Travel More with Housing Exchanges: How does home exchange work?
Our Home Exchange Beginnings
Too good to be true! That’s what I thought about the home exchange concept. Sure, it’s fine for people living in fancy homes in highly desirable areas - but who would want to stay in our modest rural home in small-town Canada?!!?
My husband and I remained curious but hesitant for years because, in theory, the concept seemed like a great way to save accommodation dollars and experience travel differently. Finally, in late 2019 we officially joined HomeExchange as free members and completed our home profile. (An annual subscription fee kicks in when the first exchange is confirmed.) We were ecstatic and nervous when we quickly received two requests. The requests were for guest points (more on that system below). We eagerly agreed to host families from Spain and Ontario and made plans to go camping while guests used our home.
Unfortunately, none of this came to pass.
The pandemic put a kibosh on everyone’s travel plans during the spring and summer of 2020! Everything was cancelled - although we did get to keep the points we would have earned hosting these families (silver linings)! Travel wasn’t in the cards for another 2 years and we were no longer in a position to exchange our home as our empty nester house had become full of kids who had returned during the pandemic and then stayed for cheap rent 😉while they went to college.
In 2022, we finally embarked on our first post-Covid trip. It was an epic 10-week adventure launching us into retirement. Our accommodations were booked through VRBO with hefty discounts as we stayed for a full month each in Sevilla and Lisbon (a money-saving travel tip!). During December in Lisbon, stormy weather threatened. I’m not talking just rainy days, but hunker-down and batten-the-hatches-type storms and flooding. Given our loose travel schedule and affordable accommodation, we flirted with the idea of leaving Lisbon for a week to avoid the storms.
We scoured cheap flights from Lisbon to anywhere in Europe during the coming week. We picked Bordeaux, France as our spontaneous destination. The next step was to find a place to stay. Without truly believing it would work out I sent out one request - yes only one - to a woman in Bordeaux whose online home exchange calendar showed availability for a guest point exchange. Within a day we got a yes!
The Garron River, Bordeaux, France
While we were still paying for our empty VRBO in stormy Lisbon, we essentially stayed for free in glorious Bordeaux using our small bank of guest points. It was a week that confirmed we LOVED the home exchange concept and helped resolve any hesitation about staying in someone’s home or sharing our home.
Our host had arranged for her neighbour to let us into the apartment. It felt like the most authentic stay of our 10-week journey. We learned what it felt like to be a guest, how important communication is, and how welcomed you feel coming into a home vs a rental. We ate breakfast overlooking the Garrone River, took our host’s suggestions on her favourite places to eat, and joined the cheers for Morocco in the World Cup as the apartment was near Saint Michel, a neighbourhood with a vibrant Moroccan community. It was an incredible adventure. We came home committed to being home exchangers (as soon as our adult kids flew the coop).
How Does Home Exchange work?
This isn’t meant to be a commercial for HomeExchange (the company), but it’s the community I belong to and is generally representative of other home swapping sites.
HomeExchange is free to join, to begin with. Becoming a free member allows you to explore possibilities and be inspired by the homes available in the places you’d love to visit. HomeExchange members complete a calendar on their profile showing the dates their home is available. Exchanges are requested and arranged by directly contacting members through the site.
There are 4 ways to “exchange” with HomeExchange:
ONE: Reciprocal Exchange
This is the classic home swap where I go to your house and you come to mine at the same time.
I’ve read dozens of stories on the Home Exchange FaceBook page about people becoming lifelong friends after arranging these types of exchanges. The swaps can be a weekend away or a long-term home exchange! I also see requests for exchanges of 6 months or a year!
TWO: Non-simultaneous Exchange
This is the same as a reciprocal home exchange except for the timing. In this example, I stay at your place in January, and then you stay at my place in August. It requires the hosts to be elsewhere when guests visit ie. on another home exchange, paid vacation, or visiting family.
THREE: Home Exchange Guest Points
Most people’s concept of home exchange is the reciprocal exchange where two families swap homes. This is only partially correct. HomeExchange also manages a unique “exchange currency” called guest points. The program has developed a system that calculates a suggested point value for homes based on certain criteria. You ‘earn’ points when a guest stays in your home and ‘spend’ points when you stay in someone else’s home. In other words, instead of being limited to swapping two homes in an exchange, there is the option to swap guest points for a home. Here's how it works. Let’s say I want to stay at your home but you don’t want to (or can’t) come to mine. If I have earned enough guest points by hosting people in my home, I can then offer you guest points (instead of my house) in order to stay in yours.
