For many small business owners in southwest Florida, paradise is business.
And for Steve Buchalter, a local realtor who owns several vacation rental properties, business was good.
Until last summer, when he says he stopped receiving payment from his vacation rental management company.
“All of a sudden at once, everyone was having the same problem. They weren’t getting paid,” Buchalter said.
Bill DePietri, another Naples property owner, had the same problem.
“Through the summer we weren’t getting any checks. Around September I started to really push her for it,” DiPietri said.
They all went into business with Haley Morad, the owner of Live Your Best Life Vacations.
The business model is simple, renters book the stays through various websites, the sites pay the rental management company, then the company takes a 15% cut and the rest goes to the owners.
But the owners tell Fox 4 they aren’t getting paid.
“I had at least $16,000 in rentals,” Buchalter said.
“(Morad) ended up getting us for $10,00. She had taken money from the renters and she never reimbursed us for it,” said DePietri.