Lovely house, shame about the climate control and an owner who doesn’t like criticism
Scored 6.0
The house is spacious and modern, with some lovely art. Kitchen is large and well-supplied (except for dishwasher tablets), and all laundry and bathroom supplies were provided. The location is quiet, beautiful, and convenient, with a lovely park a short walk up the street. The master bed was comfortable, although the bedroom lacks light blocking curtains – necessary because of the street light right outside it.
The biggest problem was the heating, which wasn’t working when we arrived on a very cold and wet day. It took 36 hours and far too many emails back and forth for this to be sorted out, which made for an uncomfortable start to our holiday, and even then, promised extra blankets (there is no extra warm bedding in the property) were never delivered. However, once the heating was restored, the real issue emerged, which is that the ducted air-conditioning only has one temperature control for the whole, large house. The owners claim the temperatures are set at 25° for heating and 22° for cooling, and cannot be changed by guests. This turned out to be untrue, fortunately. The controls are badly designed and hard to see, and the information provided by the owners utterly confusing and wrong, (though the instruction booklet is in the drawer underneath where the control lives.) However, when you manage to set temperature and fan speed, it’s set for every room. While 25° might be fine for sitting and watching TV, or using the kitchen, it’s impossibly hot to sleep under. If you set the temperature low enough to sleep, the rest of the house is chilly when you get up. We found it irritating enough with just the two of us, and every guest in their own bedroom will have different preferences. I also didn’t like the snippy note the owner sent after we insisted the heating needed to be sorted out, and also reporting an issue with the shower head (which was promptly fixed the same day as the heating was sorted out) which asked us to “kindly note our home isn’t perfect, but its clean, comfortable, and we hope has everything you’ll need for a great stay! Its a real home with a few little quirks, and we hope youll find that it adds to its charm.” Having no heat when the outside temperature is 13° doesn’t ‘add to its charm’ nor did having to spend so much time from our limited stay in Perth to deal with the management!
Reply from owner:
Hello Chris. Thank you for your review and feedback. I completely understand your points; however, best to be clear we did do everything we could to assist you as soon as you made contact on arrival & ensure you were comfortable as quickly as possible. Being a new home, these small issues can sometimes present from time to time & we work very hard to ensure all our guests have a wonderful stay. Just to clarify, my message regarding our home not being perfect and has some small quirks was certainly not intended to be ‘snippy’; I just wanted to point out that people’s homes are rarely perfect (as we all have different expectations and requirements), but that overall, ours is super clean, convenient, spacious & comfortable. A true family home. We would love to host you again and welcome you back to any of our 65+ properties we look after all over Perth as short term rentals 😊 Stay well & safe travels, Sarah @Staycay