The demise of Owners Direct
The writing has been on the wall for quite some time, but an email announcing the end of the road a couple of months ago was still a sad email to receive. The brand Owners Direct has been written off at last.
It’s not been a way of contacting owners directly for quite some time; the parent company Homeaway, owned themselves by Expedia, have long allowed large agencies to list. Since they introduced a service fee, online payments and bookings, direct contact has also been more difficult to make with the company hiding guests email addresses from the owner. Forcing contact through their site until after the booking is made. Not a great way to build the sort of trust there needs to be between an owner who is handing over the keys to a property that may well be worth hundreds of thousands of pounds and the guest handing over their money to a stranger in exchange for a lovely holiday.
