Review Storey Lake resort community 8/12/19

[omniscientmommy]

We have stayed 3 times at Windsor Hills community and while we love it I wanted to give a different community a try. I found an Airbnb rental for a 4 bed, 3 bath townhouse/side by side with a splash pool. This property although on Airbnb is managed by a property management company called Fvh or Fidelity Vacation homes. I chose this unit online based on community amenities and the reviews of that property. Now a month and a half before our stay I got an email saying that theat particular unit was no longer available but they had another one that was the same, just different decor for the same price at $160/night and would we be ok switching. Sure.

We received a rental agreement when I first booked that we had to sign. Overall reassuring that they are legitimate. So 5 days before our trip the send me an email with the door code and address, in a not secure format. They address we were told to imput into our GPS to get us there wanted us to take a back way not through the guard area for us to check in. Since I had driven by there before I changed the GPS address.

After getting the car on the way to the unit we had to pay 3 tolls, the last one costing us $2. We know about all the tolls but it still stinks. So after we pull up to the guard house we hand over my ID and tell them the address. They in turn give us a piece of paper with a QR code on it to use for re-entry in the other lane. Cool. Head to the unit, parking for townhouses is setup like the condos with parking in a lot no assigned spots. We parked right in front of the unit and immediately saw the porch light was out.

Entering the unit we can see the walls are marked up, ok fine. Get our stuff in take a quick look but really it was midnight at this point so we just went to bed. The next day we really started to look. The unit is definitely not being taken care of that well by this company. A bathroom light was out, blinds for the slider are missing panels, marks on every wall in the place, and the pool was definitely not cleaned, plus 2 missing cable boxes. I reported all this to the property management company and they sent someone out right away. He took pictures and replaced the light bulb in the bathroom. Otherwise nothing else has been taken care of.

The unit itself is a new build, probably this past year. So the owners of this unit lack stuff. Because of the high ceilings and sparse decor it’s echo-y. Also we actually use the kitchen to it’s full extent. Maybe that’s not the case for other renters but I use measuring cups, mixing bowls, pots/pans, etc. They do not have a lot of kitchen items. Also all they have is ‘breakable’ dishes/cups. We have kids, they drop ****. And no kitchen towels.

We knew coming in to bring soap, sponge, paper towels, etc. however I assumed they would have more then 8 towels and that there’d be pool towels considering the pool that is attached. Nope. So 3 days in and I have already done laundry. Washer and dryer work. There are no ceiling fans or ceiling lights in the bedrooms. Also the master bedroom only has one night stand. No power strips which stinks because the outlets are not placed in good spots.

Overall cleanliness is something the staff need to work on. The pool deck was dirty. Dusting looks like that hasn’t happened in a month+. And for some unknown reason lights in the unit have rust on them. I assume the builder is being cheap.

Community amenities. The pool, lazy river, splash pad and slides have been closed everyday due to storms. So not sure how those things are. They do offer mini golf and other activities for some fee. There is a bar/grill and gym, need to ask for the code for the gym. The clubhouse supposedly can be walked to but since there was no welcome book or anything with any useful info in our unit I wouldn’t know how. We drove.

The guard house, a joke. Seriously once you’re checked in they don’t make you scan that QR code, they just open the gate for you as long as you look like you have a paper with a code.

Places near us - Publix, Walmart (shady), and SuperTarget for groceries. We don’t really eat out so I can’t tell you what’s over here for restaurants.

The drive to Disney, ugh. We love Windsor Hills because it’s 6-10 min normally to Magic Kingdom. This is 15-20 min every time.

I will update this later on and try to get some photos of the unit and community areas.

 

[omniscientmommy]

So after our 10 days I can safely say that we will try to switch our reservation for our Nov. trip to Windsor Hills. Every night there seemed to be someone up making noise or in the pool until 11pm. There really didn't seem to be any rules posted anywhere. DH was worried about the kids running through the unit and making noise but honestly no one else seemed to care. We did go to the community pool one day. The lazy river had trash floating in it. Also there were some teenagers( 17 - maybe early 20's) that were floating in the river, probably 10 of them in a group with a portable speaker blasting rap music super loud. The staff didn't seem to care. The lazy river was also freezing cold, compared to the pool and splash pad The splash pad was fine, one of the sprayers wasn't working. ds8 didn't try the waterslides. We went in the pool for a second but that also had garbage in it. I did use the bathroom while there and one of the stalls was out of order but it was clean. Parking there is very limited. We were lucky to get a spot in the lot but many people had to park on the street around the corner. We didn't use any other amenities there. I think if you're really there do go to Disney then staying this far out isn't worth it. I didn't really take any pictures but IMO it's not worth a second visit there.

 

[HeyMickeyUSoFine]

Thanks for this in-depth review. I was torn between the 2 but leaning more toward Storey Lake for the newness. I think I'll stick with the closeness of Windsor Hills.