Villas4All - From the beginning ........

In the Spring of 2000 a family friend was completing the purchase of his new Florida Villa on a popular community along US27. As 'Closing' on the property approached, he offered them, including Stuart (V4A Webmaster) the chance to stay for two weeks as his first guests .

Stuart and his family had such a wonderful time and found the luxury of a private home with it's own pool, so great,
that they decided to purchase their own 'Home in the Sun'. They searched the area, with the help of a Realtor and decided to buy a resale home located within the same community but on a larger plot with a beautiful natural pond to the rear, that in turn was backed by conservation forest. It offered great privacy in a wonderful scenic and restful setting ... what else could anyone want when they needed to escape on holiday!

Later that year the family visited their newly acquired 'Dream' home in Florida in order to give the property some TLC and also to stamp their own mark and personalities on it. This they achieved with a lot of hard work and successfully bought it back to it's former glory. It was a home that had been rented out for around five years by a Management Company Booking Agent who dealt with tour operator bookings and it definitely needed some loving attention but the location was so breathtaking and tranquil that it was worth the effort.

During that visit Stuart started to dream of living his life in Florida and also recognised the great value offered by Villa Rentals in comparison to the Hotels/Motel culture to date! The privacy, pool, no restrictions, come and go as and when you please, eat in or eat out, extra TV's, DVD's, games machines, laundry facilities etc and also not having to live out of suitcases ... these were just a few extras available when renting private villa accommodation.

He became aware that there were quite a few private villa-homes available for holiday/vacation rentals in both the local area and further afield too. After some months of investigation into the market, planning how the website would work and then constructing it to provide the best possible 'on-line' coverage, the 'Villas4All' (www.villas4all.com) site was launched in late January 2001. It was originally HTML based and featured over 80 Orlando villas and condos

This site was created specifically to enable both owners and guests to make direct contact with one another so that details and availability dates on a specific home could be requested and provided in super-quick time. It provides a similar listing of classified adverts found in newspapers, magazines and other glossy brochures but with the added benefit of providing much more detail and information on specific properties. Direct and immediate contact is available with the owner and so, no longer do guests have to wait for 'snail-mail' to arrive with information and booking literature. Owners are offered unlimited space on which to advertise their home and they can provide their own text and photographs to show the home to it's best advantage.

At the same time as viewing and enquiring about holiday/vacation accommodation, guests also have access to other useful information including maps, attractions (Disney, Universal, etc) and other items of information and interest. This
enables them to make an informed decision on the location that will best suit them as well as booking a home in that area! The site is in fact a 'One-Stop Shop' for those looking to visit Florida with their family and/or friends.

Shortly after launching the site, Stuart felt it would be a big advantage to owners to be able to make contact with one another to discuss, help and share information on the ownership of their vacation rental property. This would be especially helpful to new owners and was not available on-line anywhere else at the time. Stuart introduced a 'Chat Forum' to the site (initially based on 'Villas4all') but the membership grew so quickly that not long after, it had to be moved to it's own listing. Stuart's original concern that maybe a 'Forum' would not work, was totally misplaced as it became such an 'overnight' success. He admits that he did make one important mistake in not locking the Forum, thereby allowing access to non 'Villas4all' members! This was soon remedied and then the 'Florida Rental Home Owners Forum' (www.top-forums.com) was transferred to it's new home, where it now hosts almost 5,000 members.

Although the Forum was originally set up for home owners only, it became apparent that this was a little one-sided and that input from other members working within the STR industry would help to provide a more balanced view. Still primarily owner-based there are also Property Managers, Realtors and other related businesses represented, offering experienced advice and guidance. The FREE site is run, administrated and moderated by Stuart and his Mother, Pattie.

During 2002 the 'Villas4all' website was upgraded to a database-driven system in order for it to run more efficiently and to be more conveniently maintained. This update also made it easier for visiting guests to navigate the site. As part of the on-going improvement to the web-pages, Stuart worked hard on the optimization of the up-dated site, thus enabling it to climb higher in the Search Engine rankings which in turn bought about increased traffic to the pages.

In 2003 following encouragement and backing from many Forum members, the parent company of 'Villas4all', 'Florida Ideal' (owned by Stuart & Pattie Buckley) launched a Property Management Company to provide a lot of owners on 'Villas4all' and the 'Forum' with fair, honest and efficient management and care of their homes and guests. It operates along part of the US27 corridor and on CR54 (covering Polk and Lake Counties).

'Florida Ideal LLC' management is administered and managed from the UK office where Pattie is based. The local office in Florida houses the Technical side of the business managed by Stuart and is where the Maintenance team is located. Owners in the UK find the availability of the UK office hours very convenient and with a local U.S.Toll Free Number also going to the UK office, the American home owners and guests in the properties have the convenience and confidence of knowing that a 24/7 direct telephone contact with a company representative is always available to them. The company does not believe in using answerphone/message services and that is why a 'live/real-time' contact will answer at all times.

Stuart became permanently based in Florida in the autumn of 2006 and able to take control of the U.S. office. He married his American girlfriend, who he first met at an owner's BBQ and they are now happily settled into 'Married Life' having purchased a home on one of the US27 communities. Their family was recently expanded to include a new addition with four legs .... a puppy called 'Tiva' (named after Captiva where they spent their honeymoon) and Stuart's long ago dream of living in Florida has now become a wonderful reality.

In December 2007 the 'New' Villas4all v2.0 went 'Live' with a brand new website design, extra features, search systems, late availability and guides to Disney and other Attractions. It now offers it's own Forum to enable potential guests, hoping to visit Florida, to 'Chat', discuss and learn much more about everything they need to make their visit a great success!!
The 'New' site will be an on-going project through 2008 that will see the implementation of more ideas and features to increase the popularity of the site and offer success for both guests who visit 'Villas4all' and owners who advertise on it.

Thank you for giving up some of your time to read this information that we hope has been of interest to you and explained our background. If you have any comments or questions please feel free to contact the Webmaster (Stuart)

(2000-2007) Villas4all.com