Summit Manor Condominiums

We stay during a non-holiday week so there were less people. We experienced excellent parking & convenience & were able to park & just walk to most everything we wanted to do. We loved the location of the condo, as it is right across the street from the Ober Sky Tram. The stayed in corner unit that was located closest to the end of the parking lot. We had views of the creek & the lit park area that we were told by locals that bears frequent. We didn’t see any though. The hot tub by the pool area was closed which was disappointing. Other condominiums around us had theirs open. The unit itself was freshly renovated, clean, & decorated well. It was very lacking only in places to hang coats & put shoes. A halltree bench area with storage & hooks can fit at the entry & would have been an excellent place to hang & stow ski gear. ⚠️The main critical feedback as my title suggests, is that the owners installed a ring camera at the door just before we arrived. It was not disclosed in the VRBO description & clearly violates Tennessee first party law, where audio recoding devices cannot be used without the expressed permission of at least one party in the conversation. Doorbell cameras can capture audio clearly from large distances away. We don’t do social media & have young children that we don’t want to be exposed being recoded, especially not in your face & up close video & audio recording right at the doorway. We felt uncomfortable coming & going, knowing that “someone” is watching & listening to us. On one occasion my hubs & I needed to step outside to have a “heart talk” about a personal issue & felt exposed and our privacy violated. We had to walk into the stairwell away from the audio/ video recording but still felt that the Ring audio could be capturing our conversation since it was activated when we had to walk outside. I get that it’s considered a public space where people can hear you, but if some dude was recording our conversation I would call the police. It’s just not considerate to record private conversation in a space that is supposed to be a safe space “aka home”. And it’s not just our unit door either, every other condo had a Ring device! We had to hide our children’s faces & make everyone be quiet every time we entered & left the entire condominium area!! It was ridiculous & it made us feel like we could be recorded inside our unit also. We didn’t have total peace while staying there because of it. We wouldn’t have rented from them if we had know & will be reporting it to VRBO. Lastly, the stairwell floors are not marked, so I went to the wrong unit (apparently owned by the same people) & used my code and entered the other wrong unit directly above ours! Luckily no one was there, but it was vey awkward & this really made us uncomfortable & paranoid, as it made us feel not secure at all that other tenants also have our door code & can do the same thing! We were concerned that we could be robbed while we are away, or worse while we are sleeping! Our children were staying in the first room next to the door! We will not be staying at the unit again & will be reporting it all to VRBO.

I have stayed here at least 4 times with this owner on the second floor. I cleaned the garbage out daily, inspected each room daily and picked up trash. We did have some issue and a communicated with the owner. The VRBO process is that the traveler rates first, the owner is given a chance to rate response to the traveler and then rate the traveler. I gave him great reviews, he gave me a lousy review saying I damaged his walls and rug ( I didn’t). He would never rent to be again due to the damage, not following his house rules, rewiring the TV ( we changed the source input), and trying to get the gas fireplace to work in a power outage. We are PHD engineers and took the panel off to find out that the owner did not have batteries for power outages. Since it was 6:00am we didn’t want to wake him up. We did no damage. He gave me a zero for following house rules, we followed every single one to the letter. He gave me a three for cleanness due to food under the dinning room table ( which I crawled under and cleaned twice) and a 3 foot black mark on one wall in the bedroom. I asked for pictures of the damage, which he still has not sent. We checked out a day early due to my husband having surgery. I really wonder I someone else stayed in the unit. The cleaner complained because they had to use the vacuum to pick up food in the living room. He and I communicate many times, but he never mention his issues with me until after he got his good review. VRBO is wrong in not letting the traveler have any response to a negative owner review. The owner came out and watched us leave ( he lives in one of the units), but he never told us his issues. VRBO said we should always take pictures of the unit when we enter and when we leave. Why is that not in the instructions. VRBO said to change my email address and I can rent from him again. I won’t rent from him again, but there are many other rentals in Summit Manor. I just will be taking pictures of the condo in addition to the scenery.

We had no instructions for TV or the internet for 2 days, no lights in the living room or bedroom, no coffee pot or supplies, kitchen was dirty, pots and pans were very minimal and in bad condition.....