Use Web to rent a vacation home

For many travelers, renting a house, cottage, condo or apartment by a beach, ski slope, resort or a major city can make an affordable, roomy alternative to spending a week or two in a hotel.

Good rentals offer amenities, privacy, comforts, homey ambiance and personality that can be hard to match in a hotel. They generally cost less on a per-night, per-person basis and also provide other economies, such as free parking and use of a kitchen.

The Internet has revolutionized the vacation home rental process. Starting with local real estate brokerages who moved their catalogues online, a raft of new companies has emerged over the last decade to provide quick access to thousands of vacation rentals around the world. Selections can be quickly searched by destination, size and type of house, or area of interest, such as skiing.

One of the oldest of these companies, Vacation Rental By Owner (www.vrbo.com), now provides access to more than 60,000 properties and attracts some 20 million viewers per year. Another company, HomeAway (www.homeaway.com), has consolidated eight services into a single site that lists more than 65,000 properties in 90 countries. Other significant rental services include Vacation Home Rentals (www.vacationhomerentals.com) and Vacation Rentals (www.vacationrentals.com) and Rentalo (www.rentalo.com). An Internet search will provide links to many smaller, mostly regional listings.

Virtually all of these sites are essentially subscription services that offer rental listings placed and paid for by property owners or managers. Free to prospective renters, they provide comprehensive files on various properties, complete with lots of photos, long lists of amenities and other particulars, such as what's included and what's not (dishes, linen etc.), the owner's deposit, cancellation and refund policies, cleaning fees, along with calendars detailing prices and availability.

Interested renters are directed to contact the property owners by e-mail or phone to confirm the reservation, work out the details and arrange for a lease. That direct contact also provides renters with an opportunity to pick up knowledgeable information about the area and also get a "sense" of the owner.

That sense is important, because none of these services actually inspect properties or verifies information provided by the owners, and so all transactions involve a degree of trust and good faith. Several of the companies offer cyber "guest books" on each property, which give candid insights from past renters. They also claim to respond to renter complaints and drop properties that have been misrepresented or don't fulfill their promises.

So before you send any money, make sure to get a written lease confirming all the rental details. Also ask for details about how and where you'll get the keys to the property, who will be there to show you around upon arrival and who will be available if questions or problems arise during your stay.

While there are no guarantees a particular property will live up to all your expectations, these services greatly simplify the rental process from start to finish.