There wasn’t anyone to leave a bad review of.
To celebrate a month of living in the Indonesian province of Bali, New Zealand-born traveler Bree Robertson recently decided to book herself a “romantic getaway” in an eastern village. Only, when she arrived at the retreat, she discovered that the villa was totally abandoned.
“When you book an Airbnb in Bali and it’s an abandoned building,” Robertson, who posts travel content under the name Atypical Adventure, wrote in a viral TikTok video of the desolate villa. “Completely overgrown. No one home. Smashed windows,” she described the building.
“The place was $80 … and had some great reviews,” she explained in the clip’s comments of her decision to rent the deserted property for her and her partner. “Airbnb also said the host had a response time of an hour so I assumed it was still open.”
There were even positive reviews from the space on both Airbnb and other listing websites — albeit ones from 2019.
After Robertson and her partner took a rainy two-hour scooter ride to the lodging, however, they realized how badly they’d ignored the red flags: The dwelling was deserted and falling apart.
“We rocked up and it was very much abandoned,” Robertson told the website Stuff. She reported the property to Airbnb’s support team, which promised her a refund, and subsequently removed the listing.
Still, Robertson is confused how the listing was ever live in the first place.
“It was super misleading – that was one of the things I was banking on that gave me a lot of reassurance, I was like, ‘they’ve been replying to other people, maybe they’re just busy’,” she told Stuff.
“We were disappointed to learn about this experience and provided our support to the guest at the time, including a full refund,” an Airbnb spokesperson told The Post. “We hold Hosts up to high standards and the listing is no longer on the platform. In the rare event something isn’t as expected on arrival for a stay, our Community Support team is on hand 24/7 to help.”