Original Message:
Re: Anyone have experience with Preston Green or Americap International Corp (by Matt K.):
I've rented from Preston 2 years ago and just booked another stay at the same property in So Cal. It went without a hitch last time, and the price was actually about $100-150/week lower than everything else I could find direct from owner. Same story this time, his price was about $50/week higher than the best offer I got direct from owner. To me it's worth it because it saves me time. I've dealt with Preston, the process is fine, you pay an upfront deposit (on a credit card, so you have protection from your credit card company), and you pay the rest once the reservation is in your name. There's plenty of dishonest people on all sides of these transactions. The owner can decide to change the reservation at the last moment, regardless of whether it's rented directly to renter or through an intermediary. At least if I rent through an intermediary and an owner pulls something like that, I want to think that the intermediary I paid will resolve this headache for me better than I would myself, because he has been doing it for longer than I have.
I want to go to the place I want, and I want to pay the least amount of money doing that. If someone can handle the travel arrangements for me, it's worth the extra $50-100/week to me, easily. My time is more important than that.
I suppose the point of this is -- it's all relative folks. Some folks don't like intermediaries and that's fine. To me, they fulfill a business need and spend their time on something that I'd rather not and I would gladly pay them for that. Hopefully, they realize that and we have a good relationship for many years to come.
If I get screwed than there are legal recourses of course, but in my experience a business would rather have a happy repeat customer than create problems for themselves over 1 transaction...