Short term apartment booking deposit - how to safely pay?

Hi,

I am currently living in the US and am planning a holiday in Ireland during the summer. I have found a short-lease apartment advertised on Daft.ie that suits my needs for the 3-week trip. They require a booking deposit of eur500 up front, with the rest payable on arrival. The options for paying the deposit are either:

-via Paypal
-electronic bank transfer
-Eurodraft by post

Is one of these options safer than the other? Obviously, Paypal would be the easiest for me, but I'm not familiar with their terms and conditions.
If I show up in Ireland and find out that I've been duped and the owner of the short-term accommodation has done a runner with my money, have I any recourse with these options? Would my VISA a/c be protected if I paid via Paypal? Call me paranoid, but it's hard to be 100% sure of things from a distance.

Before I go ahead and make a booking, I wanted to consult the advise of your good selves to make sure I'm not making taking an unnecessary gamble. Any advice welcome!

Hi,

We have a holiday rental in France and are familiar with your concerns. Firstly ask the landlord for references from past guests. Have you spoken to the owner by phone? Often a phonecall is reassuring and can help. Be upfront about your concerns. They should be willing to give whatever assurance needed to secure the booking. Have you friends in Ireland that could to a little research? Its not such a big place and a few phonecalls might solve it. It is common for guests to have these concerns. Holiday-Rentals is a site that owners pay to advertise on and it gives a money back assurance.
Paypal is the cheapest way for you to pay but is costly (4-5%) for the landlord. I think international bank draft is not expensive on either side.
Hope your holiday works out well!

Just sent off over £700 to rent an apartment in Majorca that included a £250 security deposit. It's always a worry when doing this especially when I had to ask the owner to acknowledge safe receipt of the Inter Bank transfer. You wouldn't believe the curt, thankless response that I got. Then there is the worry about getting the £250 security deposit back. I use www.holiday-rentals.co.uk that has a guarantee scheme built in to the rental plus the fact that you can read previous renters reviews of the apartment. Having said that how genuine are these?
A bit like trusting the bankers I suppose......

I assume you are dealing with a private owner rather than a company which should just accept a credit card which gives protection.

As regards pay-pal you should check with visa as regards protection,As regards the person to whom you are sending money - do you have his name and home address and home phone number ? If so, check that it belongs to him by looking in the telephoen directory (which is on-line). he could be ex-directory, or indeed only have a mobile, but it's something I always do when booking in such circumstances -and I book 50/60 private apartments with private individuals all over Europe.
An unwillingness to give a home address -and difficulty checking it - means don't book.

It's not perfect but it helps. Of course if the place is a tip then there's little you can do when dealing with a private owner.

I have rented through holiday-rentals too and sent off deposit of 450 by sterling bank draft. Got courteous acknowledgement and happy that all is in order. Guess you're right, there is abit of trust involved in these things...

Regarding the Holiday-Rental reviews, they are genuine. In fact owners can repond to issues raised but not have the reviews changed or dropped. I would agree with all the advise given above. Have a great holiday!