Discussion Thread:

San Miguel Warning
Public Discussion
San Miguel WarningBy Bravo on 2008-03-08 10:36
Just wanted to post a heads up for anyone travelling to San Miguel de Allende and wanting to rent a house. We were there Oct 12 and rented a house from Rory Kyle with Rental San Miguel and paid her a $200 deposit in case of damages or for any long distance phone charges. The day before we left, I called to let her know what time we planned to check out and she told me that the phone bill would come in about two months later and that she would return our deposit then. When I hadn't heard anything from her by January, I emailed to ask about the deposit and was told that she had just mailed it to me. Weeks later I emailed again and was told she didn't have our address. The next time she said she first needed to cancel the first check and the third time she asked me to confirm the amount of the deposit. On March 1st, I finally received a check for only half of the deposit with a note telling me that she had already returned half of the money when we checked out of the house. Not only did she not return any of the deposit but we didn't even see her the day we departed (we didn't see her again after the first day). She hasn't responded to any of my emails since then, even after I forwarded all of our previous emails which document the amount owed to us. In my last email to her, I told her that her reputation was at stake if she didn't respond. We have never had an experience like this before and at this point, I'm not sure how to go about getting our deposit back. The only thing I can think to do is warn any other travelers to beware of entering into any rental contract with Rory Kyle and Rental San Miguel.
San Miguel WarningBy rrakoczy on 2008-05-11 18:23
I was surprised to discover this posting as I too was ripped off of my security deposit by Rory Kyle. We originally rented our apartment from Rory (Casa Casbah) for one month (March 08). When we arrived, we were so happy with the place we inquired about renting for the month of April. Rory told us she needed to talk to the owner and see if she wanted to rent it out for longer. It took 10 days to get a reply, and when we finally did they said we could rent it, but costs would go up and we would have to pay for items that were currently included. We told her we needed a couple of days to decide. Eventually we decided against the higher costs and called her and told her that we were not interested. At which case she scolded us for breach of contract (which we had not signed, or agreed to verbally) and told us that she already told the owner that we were staying and that she would have to change her plane ticket. Etc. Etc.... Essentially, we were told that she was taking our $300 security deposit for "breaking the contract and costs incurred by not renting the place". We tried for the remainder of our stay to work something out, evening offering some money so we didnt lose everything, but to no avail. Rory Kyle stole our $300. There is no way around it. Now I feel she planned to do it from day one and found the whole "extra month" event to be convienient excuse for her. Rob