TravelTalkOnline Forums Travel and Vacation Forums St. Maarten - St. Martin Pondering an AirBnB

This year Beach Side Villas is fully booked for the two weeks that I want to be there. Y'all need to shut up about it! lol

Anyway, a place at Rainbow Beach Club looks pretty nice. Two bedroom. Top floor, gorgeous kitchen (yes, I cook), laundry ...walking to Jordan Village. There was another choice at LaSiesta on the beach in Simpson Bay, but we can get a lot of rum punches and dinners out for the price difference. So I decided I could give up being directly ON the beach. We usually travel to Orient or Mullet anyway. Or spend the day at El Zafiro. And Rainbow has a pool, and if the beach is "in," a walk down the spiral staircase.

My concern is the cancellation policy. It seems HARSH. Only 50% refund for canceling? Does trip insurance cover an AirBnB?

Has anyone had experience staying at RBC in Cupecoy?

Thanks in advance!

Leona--MOST places do not have such a harsh cancellation penalty. PERSONALLY, I would not accept that. Trip cancellation insurance pays, regardless of the type of accommodation, but doesn't cover if you just decide not to go, unless you buy "cancel for any reason" coverage, which is very expensive. You have to cancel for a covered reason, which generally is your health, or a family member, etc., but they are VERY strict about those things, so you might need to cancel, thinking it is covered, when it turns out it is not.

Rainbow is a pretty big complex. I think actually most units there are fairly similar. Why don't you look for another unit there which doesn't have that cancellation policy? Or at the Cliff? The Cliff would probably be more expensive though.

I presume that you know that Bill and Elaine live at Rainbow. I've visited their unit, which is very nice.

Best wishes in your search!

Not sure exactly what you want but our favorite place is The Belair Beach hotel.

On the beach, a very private beach with virtually no access points but from Divi. Fabulous swimming. Every unit is oceanfront and two bedroom with a small but very usable kitchen. The resort has been nicely renovated since Irma. It has a wonder little store and a decent restaurant and a FABULOUS staff. It's close to Phillipsburg and grocery stores. Plenty of secure parking. Designated beach chairs for your entire time there. Additional restaurants available at Divi which is exactly adjacent. And NO jet fuel fumes!

It literally has everything WE need.

Exactly Carol. We even go so far as to filter for the best cancellation policy. Some are ridiculous like losing 50% of the booking cost if you cancel after just 48 hours after you book!! When you book 6 months + in advance that is unreasonable. It's their place I guess so they make the rules but we don't even bother with those places regardless of how cheap or swanky or marketed as the best thing since sliced bread they are. We also look on both Airbnb and Vrbo too.

Have you looked into Mary's Boone??? We stayed many times before we discovered BSV through, thanks to TTOL!! Mark and Carla Cleveland do a nice job of owner/operating this lil gem!! http://www.marysboon.com/

Dolfer, I just checked the website for Belair, and the place does look nice. One thing you wrote did have me confused - you said that there is designated beach chairs - do you mean for your unit? One reason we have stayed away from hotels, is that in many of them on other islands, people would go down at 6 or 7 in the morning and put towels on the chairs, and so if you showed up around 10, there were none left.

At the Belair you get with Beach Attendant on your first day, select chairs and the attendant puts a piece of tape with your room number and those chairs are now yours for the duration of your stay. We almost always find available chairs near our room so it can be a short walk. Our last stay it was 28 foot steps from our front porch to our chairs.

dolfer--I really LIKE the planes at BSV! I don't smell any jet fumes either. But, everyone has different wants and needs.

Dolfer, thanks for the quick response. That does sound great.

barry--Of course at BSV, no one has to mark chairs at all, because many days, you may be the only ones on the beach there!

I would not mind being near the airport but my wife has an ultra-sensitive nose. For example, I was experimenting with a new tequila-based cocktail the other night. She walks in the door from work and two rooms away, before she has seen me or the cocktail, and she says "Oh, hitting the tequila already?"

Yes, some people are very sensitive to things like perfumes, etc.

Too bad re your wife's scent sensitivity because BSV is really an awesome place to stay. No issues with beach loungers as each unit is equipped with two on the sun porch and I think two more - possibly even four - in the sand for their personal use.

In all the times we've stayed there we've never had an issue with fuel odors except for one time when DH was sitting on the observation deck for almost an hour watching the big boys come and go, and even then, it was minimal. But we've never been bothered either in the BSV unit or on the beach there.

