We booked three apartments with friends. Getting the reservation sorted was already difficult because the owner sometimes took a whole day to answer a simple question. Before we arrived, he didn’t respond to messages or pick up the phone. At check-in, the cleaning lady seemed surprised to see us, and we were told to wait while the owner sorted things out. Check-in was supposed to be available from 15:00, and we arrived at 17:00, but we still waited three hours for him to show up. He seemed drunk when we first spoke, and it was hard to communicate. He barely spoke English, so we had to use gestures and Google Translate. Friends were planning to visit the next day, so we asked if we could celebrate a little and when we needed to be quiet. He said partying was fine as long as we were quiet from midnight. When we asked for an ashtray, he gestured that we could throw the cigarette ends wherever we liked. It seemed odd, but we thought he was just relaxed. We were wrong. The next day, we grilled, had a few drinks, and used the pool with our friends. Before 21:00, the police showed up and told us to be quiet. The other guests said they hadn’t called, because they liked to party too and weren’t bothered. The only others in the house were the owner’s family, who had said it was fine to party until midnight. The following day, the owner arrived in a frenzy, yelled, “Everybody! Sit!”, and pointed at a table beside the pool. We sat down, but he shouted noises we couldn’t understand and left. The weather turned stormy, so we couldn’t leave the house. The cleaning lady said the owner wanted to talk at 14:00. We stayed in, but he never came. The next day, while we were at ZRCE beach, he called to ask where we were because he wanted to speak with us. It felt as if he expected us to stay at the house all holiday so he could yell at us whenever he wanted. After a week, some of us had to leave because our holiday ended before the others’. We had booked two double apartments for the couples and one four-bed apartment for the single friends. The singles left and the couples stayed, but the owner had booked other people into one couple’s apartment. Sorting it out took half a day, and he also tried to make the people who remained leave. The apartment itself was in poor shape. The toilet seat was loose, shower water wouldn’t drain, and there was mold in the shower. The place stank, and the couch had yellow and white stains and smelled of urine. Wind blew through the apartment and made the doors flap all night, even when we shut them tightly. The owner charges 5 euros a day for AC, but it only makes noise. The pool was good, but we had to clean it ourselves, and it irritated me that the owner then blamed us for it being dirty. I would never book an apartment from this owner again. The place wasn’t worth the money, and the owner was a dealbreaker, even if the apartments had been great. He seemed to want us out once he’d got his money. Communication was impossible, as he didn’t speak any of the languages listed in his ads. Even if he did, he seemed drugged up 24/7, so talking felt pointless.
