We’re well versed in booking a lovely holiday home or stylish hotel for a holiday, but there’s one lesser-known corner of the travel industry that seems to be rapidly on the rise: the house swap. Think of it as the same as opting to stay in a villa, but with a little more reality and on a considerably lower budget. The idea seeped into our mainstream consciousness after Nancy Meyers released her festive romcom The Holiday. In it, Amanda (Cameron Diaz), a recently single, LA-based film producer swaps lives with a lovesick Iris (Kate Winslett) in Surrey. Enter Jasper (Jude Law), the latter's brother and Miles (Jack Black), the former's colleague. Needless to say, love, drama and hilarity ensue.
Whilst such antics cannot be promised (and may not be hoped for by most), at the very least, a home swap offers a more novel, personal kind of holiday. With flexible working and working from home widely available options today, it can also provide a brilliant way to test out a potential new location for a few months. For the uninitiated, we spoke to two of the top companies in the business – Love Home Swap and HomeExchange – to glean a little more information about how to get involved, what makes house swaps so appealing and how they are growing in popularity in a post-pandemic world.
The thought of house swapping can strike fear into many, as you are essentially letting strangers run free in your precious home – whether it’s your permanent house or a second home that you are putting up on the site. For HomeExchange's CEO, Emmanuel Arnaud, the best way to feel at ease is to communicate: ‘It's normal that you are a little scared, and communicating with your host is the best way to reassure you. It's ok to request a phone call for instance, or even to have a video chat where they show you their home and family if that reassures you. As long as you are kind and respectful, feel free to ask any question that you are nervous about.’ He also advises transparency, saying ‘People do not expect your home to be magazine-perfect. It's ok if it has small flaws. You should share them with the person coming to your home so that they do not have any negative surprises when they arrive.’ The HomeExchange annual fee also covers any property damage that might occur, though Emmanuel does assure potential members that 99 per cent of home exchanges happen without any issues.
First of all, you have to sign up to a site like Love Home Swap or HomeExchange and list your property. Most websites have a membership scheme with varying tiers, so you pay a monthly fee and then pay nothing when you undergo a house swap, meaning free accommodation on your holiday. You can also stay somewhere without anyone coming to your house, using points that you accumulate as a member. As Celia Pronto, Managing Director of Love Home Swap, explains ‘There are many benefits of home swapping over “traditional” holidays. The first perk is that it’s low cost - for the price of a year’s membership you can travel to destinations all over the world and not have to worry about accommodation costs. Staying in someone’s home ensures you get better, roomier, more interesting and comfortable accommodation - and remember, being in someone’s home also means it comes with the contents, so you’ll likely have books to read, games to play, maybe even a gym or a pool to use, all privately.’
The key misconception is that you have to perfectly time a holiday at the point when your desired house is free and its occupants want to come and stay in yours, creating a never-ending chain of confusion. That is simply not the case and there are a few ways to use the services on offer. A ‘classic swap’ is when you find a household who want to come to your house while you go to theirs, and this can be either at the same time or on different dates. But, there are also ‘points swaps’ which, as Celia says ‘allow you to travel without having to match your plans with another member. You can earn for hosting guests and then you get to spend those points when you decide to travel, you just pay a small service fee based on the length of your trip.’ There is no limit on how long you stay somewhere for, it simply has to work for the person whose house you are staying in. So, say you wanted to consider living in Barcelona and a member there wanted to try London, you could swap for three months to see how you fare in each other's cities.
It’s easy to get signed up, as Celia details: ‘There are four simple steps to get swapping - firstly use the search filters on the website to find exactly what you’re looking for; whether you fancy a city pad, a château in the hills or a beach hut by the sea, we have it all. Then tell other members about your own home to attract some swaps - all you need to do is provide a short description and a few photos of your property and you’re away. Once you’ve become a member (you can try the site for free for two weeks) and your profile is set up, message homes you like the look of to start arranging your swap. Once you’ve confirmed the details you can confirm the swap securely on the site by the click of a button.’
There are certain key bits of advice that can help make a house swap experience just that little bit smoother. For Emmanuel, it’s ‘Keys, keys and keys: the number one thing people miscommunicate about are house keys. Making sure you have an easy plan to exchange keys and that it is fail-proof will help ensure you have a great holiday. For instance, if you need to pick up keys from a neighbour, make sure you have their phone number beforehand, and can work through a plan B if your plane is late or if there is traffic.’ He also believes that ‘The spirit of home exchanging is that you are a guest in the person's home. As a thoughtful guest, you should come with a small gift to thank your hosts, ideally something specific to your state/country... and when you leave don't forget to leave a thank you note! I like to also send my host a picture of the living room when I'm leaving so that they know it's clean and tidy, and are reassured I have taken good care of their home.‘
HomeExchange and Love Home Swap aren't the only two home swapping services on offer however. In the luxury travel sector, options include 3rd Home, a high-end exchange club. It works a bit like a time share, with second-home owners promising a few weeks at their own property in exchange for credits that can be used at other people's second homes. To be involved your second home price must be in the region of $500,000 to $50,000,000+, with the average house being somewhere in the middle. IVHE also lets elite homeowners swap their homes with other members, or build up credits for a future stay. Bored of the usual villa? As well as luxury villas and condos, ski chalets, safari gam lodges and yachts are also on offer. Another popular platform at the moment is Kindred, which counts flats in Lisbon and airy LA houses among the homes on its books.
The benefits of house swapping can be greater than just the cost-saving aspect. You get access to a wide range of properties, the type of which you’d never come across on a general holiday house listing. ‘It’s also not just homes that are swapped,’ explains Celia Pronto, ‘it’s frequently a bit of a life swap too – with members using each other’s cars, looking after each other’s pets, and even using each other’s baby seats and toys! Home swapping also gives you an insight into the local culture because you become a neighbour, rather than a hotel guest while on vacation.’
