St. Croix, U.S. Virgin Islands, Spring Break
Reprinted below are excerpts from my most recent article on house exchanging, which appeared in the January 2014 Washington, DC monthly magazine, The Hill Rag. For the complete article, go to
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The last time you went on
vacation, you left behind something that could have saved you thousands of
dollars: your home. Why let your house,
apartment or condo sit empty when you can swap it for someone else’s? Home exchanging is an increasingly popular
way to save money and experience more authentic travel. Instead of paying for cookie-cutter hotels
and endless restaurant meals, house exchanging lets you relax in a comfortable
residence and cook in a fully equipped kitchen. It puts you into real neighborhoods where
you can live like a local and discover off-the-beaten-track locations few
tourists ever see. For the past decade,
my family and I have exchanged our modest Capitol Hill rowhouse for homes in
the U.S. and abroad. House exchanging has
given us cash in our pockets and a front-row seat on the world.
By
swapping our home with others, we’ve had memorable spring breaks, summer
vacations, Thanksgiving getaways and winter holidays. We’ve stayed in downtown London and
Copenhagen; relaxed on the beaches of Costa Rica, Florida, and the Virgin
Islands; hiked around Yellowstone and Yosemite National Parks; and discovered
history on Normandy’s D-Day beaches and Rome’s ancient ruins. We’ve explored Oregon’s tidepools and walked
Boston’s “Freedom Trail;” lingered over mussels and beers in Belgian
restaurants and hiked in Germany’s fabled Black Forest. We’ve done 24 exchanges, including the trip
of a lifetime in 2011 when we took our son out of school, negotiated leaves of
absences from our jobs, and traveled around Europe for four months, doing house
exchanges along the way. Home swapping
has let us see the world from the comfort of someone else’s living room.
Swiss Alps, Summer Vacation
In the United
States and around the globe, house exchanging is a growing practice. The websites offer thousands of listings in
more than 100 countries.
Home swapping is a truly global phenomena that cuts across age, race and
gender lines. And you don’t have
to be rich or even a home-owner to do an exchange: while there are some places with drop-dead
views or infinity pools, there are many apartments and modest homes that
provide a great base for travel.
There are a few
things you need to know to be a successful house exchanger. First and foremost, you must be trusting. A complete stranger will use your home,
unsupervised, while you are far away.
You have to be comfortable with strangers rummaging around your kitchen
cupboards, snoozing under your covers and eating at your table. You have to think of yourself as The Three
Bears minus the “who’s-been-sleeping-in-my-bed?” outburst because after all,
this time you invited Goldilocks in.
You also need
to be fairly well organized. If you’re
the kind of person daunted by planning a weekend getaway, or who thinks summer
vacations are more trouble than they’re worth, you probably shouldn’t consider
house exchanging. There’s no hotel
concierge to book your theater tickets or hail a cab: what you do and how you
get there is entirely up to you, which is, of course, half the fun.
Here are some
of the most commonly asked questions about house exchanging:
2.
Is it safe?
House exchanging is a trust-based exercise, so there’s no way to
make it totally fool-proof.
There are basic steps you can take to increase your security,
including removing valuables from your home and using travel boards to evaluate
a prospective house exchange neighborhood.
3.
Who is a typical house exchanger? Everybody!
Young and old, single and married, people with young kids, no kids, or grown
kids, straight and gay, and all colors.
4.
Do you have to do a simultaneous exchange? You can do either a simultaneous
exchange (you both travel to each other’s homes at the same time) or a
non-simultaneous exchange (one person travels to the exchange house while the
other travels at a later date.)
5.
What do you do about pets? See if your house exchange partner would
be willing to care for your pet, and indicate if you're willing to care for others' pets.
6.
Do you meet house exchange partners in
advance? Typically, you drop
your house keys in the mail or leave them in an agreed-upon location and head
out the door before your exchange partner arrives.
7.
What do you do if you get a dump? Out of 24 exchanges in 13
different countries, I’ve only crossed the line into a true “dump” situation
once, and even it had its redeeming characteristics.
8.
How do you make your home ready for an
exchange? By leaving it clean,
with ample closet and bureau space, lots of information about the house,
neighborhood and city, and a friendly welcome note!
House
exchanging is a great way to travel.
Make it a new year’s resolution to try this increasingly popular way to
go!
