Issues over travel insurance remain murky
Dare County’s March 17 restrictions on visitor access left vacation rental brokers in murky waters when it came to tenant inquiries regarding refunds and cancellations due to the COVID-19 crisis. But a March 19 letter from the North Carolina Real Estate Commission’s (NCREC) legal counsel sought to clarify that, stating that with the exception of certain statutory fees, the state’s Vacation Rental Act requires brokers to refund any and all funds when access to vacation rental homes is obstructed.
“In the current situation, landlords of vacation rental units in the affected areas cannot provide access to the units for the tenants who have pending reservations,” wrote NCREC legal counsel Janet Thoren in the letter to Commission Chairman Jeffery Malarney. “As a consequence, we have determined that when access to the property cannot be provided, we find that [the Vacation Rental Act] requires that the landlord and broker refund all monies paid by the tenant.”
