Cozumel House Fiasco

First, let me tell you that this complaint is about a rental agency with the
web site of Cozumel-Villas .com         Note the dash - there is another web
site called CozumelVillas.com  that we have used before and been pleased -
it is run by Ron and Sherrie White of Minnesota.  Cozumel-Villas.com is run
by Rex Walker of Boulder Colorado.  BEWARE OF THAT a.shole.

My group goes to Cozumel twice a year in general.  We like to go during
Carnival in Feb, and like to rent a house in town so we can walk to the
festivities, restaurants, and walk to the shore to get picked up for diving.
Location is paramount to us - much more important than the house amenities.
I have been to Coz 20 times, many of the group are 10 plus visitors - we
love the people, and realize that it is Mexico, and don't expect everything
to be like home.

5 months before our 2004 carnival trip, we rented a house from Rex's
website.  It was a very reasonable priced house, just south of downtown, 2
blocks from Plaza Las Glorias,  no pool, but 3 bedrooms, close to town, and
convenient for diving pick up.  The balance was paid in full by early
January.  We have friends in Cozumel who wanted to know where the house was,
but the agency wouldn't tell them.

Usually when we arrive in Coz, the rental agency meets us at the airport and
escorts us to the house we have rented.  When we arrived last trip, someone
met us and asked us to go to the office.  When we arrived at the office,
they told us the house wasn't available - it had been rented long term.  Why
hadn't they told us that before we arrived???   Mexican excuses.  They
offered to put us in an "upgrade" house - to their credit, it was a more
expensive house, had a pool, and waterfront, but it was 3 MILES NORTH OF
TOWN!!!!   They offered to rent us a van for almost as much money as the
original house cost.  Finally, after an hour of haggling (after an all night
flight from Seattle) and insisting on talking to the owner, Rex Walker, they
finally rented us 2 Geo Tracker's for $200.  Both were crummy car even by
Mexican rental standards, one was the biggest piece of sh.t I have ever
seen.  Ran on 2 or 3 cylinders, nothing worked, no muffler, had to roll down
the windows to open the door from the outside - no inside door levers!! Cars
came on empty - literally on fumes.   Plus, now instead of someone walking
into town whenever we wanted, we had to drive, park, make arrangements to
meet, designated driver,  pain in the butt.

To top it off, maid service was the worst I have ever seen in Mexico.  1 day
there were 4 hand towels (no bath towels) for 7 people!!!!  Took us 2 days
and multiple phone calls to get towels.  Floors were consistently dirty. We
had to drive 6 miles to the marina for diving every am instead of a 2 block
walk for boat pickup.  We had a water talk overflow and flood the place - I
got the water turned off, and we cleaned the place up.  No thanks from the
agency.  2 days to get it fixed and water back to normal.

After arriving home, we complained to Rex and the agency.  All they have
done is give us sh.t for not being happy they "upgraded us" to a house we
didn't want, in a location out of town, and gave us a "bargain rate" for 2
pieces of sh.t rental cars.  They have not apologized for what they did, and
continue to insist the did us a favor. Both Rex, and their general manager
are clueless in any attempt at customer satisfaction.  No offer of
remediation, no explanation of why this happened, no acknowledgement that we
were inconvenienced.  I have given them a month to respond in some form of
satisfactory manner before complaining publicly.

Avoid Cozumel Vacation Villas owned by Rex Walker of Boulder CO.

Email me if ?

Ed Stroup

Spokane, WA

hcdrdive@hotmail.com