Rental Management Company Refuses To Pay Rental Proceeds

[Will Dyer]

While living abroad for several years, I contracted with a large vacation rental management company to manage my rental property. As I was living out of the country, I set up 'auto-pay' for regular bills, and alerts on bank accounts to keep abreast of any excessive dips in balances or unusual activity in general. After a while I grew to trust this company and began paying less attention to rental income summaries than I should have. I began getting alerts for balances below my established limit and notices of 'insufficient funds' on various monthly service bills. A more thorough look through the annual performance summaries ultimately revealed that, despite the appearance of all things being 'business as usual' - it was NOT.

Under all the usual categories of occupancy, unit activity, net rent, expenses, beginning balance, ending balances, etc., etc., everything on earnings statements appeared normal, as usual. Under the long overlooked category of 'payments' (the category where it displays payment/s ACTUALLY deposited in the designated, mutually-agreed-upon account), I discovered a prolonged period with 'payments' of $0.00. Moreover, I was blown away to find that - with no announcement or explanation whatsoever - this has been taking place from the start of fiscal year 2024 until present ALL rental proceeds earned have been withheld by this company. Meanwhile, bookings well into the busy season continue to be made.

I have NO IDEA how to play this 'game'. I'm hoping for any savvy legal minds out there to help with ideas as to what my next move should be. Ideally, it could be possible to resolve by way of a well worded warning of legal and/or monetary repercussion(?). Thank you!