Exec summary (who does not want to read all): with all the respect to Tessa, who was helpful and reactive to our needs, we would not qualify this as a 'luxury' house but of course this is subjective definition. Would we return?...
Exec summary (who does not want to read all): with all the respect to Tessa, who was helpful and reactive to our needs, we would not qualify this as a 'luxury' house but of course this is subjective definition. Would we return? If the price was better, likely yes (maybe we also got higher price due to May vakantie?) but with less families so that at least 1 room downstairs is 'sacrificed' as 'public' area for shower to the pool.
Positives:
Tessa (host): helpful (cut our wood even without asking, gave cables for car etc.), reactive (answered relatively fast all questions we had), jumped in to help immediately when one bathrooms had no warm water etc.
Swimming pool is really great (although some of us found it little too small) especially as you can enjoy viewing while others in living room and because you can set a higher temperature (we had it 30-32). Kids absolutely loved it, adults as well!
Had a wonderful outside fire place, we enjoyed it every single night. Had a sort of grill attached, if you are handy & experienced you can cook on it!
Location is in a nice quite area, you can take your own wood for the fire. No heals, mountains but ... you are in NL afterall :-)
Nice garden around the house, safe for kids.
Trampoline: extremely nice though was little damaged when we arrived :-( so we had to remind 100s of time kids not to jump around that broken area.
Negative:
No douche near the pool: 12 people going few times a day into the pool (including 2 kids of 2 years old) - every single time go upstairs to take a shower!!! (as we did not allow anybody to enter without taking shower). Plus you walk from upstairs with bare foot... so we needed additional towel to clean the legs before entering the pool. This was really more than annoying. (Hint: downstairs there are 2 rooms with shower we would recommend to keep one for 'public use').
Temperature of the pool and pool area: all was automatically controlled. So sometimes middle of the day you would have super hot radiators in the pool area, but was cold in the morning/evening when we would use the pool. Also, sometimes cold water coming in the pool cooling down the entire pool (understand from Tessa was due to some automatic maintenance system - not clear why can't be scheduled to happen during the night :) )
Cover of the pool: from '18th century'. The worse cover we ever experienced in any pool. Manual, difficult to open and to close. We even ended up breaking it in 2 pieces. After the first 'crack' only 2 people were allowed to open and close due to impracticality which made it extra annoying. Even if we were careful, still we managed to break it. :-(
Creaking floor 1st floor - (makes noise when stepping on it) - extremely irritating especially if you have kids sleeping upstairs and you need to keep quite. Also in the morning if one wakes up... it is very audible.
Separated beds - single beds are large, but there is no king / double bed. So if you like sleeping 'together' this is a big downside as there is quite a distance even if you move the beds near each other (it is not like 2 boxsprings together as it has a wooden frame).
Entrance door (and terras door): not closing properly. And with a group of 12 (including 6 kids... ) this was a pure adventure to keep the door permanently closed (as you don't want to contribute to the global warming).
Washing - no washing machine in house. Tessa offers washing service, however if you are with a group this is very unhandy especially if you stay longer (we stayed 11 days)
Water crane - no thermostat crane, burned few times our hands. :-)
Towel hooks - inexistent in the pool area. You enter, can't hang anything.
Few maintenance issues: broken trampoline, shower head moving down, shelfs not properly attached, no good knives etc. (minor - more or less disturbing issues you would not expect from a luxury house).
Landlord's response
Dear family,
Yes, you were a nice group and you were so satisfied with the house, therefore some surprise about a number of points in your review, apparently again explanation is important, because:
* Free laundry ser...
Dear family,
Yes, you were a nice group and you were so satisfied with the house, therefore some surprise about a number of points in your review, apparently again explanation is important, because:
* Free laundry service, wash-dry-fold for those staying longer than a weekend. You have been offered 5 times for free because of your 10 day stay. Guests are always very happy with that, 'really feels like a holiday'. However, you indicate as a downside that there is no washing machine.
* The front door, as explained, closes very smoothly and easily if you hold the latch upwards when pushing shut. Pushing it shut without holding the door further doesn't work, that's right.
* The trampoline already had a new bumper that was a week old when you arrived. The repair kit for the still small hole in the jumping mat (known to you) was ready. However, after your departure, this hole was 50cm wide and we bought, at our expense, a new jumping mat, because repair was no longer possible.
*Backwash of the pool: Every official swimming pool such as this pool needs regular backwash to rinse the filter clean. This always happens during the day and not in the evening or night because of noise. And then new (yes, just for a moment) tap water flows in. This is a necessity, but also a duty of the system. It has been explained to you. If we do not follow the rules for cleaning (we always score very well with pure and clean water), we will not be able to meet the legal requirements. After all, the province wants to know the water quality every day and have the water examined by a laboratory once a month. That is not to be trifled with.
Fortunately, you have contributed to keeping the water quality good during your stay, and that while you have used the pool a lot, thank you.
* And yes, you broke the pool dome. We had to hire a total of 6 hours from the swimming pool specialist for this. Again at our expense.
We always say, and have indicated to you in advance in the manuals, if something in the house does not work out, or if you need something extra, or if a child has an accident with bedding, or whatever, always let us know. We'll take care of it.
* Space heater pool area. If the room humidity becomes too high due to the use of the swimming pool, the fan will turn up louder in warmer weather and the space heating will also turn on in colder weather. As soon as the air is drier again, it goes out again.
By the way, we have made a contribution by allowing 1 of the 2 Ukrainian refugees of your group to stay free of charge. In addition, we have allowed you to use an extra bedroom at no cost. We were happy to provide you with this service.
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May 2022
