Is long-term renting through booking.com a scam?

3/30/2020 2:38:35 AM

This is 100% to be a scam. Let’s see why:

  1. a viewing before completing the transaction through Booking.com would not be possible. <= this is where you should run screaming and not read anything else. Even if the place exists, how would you know it’s not a mold infested, badly insulated garbage heap?
  2. If they wanted to do a real long term rent through an app they would use airbnb which allows for this and not booking.com which doesn’t. It is a huge red flag they want to use a platform not suited for long term.
  3. I will send you the booking invitation through the Booking.com system <= once again, airbnb has this but even there only after enquiring after a property, Booking.com very simply does not have such a feature. This person is talking nonsense, we will see why.
  4. Booking.com will automatically provide the tenancy agreement. <= the very reason Booking.com stops at 30 days is because in a lot of jurisdictions 30 days is where a short term becomes a tenancy and booking.com does not want to mess with tenancy agreements. Booking.com most assuredly will not provide a tenancy agreement! I have first booked an apartment with Booking.com close to five years ago and there’s nothing even remotely close to a tenancy agreement in all those emails, I reviewed a few again.
  5. If you don’t like the property for any reason, Booking will refund your money on the same day. <= Booking.com doesn’t exactly work like that. As this blog post shows, the host sets the cancellation policy and up until very very recently the scammer was able to siphon the funds off as soon as the reservation becomes 90% non-refundable, otherwise on the guest’s check-in date. See for example here. Right now, because of the COVID-19 situation, they can only get their money one day past check in per this update but I somewhat suspect they are not 100% up-to-date. Also, do you want to convince Booking.com that the apartment simply doesn’t exist within less than 24 hour before your money is gone? If Booking.com doesn’t side with you then your only avenue is to sue them in a Dutch court of law.

Finally, if I needed to make a grim bet, I would put my money on this being nothing more than bait-and-switch and they don’t want to use Booking.com: you agree to this, and after some hemming and hawing and probably a few juicy photos they come back complaining about some problems with booking.com listing and ask for a plain vanilla WU wire. By this time you are hopefully hooked enough to go ahead with it, if not, what’s there to lose for them? You can even test it by agreeing and see what happens, just don’t send money to them…

And if you are wondering how people rent long term in a different country: they might have boots on the ground (company or friend) and if they don’t then just do a short term rent much like it’d be a vacation and get a place once you are there. Easy as pie. I did so when I landed in Vancouver.

Credit:stackoverflow.com‘

About me

Hello,My name is Aparna Patel,I’m a Travel Blogger and Photographer who travel the world full-time with my hubby.I like to share my travel experience.

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