Home exchange - the only way to travel

Ginetta Vedrickas continues to write about home exchange. This time for the website 'Retiremove.co.uk'.

Read the personal story of Ginetta who has done her first exchange 15 years ago...

Swapping: the newest trend for vacationers

First few lines of this article..: "Many families would claim that travel is an essential part of their lives. It’s educational, enjoyable, and provides a wonderful change of pace for adults and children alike.
However, in recent years, many have been forced to give up on luxuries- including vacations. Still, there is an affordable option that many have adopted: swapping!".

FOTO Stan od uspomena - put oko svijeta u 90m2

Ivana and Ksandro Kovacic are a Croatian couple who manage InZagreb apartments, a family run short term rental company in Zagreb. They've been in this business for 7 years and have recently discovered HomeForExchange.com as a great way of travel and opportunity to meet people with similar interests. Since they love to travel and also own three of the apartments they rent in Zagreb, the idea of swapping homes came naturally. Only in one year, they have already exchanged in London, Paris, Southampton and few coastal towns in Croatia. They travel often as a family and have talked about their travel experience and HomeForExchange.com website for the main Croatian Daily Paper, Vecernji list.

Urlaub im fremden Zuhause

Home exchange is not very popular in Germany. Very strange because Germany counts more people than for instance France. In France we have about 4,000 active members and in Germany just 245! We cannot find an explanation for this, but we are very happy that the media is writing about home exchange. If you are student studying social demographics, it would be a nice idea to investigate why Germans are not into home exchange.

Visit cities for free, new books.

Lydie Thomas is the author of 'Your Guide to Visit Paris for Free' (www.visitparisforfree.com) and 'Your Guide to Visit San Francisco for Free' (www.visitsanfranciscoforfree.com). French born and raised, she now lives in Northern California with her husband and her two daughters. They all spend their summer in France to visit family and friends, and working on her travel books.

Lydie mentions HomeForExchange.com in her books as well. Here is short paragraph from her book:

"Yes, you can visit cities around the world rent-free. Just exchange your home with a local family. Once you start, there is no coming back to hotels and rentals! Register on a home exchange website like Home For Exchange (www.homeforexchange.com), pay a membership fee (roughly the price of one night in a hotel), list your home, and start researching and contacting people. Our family has been doing it successfully for years."

You can order books of Lydie Thomas online through Amazon. We believe she is contributing to the awareness of home exchange in general and we recommend reading her books.

Photo Travel for less? Try Home Exchanging

Bob Grytten is a valued member of our website and actively spreading the news about home exchange as well. On his blog he wrote a clear article about the advantages and joy home exchange can bring you (direct link to Bob's listing on our website: www.HomeForExchange.com/27239).

First part of his article on Empowernetwork.com:

"Like to travel? Looking for a way to cut the costs; but, still enjoy those exotic locations? We may have part of the solution.

We’ve traveled to Italy, Greece, Norway, France, Spain, Ireland, Germany, and even Florida for a couple of weeks over Christmas. France, Ireland, and Florida came because we hosted travelers from those countries in our own home – and we stayed in theirs. HomesForExchange provides listings of thousands of people who have discovered this unique way to cut housing, car and even food costs for the traveler. But, it’s more that that, in our experience – it’s like a fraternity of people to people cultural exchange. The most often question asked us by others is about safety of our home. Actually, they are granting us the use of theirs at the same time. It’s like a mutual trust and confidence. Not one’s thing? I can understand that, but for us it’s an exciting way to travel, and their are documents that the parties can sign outlining the arrangement on the Exchange site."

Click on the headline to read the full article on Bob's blog.

Smart Consumer: Three weeks in Barcelona for free? The joy of house swapping!

Good article by John Hearne of the Independent. Focuses on the savings home exchange offers you. In this time of recession home exchange is still the cheapest way of travelling as accommodation costs are zero.

Home exchange - cut the cost of your holiday

"After swapping his house in London, Patrick Collinson found himself staying in a brownstone villa in Illinois's answer to Islington."

Journalist Patrick Collinson experienced home exchange with his family and like many he seems to be addicted to it.

Another quote from his article:

"If you're looking for an overseas exchange, pick the website that offers the largest number of listings in the country you wish to visit, and the fewest number in the UK (assuming you live there). This dramatically improves your chances of finding a swap. For example, HomeForExchange.com, probably the best value (it charges £37 a year), has more than 2,000 properties listed in the US and 800 in Canada. There are 740 in England."

Home exchange: tourism for those who want to spend little...

Home exchange is gaining popularity in Brazil and the Época magazine has written an article about it.
We have been contacted by the writer of this article (Lucas Hackradt) and contributed to this article by getting him in touch with some of our members.
First lines of this article: "Little known in Brazil, 'home swapping' or 'home exchange', is a type of tourism where you leave your home to a complete stranger while staying at their house. It is safe, comfortable and most of all... it's cheap....".

Shoestring Living: Make frugal travel work for you

This article contains some hints of cutting your holiday budget and home exchange is one of them. It shows again that there is a vast number of people who are not familiar with home exchange.

First lines:

"Now that summer is in full swing, so is summer travel. This season inevitably brings along an itch to break from the routine, get out of Dodge and see a bit of something new. For those living on a shoestring, doing so poses a significant challenge. Read on for some frugal ways to save on travel-related expenses, wherever you travel this year."

Downsizing: "Do you have anything smaller?"

This article is not primarily about home swapping, but about downsizing to another home once your children are grown up and living on their own. Downsizing to a smaller dwelling can reduce the costs of living significantly. As one of the hints for people who have not yet downsized to a smaller property the writer of this article mentions 'house swapping' instead of staying in hotels when you go on holiday.
HomeForExchange.com is one of the recommended websites.

My home is your castle

Germans are not really in to 'home exchange', so we are always happy when the media addresses this subject. Journalist Thomas Heuzeroth of Welt Online has written a perfect article which may get a few more Germans enter the wonderful world of home exchange. The title of the article is very creative, never thought of this myself.

"Biete Viersen, suche Venezuela: Haustauschportale für den Urlaub werden immer populärer. Dabei lässt sich nicht nur Geld für die Ferienunterkunft sparen - Touristen kommen so auch der Kultur ihres Urlaubslandes am nächsten. Aber es gibt Fallstricke."

Read the full article including which includes interviews with Ans Lammers and an overview of the history of home exchange. Our rating: good article!