Need help with Vacation Home Rentals

[Lady_Sarah]

Hi everyone,

We are taking an extended family vacation in June 2011 to celebrate our oldest son's graduation. There will be about 16 of us and we want to rent a house and stay all together. The houses that I had found at All Star Vacation Homes are unfortunately all spoken for now (2 years in advance) due to a major volleyball tournament that goes on at Wide World of Sports in mid June. So now I'm looking for another company that might have a house available during that time.

What we want is a home that sleeps 16 people, is close to WDW, has about 7 bedrooms with 5 masters preferred, in a gated/safe community, and has its own private pool. I don't want to be at a timeshare, community facilities don't matter.. just the house, and I want to go through a rental company if at all possible versus working with an individual home owner.

Can anyone suggest some other reputible rental companies to look at (or message me some)? There are so many when I do a search for vacation home rentals and it's hard to know which ones are honest companies that are good to work with.

Thanks a bunch!

 

[Frothy]

Always been very happy renting through Florida Leisure. We rent a 6 bed home with a wonderful lake view on Cumbrian Lakes and I know they have other large homes as well.

 

[Lady_Sarah]

Thanks for the information. Unfortunately they only have 1 home that sleeps 16. That seems to be one of our biggest issues as we really need a 7 bedroom house. I can find quite a few that fit 12 or 14 but to get 15 or 16 is tough.

 

[mousemom11]

Try Villa to Rent. They have 4 7-bedroom houses.

Also try VRBO - Kissimmee area.

HTH.

 

[Lady_Sarah]

There's some lovely homes in VBRO. I really like the Formosa Gardens area also. But I'm leary renting through a private owner. How can I tell that the home is as it says it is. Then what happens if they sell the home in the mean time (remember 2 years) and I'm possibly left hanging with no homes left a couple months before going to Disney, and them having our money. Also, it seems that the private owners want 20% down versus some of the management companies I have seen only wanting 1 night.

Does anyone else have ideas for where to find homes for 16 that fit what I am looking for?

 

[sympatico]

We always rent directly from the owner. You can find lots of 7+ bedroom homes on vrbo.com for Emerald Island and Formosa Gardens Estates.
This is the Kissimmee site:
http://www.vrbo.com/vacation-rentals/usa/florida/central-disney-orlando/kissimmee
Look at homes in Emerald Island (manned gate), Formosa Gardens Estates and Acadia Estates (both have a coded gate), Rolling Hills has a few big homes but is not gated.
Emerald Island also has community facilities.
There's also homeaway.com http://www.holidaylettings.co.uk/kissimmee/
Another company apart from allstar is floridasunvacationhomes.com

 

[boakl]

with 16.

The only thing you listed that you'd like, but it doesn't have, is 5 Master bedrooms. It has four, but one of the non-masters does have its own attached bath. The only other issue is that the kitchen is small and not as well-equipped as we would have liked, but then again, maybe you don't plan on cooking all that much. We were there for Thanksgiving and skipped the parks on Turkey day, and needed a lot more cookware than the owners had supplied. We did manage to make it all work though!

It worked out great for our group. We had three sets of grandparents, four of us were in our late 30's/early 40's and five little boys all under the age of 8. We never felt crowded or on top of each other. There was a cinema room that the little boys loved! There were also lots of little spaces to go and hide when you'd had enough of family togetherness.

Formosa Gardens is gated and ridiculously close to the parks. Even during Thanksgiving week we were on property in under 10 minutes. We'd usually set out to leave 1/2 hour before we wanted to be in the gates for all of the parks except for the MK, which we allowed 45 minutes from the house to the gate.

The pool was huge, lots of lounge chairs and a great view of the lake. It was great to wake up with some coffee out there or enjoy a glass of wine after a long day at the parks. There are two enormous round tables out there that seated everyone just fine.

We rented directly from the owner with no major issues, and we'd stay there again if we went with such a large group.

Here is a link:

http://www.vrbo.com/8232

They also rent through Presidential villas, if you'd prefer to go through an agency. Here is their link:

http://www.presidentialvillas.com/florida/kissimmee/f2/

Hope this helps

 

[Lady_Sarah]

Thanks boakl, that's very helpful. I sent you a PM with a few other questions.

Has anyone else stayed in a home that sleeps at least 16 that they could recommend?

 

[KayR]

Emerald Island Resort has several 7 bedroom homes. There are the Bay homes which have 7 bedrooms, 4.5 bathrooms. They also have homes on the Enclave which have larger floorplans and larger lots - these are the Harbor style homes and they have 7 bedroom and 5.5 or 6 bathrooms.

There is a website of owners at Emerald Island Resort Homes

Like Formosa, it is close to the parks - in fact it is in the same area. All of the owners should have a management company locally who looks after the home.

 

[Lady_Sarah]

Thanks Kay, I have been continually searching for the past few days and I do seem to be finding some good ones in Emerald Islands. My top 2 homes so far are both there. I like that the prices are reasonable as well.

What type of house was the one that you stayed in?

 

[KayR]

Its a Palm Harbor style with the den upstairs (extra space instead of large ceiling above the familyroom area. It has 7 bedrooms and 5.5 bathrooms.

We stayed there once with 15 people. I was worried it would feel crowded, but was surprised how uncrowded it felt.

The floorplan is here

Its one of the "Enclave" homes so it is on a larger lot and has a larger square footage. The homes are further apart too, which I like.

HTH

-Kay