This concept was a game-changer for me. I thought that unless I lived in a hotspot like London, Paris, or Rome, I would be anxiously waiting and hoping for 1) someone to want to come to my little town, 2) from a destination I wanted to visit, and 3) at the same time I was able to travel. The guest point “currency” changes that completely, eliminating the variables of time and destination. It means I happily host other home exchangers in my house when it is available and earn a bank of guest points I can use to request homes in the places I want to visit when I want to visit. This was our Bordeaux experience. Our host had a planned trip and made her home available while she was away. Because it was not a reciprocal exchange where she stayed in our Lisbon place, we used guest points to cover our week in Bordeaux.
The guest point system is unique to HomeExchange. There are varying opinions amongst the house-swapping community. Some people prefer direct home swaps and don’t like the idea of guest point valuation which, while very flexible, introduces a transactional element. To each his own! For someone in a place that isn’t flooded with tourism or exchange requests or is very far away from some of my preferred destinations - it’s the answer!
FOUR: Hospitality Exchange
This is another interesting opportunity in the home exchange community. A hospitality exchange is when you come to my place as a guest, but I stay in the house, too. You’d be using my guest room and sharing the rest of the house’s amenities for fewer guest points than a full exchange.
This is a very different experience but I’ve read so many benefits. For one, you now have a local connection for your stay. You meet people! These exchanges can look different depending on what guest and host agree to: you might spend no time together and simply share a kitchen or you might get a full welcome with a built-in tour guide. How fun to cook for each other and get to know a fellow home exchanger in this way! Have you ever wanted to run a Bed and Breakfast without the hassle, commitment, and money aspect? You might love hosting Hospitality Exchanges.
Yeah, BUT… Is it for you?
So let me also be honest about the things that make people hesitate. This approach to travel may not be suited to everyone and you might not feel comfortable about the risks. Some of these issues, however, are only negative depending on your point of view.
“I don’t want someone to sleep in my bed!”
That was a response we heard a few times. And yes, people I don’t know will sleep in my bed, go through my kitchen drawers, and may even snoop around the house to see how I live. It was strange the first time we hosted a couple in our home. Every once in a while we tried to imagine strangers using our BBQ and enjoying our deck or soaking in the bathtub. To be honest, the strangeness didn’t last long, and when we received feedback on that first exchange “Honestly, everything was perfect!” - those thoughts vanished! I laugh a little with this hesitation when I think about hotels whose beds and bathtubs welcome thousands of strangers!
“What about my valuables?”
Our valuables LOL!
I don’t actually have a lot of valuable things. I’ve prioritized experiences over things in my life, so have accumulated few things that would be worth anything to anyone else. We securely stored passports, personal/private documents, work-related material, extra currencies, music equipment, and so on. We also used a storage cupboard to stash away our single malt scotch collection and a few pieces of jewellery. We could have locked it, but to be honest, after the communication with our guests, the guarantees that come with HomeExchange, and the required sense of trust and respect - we didn’t.
When we returned, nothing was damaged, but if there was, there is a system in place for communication and compensation. The company has the details of exchangers, takes a deposit, and has 3 critical guarantees along with an online SOS service to help with:
Cancellation protection if your hosts cancel on you at the last minute and all your flights are booked and arrangements made. The company helps you find a new place and offers compensation of up to $840 USD per week if they can’t find a replacement exchange accommodation.
Compliance guarantee if the accommodation doesn’t fit the home description. The SOS team will help find an alternative exchange or up to 6 days of paid accommodation if required. Reading home exchange reviews is important in your research of homes to exchange with and they help to minimize the chance of a home not meeting the description.
Damage with insurance coverage of up to 1,000,000 for property damage. Plus there is a $500 damage deposit authorized for each exchange just in case. There is a formal process for hosts to keep this deposit should they need to - I hope I never have to, but it's good to know it’s there!
“I don’t want the risk of coming home to a mess!”