I never thought we'd find island accommodations we'd love as much as we did our specific unit at the Towers, but a couple of years before we lost it we discovered BSV so while losing our Towers time was sad, we decided we are possibly even happier at BSV. Never thought I'd say that.

Something to consider. AirB&B is becoming a huge scam center. If something does not smell right run! Use a credit card regardless!
G

Leona - Have you considered Horny Toad Guest House?

George--a lot of private owners do not accept credit cards. Agreed that is more protection, but not always possible. The last VRBO place we stayed at did not accept credit cards, but I knew someone who regularly stayed there, so felt fine sending a check. I was able to talk directly to the owner on the phone also, so that gave me a higher level of confidence.

The explanation that I have heard, from more than one person, as to why many private owners do not accept credit cards, is basically a scam in reverse, by renters. People pay with a credit card, and then MAKE UP something that the place was uninhabitable and dispute the charge, and the owners get screwed out of a rental. I THINK that VRBO has some kind of protection for their rental clients now? Not sure.

VRBO says that their fee includes a "Book with confidence" clause but only if you pay through them rather than direct to the owner. This is included in their fee charged. ANy payment made direct to the owner is not covered.

boucharda--OK, I remembered something about it, but not all the particulars. Thanks.

Hey Leona, look at this. Looks pretty nice!!

Link

always a concern for us, so wherever we may be travelling, we don't even consider places that have what we consider strict cancellation policies....we often use AirBnB, VRBO, Booking.com, and will sometimes choose to pay a premium rate for cancellation flexibility, vs. a prepaid discounted rate with "no cancellations"...especially when making reservations well in advance

Hve you tried Bobby Barron he has a great place in Beacon Hill
he also manages other properties as well !!

Great place except for those stairs.

Yeah, I saw that too. There is one bedroom on the first floor of the unit though.

Carol, y’all do know where those units are, right? They are on the very top of the Blue Mall, if there are even any stores still in the mall. But very interesting that the owners are rent their units out. I have always wondered what happen to all of those units since the mall tanked.

Yes, I do wonder whether it would be kind of spooky to be inside that building after night. I wonder if they have security?

Great questions. It wold be interesting to find out, we might just have to rent one of those units just to find out. I’m really considering doing just that.

Nice units however, very nice.

Fox--if you do rent there, would love to hear about it!!

Oh yea, I’ll definitely report about it.

True but the Master Br is pretty nice. I wouldn’t want to pay the 1 bedroom rate and get the downstairs one.

No idea on that, but I 'assume' that if you get one bedroom, they lock off whichever bedroom you don't want.

Yeah, I saw that, Carol. But the Blue Mall and it's "isolation" wouldn't be my first choice...lol. And if the power goes out, you're screwed if you are in the elevator.

I had a friend that lived on top pre-Irma. The pool was on the top floor as well. I notice no pool in these pics. Must be gone gone...ha ha. What I saw happen to her unit was criminal. Once a window went, Irma just blew through. She lost everything, including some pets.

OK. Best wishes in your search.

We love Mary's Boon too. We have stayed at all of them but is our favorite place out of all the others on Simpson Bay. Problem is they book up fast but do keep checking back. Great caring staff, excellent food and nice beach bar,,,, The property has become more and more gorgeous over the years.

We stayed at Moonrise, pre-Irma.

Very nice. We only needed 1 bedroom. Had to go to the roof to use the pool. Nice balcony that overlooks the Puerto Cupecoy lagoon.

There was a secure entrance with an elevator and security for the residences.

Have also stayed at Rainbow twice. Both units had great balconies with ocean views and one had a rooftop terrace.

The spiral staircase is a no-can-do for me now, sadly.

Love the Cupecoy area!

Thanks, Joyce; we also like Cupecoy, primarily as Jordan Village has grown into a nice area.

On a side note...does anyone know "Jackie" with sintmaartenrentalweeks or caribbeanweeks? I've just had a bit of a nasty encounter with this person and am very upset.

I have eventually booked with Jennifer of Jennifers Vacation Villas. The one I wanted that was on Airbnb is also listed with her. There are certainly fewer fees than AirBnb tacks on! OMG, a cleaning fee of $115 and a "service fee" of $372 to keep their website up and running? That is 1/2 of one plane ticket. It all adds up, and I'm not a cheapskate. But the way Jackie/Carlos responded to me was CRAP professionalism.