[bucky]

Hello Everyone,

It was brought to my attention today that this thread began so I felt it necessary to join as there are always two sides to every story. We are the owners of the courtyard villa in this thread.

Nine years ago my wife and I were introduced to The Villages by a client of mine and "drank the kool aid" as they say. One month later, after our first visit to The Villages, we purchased our turn key courtyard villa from the original owners who lived here. We also use our villa ourselves every January as "snowbirds." That being said we do not prefer to live in a "dump" so we feel our villa is a lovely home evidenced by over 70+ renters over 9 years of renting (many of them repeat renters) without any complaints until this one in this thread.

My wife and I travel a lot and have stayed at many different accommodations ranging from sub par and above so from our own experience we have always tried to maintain our rental at a standard above the average. Is it always perfect...no, as sometimes minor issues arise between our annual January visits that we're not aware of living 1200 miles away in the Midwest. However, each January when we're here, along with our local and very dedicated home watch throughout the year, we make improvements and maintain the same standards we would expect when we travel.

I received notice from this renter of their discontent on a number of things upon their arrival and immediately addressed them which I've listed below:

"Not as advertised" - I admit that the pictures on our site are from our original posting but only a few items have been changed but only to the better. We upgraded to a king size pillow top bed from a plain queen mattress; unfortunately the king did not come with a head or foot board but we felt it was worth the sacrifice for the upgrade. The bed is on a frame and with a new lovely bed spread to fit the new bed as pictured.

We had 2 lounge chairs years ago but over the years the FL sun took its toll and they deteriorated and we had to dispose of them but our entire patio set as posted is still looking great.

"TV did not work" - the TV was/is functional like it always has been, some simple training of the remote by our home watch and all was good.

"Rusty appliances" - the renter complained that the toaster and coffee maker were "rusty" which I immediately replaced in case some previous renters caused some damage I was not aware of.

"AC spewed water" - this was a clogged AC drain which happens often but obviously I was not aware of being 1200 miles away. It was easily fixed by the home watch.

I could continue with explanations of the other complaints the renter has posted but I hope that everyone can understand that there are two sides to each story as mentioned. All these minor issues were innocent and addressed immediately and we felt we had to defend ourselves as we are not sub par landlords or taking advantage of anyone. We love The Villages and our villa and soon will retire here. We would never want to diminish any of our renter's experience of The Villages by providing anything less than what we would expect from any rental ourselves.

Attached are pictures of our home this evening where I'm drafting this correspondence. Thank you for your time.