People have different cleaning standards and we were prepared to return home and notice things out of place, perhaps a stain on the carpet or a broken wine glass, etc. And yes, that will probably happen at some point. Our first experience, however, put our minds at ease. The place was spotless. We had asked our guests to collect dirty laundry and we would deal with it when we came home. Instead, the sheets, towels, and washcloths were washed and drying on the clothesline. We also told them not to worry about taking out the trash and compost as it was only 4 days. Everything had been dealt with and even the bins had been washed out. I’m not sure why I was surprised at this. In our first experience as guests, we went over and above in cleaning up after ourselves, too.
That’s the beauty of being part of the sharing economy - home exchangers are a community of like-minded people. They will treat you as they would like to be treated. It is not money on the line, it is their own home - even if it's not directly swapped with you, it’s swapped with someone!
Other ways to find (almost) free travel accommodation include house-sitting, pet-sitting, volunteering, and couch surfing or SisterStay for solo women travellers.
Is Home Exchange Worth it? Here’s 6 Reasons Why I’m a Home Exchanger
Housing Exchanges are a part of the Sharing Economy.
The Sharing Economy probably starts with toys on the kindergarten carpet but in technical terms, it is “temporary access to goods over ownership as an alternative mode of consumption”. Those amazing little lending libraries that have popped up are a great (low-risk) example of the sharing economy. One research study (yes, the home exchange concept has been studied!) indicates that the motives behind the concept include cost, sustainability, and social and environmental responsibility. The relationship that develops between the host and the guest is based on the principles of reciprocity, respect and confidence (De Groot & Nicasi, 1994), and require a certain level of “trust, open-mindedness, inventiveness, enthusiasm and flexibility” (Forno & Garibaldi, 2015, p. 202). Home exchange is “sharing” a place to sleep.
2. Home exchange offers a solution to overtourism problems.
A gorgeous spot in my hometown of Port Alberni, BC on Vancouver Island. Our home exchange guests get all my local recommendations!
I try to be a responsible tourist/traveller and to move away from contributing to over-tourism problems. This means visiting places off-season and/or choosing locations that are a bit off the beaten path. Finding Home Exchange accommodations in prime locations off-season (like our Bordeaux experience) and unconventional destinations (like our home on Vancouver Island) eases tourism pressures on the hot spots and adds to the tourism economy in less-known places.
3. I can help boost my local economy through home exchange.
Even though my guests aren’t paying for accommodation, they contribute to my local economy by buying groceries, visiting the market, going out to restaurants, and going on local tours. As a host, I promote local business owners and am an ambassador, of sorts, for my local area. Our first guests made the comment that they loved how much there was to do in our area and even extended their stay to be able to experience more - something they may not have done if paying exorbitant accommodation rates.
4. It doesn’t contribute to the housing crisis.
The world is witnessing changes to online accommodation bookings. Municipalities who were once excited about the economic benefits of AirBnB and VRBO (for example) to boost tourism dollars are now reconsidering the hollowing out of neighbourhoods as homes are bought up to provide permanent holiday accommodation. These short-term rentals compound the housing crisis and dilute the character of many neighbourhoods. Home exchange, on the other hand, facilitates travel without these negative effects.
5. It makes economic sense to leverage home equity.
Whether you own your home or rent, there is a cost for ‘daily accommodation’. Home exchange allows you to leverage this investment into (almost free) travel accommodation! Rather than your home sitting empty while you travel, you can fill it with fellow home exchangers and stay for free on your trip. And since it’s your primary residence, you’re not subject to changing municipal policies. And in a way, having guests is good for security. We don’t like to leave our place empty while gone, our home exchangers maintain a presence and even water our plants! For people with pets, you can even negotiate guests caring for your animals, or find homes that welcome pets to stay.
6. There is a sense of community among home exchangers.
I started Travel Bug Tonic, in part, to connect with other like-minded travel lovers and deeply appreciate the community that has grown around my writing and conversation. It’s a community that shares values about the importance of travel and the benefits of well-being. Like Travel Bug Tonic, I feel a sense of community even as a new member of HomeExchange. Those involved seem to share my pursuit of authentic and responsible ways to discover new places, cultures and people.
Since becoming members we have received requests from all sorts of people. Retirees holidaying from the United States, Vancouver Island families needing a place to sleep during a soccer tournament, out-of-town visitors attending a funeral, and families looking for a home base to explore Vancouver Island’s beautiful nature - with comfy beds, a kitchen, and laundry! I’m so thrilled to help people travel!
Comment Below! Have a question? Have an experience to share? I’d love to hear your thoughts on home exchange!
