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From Wikitravel

This article is a travel topic.

Home exchange or house swapping is a vacation alternative where you stay at someones home while they stay at yours. A house swap may also include an automobile exchange. Other items that can be up for negotiation include the care of pets and plants.

[edit] Understand

Home exchanging has numerous advantages, including significant savings on hotel costs since neither has to pay for lodging. Additional savings can be had when an automobile is also exchanged. And who doesn't prefer a spacious house to a one-room hotel? Whether for a vacation, or a longer term sabbatical, a home exchange allows one to experience a vacation living like a native.

Unless you are exchanging a 5-star villa in the Caribbean or an apartment facing Central Park, finding a home exchange requires a little bit of effort and time. The most efficient way to arrange a home exchange is to search with a 'reverse search', which identifies who wants to come to your area.

The Internet has numerous websites that provide home exchange listings across the globe. You can determine how up-to-date the listings are by reviewing the proposed exchange dates - and good home exchange sites will include both the join and expiry dates within the descriptions so you know exactly how long each exchange offer has been in circulation. Home exchange websites provide a mechanism by which you can get in touch with other people interested in swapping homes. However, you are responsible for your own exchange arrangements.

To increase your chances of concluding an exchange you should post your home swap offer on several home exchange sites (look for those that include full contact details). Look for well established sites with a good choice of up-to-date listings in areas/countries you are interested in. It is recommended to post your home exchange offer several months before the dates you want to exchange homes. Compile an enticing exchange offer that includes details about your home, yourself, your destination and proposed dates. Periodically check home exchange sites for new home swap listings. And don’t forget to contact new members as soon as possible before they are able to conclude an exchange.

Once you’ve made contact and your potential exchange partner confirms their interest in your home, get to know them better by exchanging e-mails and agreeing to speak on the telephone. To reassure yourself and your exchange partner you should ask for and offer to provide references. Faculty will have additional questions related to logistics and course schedules; international programs offices can provide a lot of answers.

Clean and tidy your home before your exchange. You may also want to fix that leaky faucet that you’ve been meaning to get to for several months now.

Create a guestbook that provides information on using your appliances, local information (e.g. hospital, restaurants, grocery stores, transportation), and contact numbers (e.g. family member or friends, dentist, car garage).

[edit] Home exchange websites

• 1st Home Exchange / Vacation House Swap [1] - lists vacation home exchange / house swap listings across the globe. Website is available in several languages.

• 3rd Home [2] - 3rd Home is the premier vacation property management and home exchange website. Exchange your second home with other luxurious vacation houses and enjoy exclusive access to some of the most desirable resorts and private destinations in the world.

• ahaGO.com Vacation Home Exchange Swap [3] - You can search for your home exchange partner by city or near any city worldwide using a gigantic geocoded worldwide city database.

• Australian House Swap Holidays [4] - Specialising in house swap holidays for people wanting to holiday in some of Australia's and New Zealand's best travel destinations. Free two year membership.

• Aussie House Swap [5] - Australian & New Zealand house swapping service for either domestic or international exchanges. Including an extensive FAQ's and house swapping blog.

• Christian Home Exchange - Swap Club [6] - Aninternational home exchange club offering free 2 year memberships. Members can choose from hundreds of beautiful holiday homes in more than 35 countries.

• EasyHomeExchange.Com [7] - A Home Exchange Community with members helping members plan their next vacations and successful home exchanges. The web site is Free to join and in about five minutes you can list your residence or vacation property.

• ExchangeOurHouses [8] - International home exchange community for vacations.

• Exchange Holiday Homes.com [9] - It's free to join, you dont need to find an exchange partner. Exclusively for owners of holiday homes, no primary exchanges. When you wish you can add a dates to receive credits to use to withdraw other dates elsewhere. UK based company with holiday homes across the world, a subsidiary of Lategetaway.com and founded in 2005. Their forum has advice and posts to help holiday home swappers and there is a section for 1st (primary) home exchangers.

• ExchangeHomes.Com [10] - established back in 1986. US based, British owned with listings from all around the world and very reasonably priced. All memberships are active and current. Lots of helpful information, plus a blog, forum and newsletter. Very secure, yet user friendly website. All listings can be viewed prior to joining.

• ExclusiveExchanges.com [11] - the first home exchange created exclusively and solely for luxury homes. Owners of well-appointed homes in desirable destinations no longer need to wade through thousands of home exchange listings which may not tempt them once they join Exlcusive Exchanges. They offer a year of free membership so that all comers may give it a try before paying the membership fee.

