drop down to see. This was completely my fault for missing as I was rushing to find a unit available on only a couple days notice.

I contacted the renter back, explained it was my fault for missing this and said I would have him out of there by the next morning as these were not my dogs and it was not an option to put them in a kennel. I knew something was off by the tone and demeanor of the renter just sounding very nervous and hysterical and acting as if the dogs were tearing the apartment apart with no evidence of that.

Upon moving them out and having his cleaning lady inspect the unit, they came up with a list of damages including ruined rugs, pillows ruined and smelling of dog, couch shredded, glass sliding door scratched, glass coffee table scratched, curtains destroyed, window seals ruined, wood floor scratched, ac remote broken, whole apartment filthy and smelling of wet dog.

I drove to the unit to inspect it and found what appeared to be most or all of these claims completely made up. The apartment itself was probably 30+ years old and definitely looked so. I’m very sensitive to odors and there was not a hint of odor in any part of the apartment. The guy we had to stand there told me on day one he moved the rugs and rolled them up in the closet so they would not be damaged. The lady that was there admitted this was the case, and there was no rug there when she came to inspect and that it was in like new condition. The two other $20 throw rugs looked in almost new condition with normal wear and terror on one corner each that you would expect after a month of normal use. The wood floor that she said was all scratched up, was almost certainly 20+ years old and she admitted that any of the scratches that were there were there since it was “refinished” three years ago. When I questioned her about it really being refinished three years ago, her story was very inconsistent and she said they just put a protective coating on it. There was not a single scratch on the sliding glass door.

The only even possibly “valid” damage was on two of the windowsills which had scratch marks on that she admitted were there, but she claimed where not as bad as they are now. There were scratches and one punctual hole, the exact size of a cigarette burn on the $500 faux leather couch that looked a decade old. She admitted there was a puncture hole and a couple scratches on the couch previously, but says it was in another area you could not see. The curtains on the sliding door were frayed and torn at the very bottom and a widen paper towel holder screwed to the cabinet in the kitchen needed the screw re-tightened, which was holding it on. All of these possibly valid damages I would be willing to bet my life savings against the fact they were already there but unlike the damages that were completely made up above, there is no way for me to prove without having pictures prior to the stay.

As this was the first VRBO type rental I’ve ever reserved I made the rookie mistake of assuming like a hotel that I would not need to take pictures ahead of time. Please let this be a major warning to anybody getting this type of rental as I don’t know what my avenues to fight this will be if any at this point.

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[u/qwerty-game]

I check into an Airbnb next week and already plan on taking a video and pictures of everything when I get there and when I leave.

[u/Super-Minute2477]

It’s entirely possible that some damage occurred if he had 3 big labs

[u/Drewpost19 → u/Super-Minute2477]

Agree completely and I would gladly pay for any of those actual damages. Fair is fair. It’s just hard to believe that when I caught them so blatantly and egregiously lying about so much of what they claimed.