The Red House

Please believe the bad reviews, we have regretted not believing them and booked this property at a crucial time and lost a lot of money. It's run by an elusive owner, very unpleasant and disrespectful about the guests. The property is managed by Amit, again, an extremely irresponsible, inexperienced person. It was our wedding in December, 2023. We booked the entire property for two nights, several months in advance. They knew we were booking it for our families to be in one place, and they also knew it was our wedding. We made the mistake of paying the entire amount in advance. We had no idea that the owners run these quack businesses to cheat people. We reached two days before the wedding day, and they decided to renovate, the entire front porch was broken and being redone. I didn't know what to do, we were two days away from our wedding and urgently needed an alternative. The rooms were smelling of mould and there was mould all over, under the bed, in the bathroom, literally in every room. It was impossible that our families of senior citizens could stay there. The shocking part was the downstairs rooms were smelling of pee and alcohol and I have no words to describe how dirty and unhygienic it was. Ooty has plenty of budget heritage properties and it's difficult to maintain them, we go to Ooty every year multiple times. And, we never stayed at the Red House because of the bad reviews. And, I still can't remember why we made such a bad decision of booking this place, but the mistake was made. We had to paid a huge amount and book a different place for our family last minute. I told Amit to cancel 3 rooms out of 6, and our vendors were accomodated there. Infact even our vendors had to be moved out the second night due to construction dust, unclean drinking water, mould and dirty linen. When we asked for refund (at least of the three rooms we cancelled), Amit agreed, because he knew exactly what he had done. He had so many months to prepare for our arrival, and they did nothing. But, the owners were so cheap, probably they don't have their own money and live off by cheating people, even their neighborhood residents spoke of the owners so badly, that they were very cheap and miserly. And clearly that was the case. I decided to file an FIR, money lost is one thing, but money lost in fraud is different. They decided to return a measly amount, and my husband just wanted the ordeal to end. So I let it go. I won't recommend this place but if you must stay here, you should know the truth and hopefully they learn their lesson through other guests. Lots of excellent properties like Smyrna, Lymond house, manor house etc, where they treat guests as humans, not as dumb tourists to fill their pockets.

We stayed at this please for two nights from Feb 10 to 12th. Initially, 3 families were supposed to stay, but one of the families had an emergency and so had to cancel. Let me share the harrowing experience we had. First, the positives. 1. The location is good, peaceful and not very far from market and eateries. 2. It is an old house with some period furniture and fittings. Now, the negatives. 1. You cannot find this place without a map. There is not even a board to help visitors. 2. This place is only for vegetarians, but this is not mentioned anywhere. 3. They offer an apology of a free breakfast. First day they offerred Idli with sambar with tea/coffee, and very grudgingly provided bread and butter when we insisted. On the second day, it was only Poha with tea/coffee. 4. After check-in, we ordered Tea and Onion pakora. After some time, we were served tea and re-heated Vada left over from the day's breakfast instead. We refused to have the vadas and did not have the guts to dine-in at the place. 5. There is absolutely no maintenance. The room heaters never worked, the washroom fittings are broken and the bed linen have stains and holes in them. 6. Some of the rooms are really small. And now, coming to the utterly bitter experience we had. The guy who manages this place, Amit is a cheat. When the third family had to back out, we promptly informed him and asked for a refund. He mentioned that a refund is not possible, but we may available of 2 nights stay any day before April 15th. In the beginning of March, the third family informed Amit of their plans to stay at the place on March 18th and 19th. At first, Amit took almost 1o days to even confirm whether a room is available or not, then he started asking for additional money to confirm the booking. When we told him that the payment was already made and as per his conditions we were asking to stay before April 15th, he agreed to refund the amount. We have been constantly following up with him since then, but he has not yet refunded the amount, and has now stopped picking our calls or responding to messages. While we were staying, I overheard another family also being made the same offer to stay at the place at a later date. Hope they have had a better experience than ours.

It was a comfortable stay for 3 nights at the Red House. Ameeth and Ashish were super cooperative and made the stay easier. Be mindful that if you are choosing the duplex room for 4 people, it only has 1 washroom. We immediately changed to 2 separate bedrooms and it made life easier (choose the green room if you have the option, it's quite spacious). The rooms don't get natural sunlight and ventilation, but you get the feel of staying in an old historic villa. Thanks to Ameeth and Ashish (super talkative but very friendly) for making the stay comfortable