Moroccan Vacation Rentals Face Cleanliness Challenges as Summer Tourism Surges

The owners of these apartments generally mention the issue of "lack of care" of some tenants towards cleanliness or the organization of furniture and utensils. They sometimes find themselves forced to use professional cleaning services before renting to other people again. This situation is essentially linked to "the absence of a written contract between the two parties". "There is a difference in the way vacationers perceive the rental of houses during the summer, in particular, and there is a difference in the way each individual treats the apartment he rents for a certain period in search of tourism and relaxation in a given geographical region; individuals, ultimately, are not equal in terms of behavior and mentality," said Mohamed, owner of rental houses in Tangier, to Hespress. He will add: "some of the problems we encounter in this context are that individuals and families think that renting a house means they have the freedom to treat its contents and furniture as they see fit, and this is a mistake, because the house remains ultimately the private property of its owner, which the tenant must treat properly during the rental period".

"Sometimes the owner has to add minor touches to the house after it is vacated, while he sometimes has to call in professional cleaners due to the level of dirt in the house," Mohamed said. According to him, this issue is also linked to the nature of the agreement between the owner and the potential tenant, where sometimes the agreement is purely verbal, while it would be possible to formalize contracts to protect the interests of each party. "The basic rule in this context is that individuals are [diverse like stones and bricks], as the saying goes, and there are indeed groups that develop problems with homeowners due to the condition in which the rented place may be at a given time, but ultimately, it remains relative and linked to specific cases," added Khalid, also a homeowner in Tangier on the same site. According to him, this issue "is taken into account by apartment owners who are looking for specific families they trust and avoid renting to singles, for example, in order to avoid any problems that could arise after the end of the rental period, particularly with regard to cleanliness and proper treatment of furniture". And to add: "the issue is mainly related to the perceptions of families and citizens regarding the rental of an apartment or a place for a certain period".

For their part, psychologists mention several factors, including the feeling of total possession of the space and the lack of consideration of the moral aspect in this transaction, which only concerns two parties. "The rental of apartments is, after all, a commercial transaction that must also be subject to two important elements: the first is that of contracts that frame the transaction, as is the case for hotels, and the second concerns the moral aspect which implies the need to assume one’s responsibilities and take them into account," explained Mohssine Benzakour, a doctor in social psychology. According to him, this type of behavior is related to the way of treating everything that is not private property, as we observe in public buses, streets and gardens, where there is a lack of consideration for continuity and sustainability. "Evoking revenge as an explanation for what could harm the house is not correct, because those who use this method only take revenge on themselves, since harming private property refers to a cowardly behavior," the specialist believes. He points to "an imbalance at the conceptual, ethical and moral level, and a lack of civility in a certain group, without generalizing of course, especially since we observe similar behaviors in our public environment." Consequently, "we suffer at the level of collective behavior and we have not yet evolved towards the awareness of a common sense, where reflection remains centered on the self."

Benzakour also mentions another problem: "Morocco lacks a clear strategy for family tourism, because the rise in hotel prices, the lack of symbolic rates and the lack of entry and exit contracts for apartments contribute to the feeling of injustice among consumers, which in no way justifies such actions. In principle, the behavior towards the rented house or apartment should be appropriate".