Paying for holiday villa...safest way

Fu_Man_Chu

Hi, we have just found a holiday villa we would like to book for our Summer holiday. After finding the villa on AirBnB and seeing the crazy booking fee's I decided to do some investigating and managed to find the Villa owners personal website for his property. Booking through his website saved us £500 but we are now left with having to transfer the deposit and then full amount into his bank account late next summer.
We would normally always use a Credit card for large purchases to enjoy the protection they offer but I'm not sure you can transfer cash from a credit card to a personal bank account.
Does anyone know of a safe way to transfer money between accounts that offers us some protection? 
The villa owner appears to have been in business 10+ years with reviews going back this far but non of us know what's around the corner and it seems to be a very big gamble in order to save £500.
Thanks
 

la531983

Unless you use a card you won't have any at all other than the small claims court. Do not bank transfer him money.

Doing a money transfer from a card to your current account and then using that money to pay them via bank transfer offers no protection either, so don't think that is a workaround. 

Fu_Man_Chu

I'm wondering if Paypal would be an option? 

tetrarch

We rented out a holiday home for well over a decade and came across this fear again and again.

There is no "prefectly safe" mechanism, and there is risk on both sides. You are worried about being defrauded and the villa owner is worried about some portential scumbag trashing their home.

The good news is that you have done your homework, found a place with a ton of reviews and contacted them directly. The very best thing you can do is establish a relationship with your villa owner, ring them and speak to them in person. Stalk them on Facebook, whetever makes you feel comfortable. I can tell you as a vacation rental homeowner, nothing is better than speaking to renters one on one.

It's all about trust - go create some

Regards

Tet

Kor65

Have you spoke to the Credit Card company to see if there is a way?  As you know, paying with your credit card could give you more protection. 

We recently booked a villa with James Villas and had a very bad experience .One of the things we found out is that apparently our contract is with the owner/property management company and according to James Villa they are not liable for anything. (Including the 11 year old photographs on their website.)

So you’re best off going direct? at  least you know what you’re getting into and you can do your homework on them as you have instead of paying a third-party a lot of money ,for doing very little. 

The risk is having to deal with the owners/property management company if

Things go wrong  but you have that same  risk if you use a third-party booking company.  

Westin

Wise words and a good summary from @tetrarch

This is obviously a private owner and you may have to accept his terms if you want to rent his villa.  They may not be set up to accept credit card payments, or indeed want to accept cc’s given the merchant fees.  

The “ Do not bank transfer him money” isn’t going to work if you want to rent his villa.  The owner will be looking for a degree of assurance that you want to stay.   No payment - no rental.

Keep_pedalling

We have hired several villas from private owners in France and Italy and have had to pay by BT each time. We always found them through villa listing sites such as owners direct where you can at least see from the reviews which villas that have had happy holidaymakers in previous years. 

Fu_Man_Chu

Thank you for all your replies especially tetrarch who gives a good insight from the owners perspective which isn't something I'd considered.
I guess my main concern is from an insurance point of view. If we or one of our children where to fall ill and not be able to travel would our insurance payout without a proper receipt from a business? I guess I'll need to do some digging into the terms and conditions

la531983

Why wouldnt the host be able to give you a receipt? Or an least an email detailing the booking?

Fu_Man_Chu

la531983 said:

Why wouldnt the host be able to give you a receipt? Or an least an email detailing the booking?

I'm sure they would, would this be sufficient for an insurance company?

TELLIT01

We have paid the accommodation deposit by BT in the past, admittedly to a place we had stayed previously.  We had to cancel and they sent us a receipt for the deposit so that we could claim back from our insurer.