If you’re looking to save on your next holiday or breakaway then why not try out home exchange.
Home exchange is a vacation alternative where you allow someone else to stay in your home while you stay in theirs. During a home exchange holiday you swap your home at a time that is convenient to both parties. A home swap holiday may also include an automobile exchange.
This is a fantastic opportunity to save on accommodation during your next trip. You could pair up with like minded people and families or people of different lifestyles and culture and your holiday could turn into a learning experience where you explore new culture and different ways of life. You are able to ensure a low carbon footprint because you can continue to practice all of the eco-friendly things you usually do in your own home. This is so much easier to do than when you are in a hotel, boat or train. You are simply in a new home environment but have full control over energy consumption, water usage, food wastage and transport, especially if you home swap somewhere close to your home or somewhere within public transport distance.
Although it is a bit unnerving to invite strangers into your home, you are widening your travel and accommodation opportunities hugely. If you would like to, you are able to spend money on things that count like sightseeing, recreation and dining out. Alternatively you are able to travel far and wide to places you never before could have afforded because all you accommodation is paid. The home exchange community is a low cost, budget ticket to travelling the world.
Here are a few basics when you consider home exchange. Join a few reputable networks. You then create a profile for your house, upload your profile to your choice of home exchange websites, and promote its best features. Input basic information such as how many bedrooms and bathrooms. Better home exchange websites will allow you to indicate personal preferences and deal breakers such as: children or no children, pool or no pool, internet or no internet and so on.
As avid home exchange traveler, Julie Gibbons, explains “In just the same way as you might meet your perfect match through a dating site, there will be a perfect house swap for you. We’ve been surprised and delighted with each of our house swap destinations – all of which have been a mystery to us beforehand. One of the most exciting benefits has been to visit locations we’ve never heard of, and would never have considered for a more traditional vacation.”
Julie Gibbons offers her Top Tips to Getting Started on home exchange. Find her tips on Organikal.
Home exchanging is a travel bargain!
Swapping houses can slash the cost of a holiday. Not only do you save on accommodation (hotel rooms and taxes), but by exchanging cars you can also save on car rental costs. You also save on restaurant meals and snacks, car parking, laundry, Internet connection, and much more.
Here are three fantastic home exchange networks that are sure to find you your dream home swap:
This site is owned and run by Ans Lammers. The website is a marketplace for non-commercial home exchange. You stay in their home while they stay in yours. Save thousands of dollars/euros on your next vacation.
Over the years, the Geenee team has travelled all over the world. And the best times have been when they stayed in real homes, and lived as locals. That way, you discover a city from the inside out – not the outside in. You tap into the real life of a place – not just its tourist attractions. Geenee is a home-swapping site that actually helps you swap. It shows you exactly what the homes on offer look like, with clear ratings, and provides advice on things like insurance, swap agreements and all that stuff.
1st Home Exchange allows you to match your exchange preferences with home owners in other countries. Simply post information about your house swap offer including your preferred destination and dates. Once a match is made, it’s up to you and your exchange partner to work out the details.
Source: Organikal, Home For Exchange, Geenee and 1st Home Exchange
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