• FractionalExchange.com [12] - A global owner-to-owner online exchange network for owners of upscale vacation homes and fractional properties. Affordable and simple-to-use network. No points or deposits and no per-exchange fees. Specializes in fractional properties as well as standalone vacation homes. All listings can be viewed prior to joining.

• Global Home Exchange [13] - long established home exchange service based in Canada with over 7000 worldwide listings and partner clubs based in the UK and France.

• Global Pacific Vacation Homes [14] - Canadian based home exchange service with worldwide listings.

• Green Theme International Home exchange [15]

• http://www.home-share.net [16] Home-Share.net enables you to save thousands of dollars/euros on your next vacation by exchanging homes with other people across the globe. Home-Share.net provides you with comprehensive information about each exchange home, image slide-shows, maps and satellite views through Google maps, you can search by location, amenities, lifestyles and affiliations, and more.

• Home For Home / Home Exchange [17] - HomeForHome.com is the leader in home exchange in Spain with more than 1700 homes in Spain, and it is expanding. HomeForHome have a ratings system, a search engine, a community section, and it's FREE!

• Homeforswap.com b [18] - Arrange a home exchange using reverse search, which identifies who wants to come to your area.

• 4homex.com [19] - featuring International home exchange and vacation rental homes. Global Home Exchange members are listed with 4 established multi language home exchange clubs for the price of one as part of an alliance of home exchange clubs.

• Holiday Homes in the UK [20] - although primarily dedicated to holiday homes for rent in the UK, they do have a section for home exchanges which is highlighted in their advanced search area. This site only contains houses in the UK though.

• Intercambiodecasa.es [21] - Spanish Home Exchange Club, search features a "Reverse Search" for people who want to come to your destination.

• Home Base Holidays [22] - a long established UK based club with a large choice of exchange offers in many countries (particularly strong on the UK, Europe and Australia) with no listings older than two years. Useful information in regular newsletters and blog.

• HomeExchange.com [23] - over 9,500 home exchange listings in 88 countries. Listings semm to have more user-entered descriptions of home, people and neighborhood and more photos.

• HomeExchange.Jp [24] - not only Europe and America but also Japan and each country of Asia will be arranged and offered. Website is available in Japanese and English.

• HomeWelcome.com [25] - home swap and home exchange listings supporting homes and travel locations of over 80 countries.

• Itamos.com [26] - Home exchange focused on adventurous and creative types. Free house swaps in 70 countries.

• Intervac [27] - one of the early clubs, still produces a hard-copy catalog in addition to listings on its website

• JewettStreet.com [28] - Worldwide Home Exchange Network with innovative features and search functions. Lots of user-entered information about the listing owners.

• Know Your Trade [29] - unaffiliated home exchange hub that rates and reviews all 60+ home exchange clubs in addition to providing home exchange tips.

• Planet-Swap.com [30] -Home exchange or apartment exchange in countries all over the world. Planet Swap is a totally free website, without commitment.

• ProfessorExchange.com [31] - professors and lecturers may arrange for short or long term job exchanges between universities around the world.

• SabbaticalHomes.com [32] - sabbatical home exchanges, home rentals and house sitting opportunities for academics worldwide.

• SelectExchange.co.uk [33] - A worldwide property exchange service for first and second properties.

• spaceXchange.org [34] - a good and quite new website for house swapping, clearly laid out.

• SwitcHome.org [35] - a completely free of charge house swapping website with the majority of offers in France for now - so if you fancy a free French holiday check it out.

• YourHomeForMine.com [36] - Free friendly worldwide home exchange club with a huge range of homes to choose from in some of the world's best destinations.

• TheVacationExchange.com [37] - The Vacation Exchange Network has been in the vacation home exchange business for 13 years. Free to join, this unique exchange site has professionals who can arrange your home swaps for you and allows you to stay in someone else's home even if they don't want to stay in yours. All homes in the network are in desirable vacation destinations, and most are vacation homes with high availability, creating endless vacation possibilities.

• Hometraveler.com [38] Offering home exchange and vacation rentals worldwide, easy online free registration and an easy to use search engine to find all kinds of vacation homes.

This is a usable article. It touches on all the major areas of the topic. An adventurous person could use this article, but please plunge forward and help it grow!