When I was looking for accommodations for our trip, a coworker told me about a house swap that she did with another person in France. She stayed for three weeks at this person's house and at the same time the owner vacationed here and stayed at the coworker's home. She said it worked out wonderfully and she had a great time while paying less for her stay. She told me there are sites where you can put in where you want to vacation and it will find houses in the area. Sometimes it's just someone renting out a second home and not a swap.
Now this is an idea I could get behind! I like the idea of house swapping; it seems like it would hold you and the person you swap with more accountable. You don't want to trash their house because you don't want to go back home and find your own house trashed!
I agree and I've heard of these before. Although you do hear about the occasional bad tourist, most of the time I've heard good things about it. I'd probably take anything of great value out of the house before I'd let anyone stay there.
This sounds fun, and a good way to get accommodation for free if you're going to swap your house out too! In saying that though I'd want to be sure that the people I was swapping my house to were reliable - I guess part of me sees the dangers in it, that someone could literally trash your house and steal your things! I hate that my mind has to think that way, but it's one of those situations where I think sometimes you have to assume the worst!
I agree with Tabitha; I would definitely remove anything of serious value before house swapping. I do that when I have company stay overnight, though.
I don't think you are the only one that thinks this way. Most of us do think of the worst things that could happen. You'd have to have a lot of trust in the people and I believe they have agencies that take care of references for this type of thing.
I think this is a nice way to save some money rather than renting a room or booking at a hotel. I believe many people here do this already, though they're not swapping houses but just renting out their vacation houses to interested people. I think that there are risks to swapping your house with another person's house so you really have to choose which person to swap with. I guess it's a good idea but not without some cons to it.
That would put my mind at ease much more, if there was some sort of reliable reference/rating system. I certainly wouldn't want to just be giving my house keys out to anyone without knowing they were going to treat my house well!
