This rating does not reflect on Silver Shells resorts themselves only on St Maarten Condo # 1405 and Southern Vacation Rentals.
My party of 5 arrived on April 23, 2022 for a 7 night stay. First of all the person who rented the condo was advised by the rental company that the key cards and wrist bands would be left in the unit upon arrival as we had an evening flight in and they would not be in the office, this did not happen. There was a lot of confusion before we decided to try the location on Opa Locka lane with the codes provided to us almost an hour later after talking to security and the guy at the guard shack. At the office location it was not clear where the lock box was,but we figured it out, obtained our access stuff and headed back to St Maarten to get into our condo. We were not told what elevators to use, where our parking would be and after several failed attempts and frustration we figured out how to get into our room. We used the service elevator as it was not indicated that the elevator was private and only went to our room. Finally after getting into our condo, right away we noticed how dirty it was. This unit was definitely not cleaned since the last tenants or probaby numerous tenants before us. We made our way to our rooms, checked our beds for bugs and such and noticed one of the single beds had hair in it. Gross. We started checking the bathrooms noticing that each of the showers were filthy and also had hair in them. The jacuzzi tub in the master suite had hair as well and some sort of liquid dried to it and the sink in the master bath had dried toothpaste. Oh and the jacuzzi tub didn't even function. As we started checking out the condo itself we noticed dried bodily fluids and blood stains both on the couches and the chairs which also had holes in them. No one sat on any of this furniture as we were so disgusted by it... it looked like it came out of a dumpster at the Goodwill. The dining room table was so dirty and none of the chairs matched the table or each other and were also gross. There was food on the floor, counters and smeared on the walls including hostess cupcake frosting smeared on the wall by the elevator outside our room, which was never touched by rhe imaginary cleaning crew. There was a large crack in the drywall, we took a picture of so we didn't get blamed for it. The property manager wanted to have a crew come look at it and sirupt our stay as if they haven't cared less about us it was obvious now. We decided that none of us were showering or using anything until we could make it to walmart for cleaning supplies. At this point it was after 11pm so Wal-Mart was closed. I had a travel pack of clorox wipes to clean the toilets and sinks so we could use the restroom and brush our teeth. The beds were as hard as laying on concrete and only 1 pillow per person. We folded up our beach towels so we had extra cushion for 1 night. There was no spare bedspreads and the ones provided were very thin and older.
The next morning we made our way to Wal-Mart for supplies for the week as well as cleaning supplies. When we got back we had to physically clean our own showers with bleach spray and surprisingly they came clean enough to be comfortable using. We used clorox wipes and cleaned the dining room table and the wipes turned nearly black. We cleaned the chairs, same thing. Then headed to the kitchen counter tops again turning the wipes brown. Clearly this unit had not been cleaned properly for a long period of time. I also bought swiffer mop pads for the swiffer in the closet and without exaggeration they turned black upon cleaning the floors. Keep in mind this is less than 12hrs of us being in the unit, therefore could not have been from us. There was food crumbs all over the kitchen floor which we swept up,but left the food under the dishwasher because it wasn't from us and if they don't care, why should we ? There was brown stuff smeared on the ceiling at the patio doors that looked like fecal matter, which would be no shock at this point.
The outside patio furniture was broken, including the glass table top. We cleaned it so we could use it if necessary and I am confident this had never been cleaned and probably came from someones trash pile on the side of the road.
At this point everyone was so frustrated tears began to flow and the person who had the rental in her name contacted the property manager who asked what she wanted her to do ! Our friend said please clean the unit as if your family was staying here. We came back from the beach to the same uncleaned unit with only the food on the walls being cleaned off and the poop smear also cleaned, everything else untouched and no smell or sign of anyone actually cleaning the place.
While that conversation was happening we made our way downstairs to our assigned cabana only to find out we were never given the proper passcode for it. Then we were told we had the wrong cabana and tried the one they said with the code they provided,it didn't work. We went back to the original one assigned and it worked there. Great. Except we open the door and same thing old dilapidated furniture, a ratty fake palm tree, mold on the walls and baseboards and stunk of mold and mildew. The toilet was clogged and we couldn't get any help as the people who run Silver Shells are not allowed to helpwith the units rented by Southern Vacation. Again we contact the property manager who says she will be coming down, we wait almost an hour and no one showed, instead another text saying go on withyour day we will fix it. Several times we asked to talk to the property manager or someone in the office at Southern Vacation rentals and was told that was not possible. This to me is their way of getting out of having to deal with customer complaints as there are many according to the employess of Silver Shells, who are amazing by the way.
This particular unit is obviously owned by slum lords who do not care about their customers only about the money lining their pockets. Myself, nor my family or friends willever rent from Southern Vacation Rentals again. We were told using Compass or a VRBO is the way to go and never use Southern Vacation, well we learned the hardway ! They also told us 2 beach chairs and 1 umbrella were included in the cost of the rental and told us to send an email abd call the chair rental, when we went down there they said they have never had an email, and they didn't have a reservation in our name and we would have to pay if we wanted it, just another lie told by this slum lord company.
Customer service was so poor and we never felt like we actually mattered to this company, they offered nothing in return only acted like we were an inconvenience to them!
STAY AWAY FROM SOUTHERN VACATION RENTALS AND ST MAARTEN CONDO 1405!
