ExchangeHomesBlog.com » Tips & Tricks

Travel Tips – International Airport Taxes

Guest Author — Fri, 17 Jun 2011 16:23:16 +0000

When traveling internationally, there is nothing more annoying than those pesky airport taxes. An easily-forgettable afterthought, airport taxes are fees charged to travelers, usually departing, for “use of the airport” or some other such nonsense. Although, in the olden days, most international airports had silly little kiosks where one had to queue up to pay the price and retain a ticket to prove they’d paid their way out, most have now converted to a system where these taxes are included in the price of your airfare. Now only a few countries around the world still utilize those obnoxious airport tax kiosks that can really put a damper on the last few minutes of your trip.

Airport taxes, also known as departure taxes or entry taxes, are essentially a way for countries around the world to exploit travelers for those last few bits of cash. Since most countries now use the airfare-inclusive system, it is easy to forget about these taxes when traveling in a country where you must still pay them at a kiosk in the airport.

Airport departure fees range in amount and can be anywhere from just a few bills of the local currency to over $100 USD, as is the case for North American and Australian travelers to Argentina, who must pay a “reciprocity fee”. This tax is the equivalent of what Argentine citizens must pay for a visa to their country. So, in the case of Americans traveling to Argentina or Chile, they must pay $131 – the same price that Argentine and Chilean travelers must pay for a visa to the United States.

If you are unsure about whether or not a departure tax is in use in the country that you’re traveling to, be sure to check online for country-specific information about airport fees. Travel Nation has also compiled a useful list of countries where you must still pay an airport tax in person, but bear in mind that fee amounts and general tax practices are subject to change, so it’s best to check with the U.S. Department of State’s Country Specific Information sheets for the most up-to-date info about departure taxes.

Do you want to learn more about how to Fly Cheaper, then visit Lets Fly Cheaper on how to choose the best ]Flights to Saigon.

Getting The Most Out Of Frequent Flyer Miles

Anne — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 12:27:50 +0000

Frequent flyer miles sound great in principle—travel with a certain airline and earn points that you can cash in later, or use a certain credit card to earn points without even traveling. What could be better than free airline ticket? Airlines, unfortunately, aren’t so keen on your sudden desire to fly for free. Their goal is to sell seats not give them away, no matter how much they try to entice you into earning frequent flyer miles. By being aware of some simple tricks of the trade, you can not only increase the amount of flight points you earn but also stretch them as far as possible.

First, earn the maximum amount of points every time you fly by choosing a specific program and following all of their rules and regulations. Be aware of their promotions and partner companies. You could earn miles by buying flowers at a specific florist or staying at a particular hotel. Keep updated by reading their websites and newsletters for promotions. Certain techniques can also earn you more miles. Fore example, see if you can earn extra miles for business trips by paying for the flight with your own credit card and having your boss reimburse you. Or if your spouse flies less than you, he or she can use a free frequent-flyer mile ticket while the paid ticket goes on your account, earning you more points faster. While you are actively earning miles, stay organized. Save receipts, and watch out for errors in your statements. Know how many miles you have and how many you need to qualify for free trips or other perks that come along with a certain status as a frequent flyer. Finally, don’t waste your miles on cheap flights or by cashing them in on other purchases, such as magazine subscriptions or club memberships.

As wonderful as a promotion may seem, frequent flyer miles are, essentially, cash, and you can bet that an airline wants to save itself money by having you spend your cash on something other than an airline ticket.

Do you figure that you’ll never fly frequently enough to earn enough miles to be useful? You can actually earn points without even flying by using a credit card that offers frequent flyer miles based on the amount you charge every month. While these credit cards sounds like great deals, getting the most out of them can be tricky. Many cards that offer miles also come with a hefty annual fee, so be sure that the cards are worth the fees before you use them. For example, if a card charges fifty dollars annually, and it takes you four years to earn enough miles to purchase a ticket worth less than two hundred dollars, then your investment in the card did not save you any money. If you believe that you can receive worthwhile savings with a mileage credit card, then charge as much as you can—groceries, dinners, even monthly bills—but pay off your bill every month or you’ll be losing money on the interest charged. If you go to a restaurant with friends or family, have them pay you for their meal in cash and charge the bill on your credit card. Some restaurants will give you extra mileage when you pay with a specific mileage earning credit card, and some credit cards will give you extra mileage when you charge groceries and other items. Take advantage of these deals by checking your credit card’s mailings, email newsletters, and website.

Finally, you’ve spent years earning thousands of frequent flyer miles on everything from your credit cards to your business trips out of town, and now your ready to cash them in and live the high life. The first way to get the best flight with the nicest upgrades or advantages possible from your frequent flyer miles is by purchasing tickets as early as possible—as much as a year in advance. Also, try and schedule your flight for the middle of the week—Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday—rather than on Saturday or Sunday when more people are flying, and try to book midday flights, which are less popular than morning or early evening. Finally, call the airline rather than use the internet to book your flight. All of these methods are more likely to lead to you receiving the awards and deals that you want to get from your hard-earned frequent flyers.

6 Tips For Cheap Discount Airfare Reservations

Anne — Thu, 16 Dec 2010 18:13:30 +0000

With the many websites out there touting that they have cheap discount airfare reservations it is hard to know what is real and what is only illusion. Some websites do indeed offer low priced tickets while others may seem to offer those low rates until you see the bottom line. You may find a flight to Orlando from the West coast for under $100, but there are also restrictions that may limit your choices. Below are just a few things you need to know about a cheap discount airfare reservation.

All cheap discount airfare reservations offer non-refundable, non-transferable, and no exchange tickets. Occasionally you can find a ticket you can at least apply to another trip if you know you will not be able to use the ticket, but there is a cost to this “exchange” usually it is $100 and whatever difference there may be in flight price. So be sure you will use the ticket for the trip you are purchasing or you will lose the savings.
There are taxes and fees that will be tacked on to the price of the flight. Some websites offer the full disclosure at the beginning when you are going to choose the ticket. Others wait until you are about to purchase the ticket to add additional fees. These fees may apply towards the credit card you are using or they could apply for buying from a discount site rather than directly from the airline.
Read everything on the page that has to do with the ticket. Read the small print and compare to other sites.
Be aware of a deal too good to be true. Some sites offer great cheap discount airfare reservations below $100, but this is only one way for a round trip ticket. You see you have to buy round trip with the site to get the great deal, but $69 is only one way, so the total would be double.
Research is the key to finding a cheap discount airfare reservation. You need to research as many websites as time will allow determining, which site is the best. You will also want to pay attention to the dates you are flying on. If you can be flexible on the dates, chances are you will find a better flight. For more info see http://www.knowdiscountairfare.com/Discount_Airfares_To_Asia on discount airfare.
Websites offering roundtrip for as low as $69 you have specific dates you can fly. Most of these flights are offered only two weeks in advance. Therefore, you have to be careful that you are online as soon as the deal hits the web in order to take advantage and not miss the cheap discount airfare reservation.

If you keep these guidelines in your mind as you search for flights, you will be aware of the dangers and pick your flight accordingly.

Home Exchange: A Great Tip When Considering A Home Exchange Partner

Anne — Tue, 16 Nov 2010 18:26:52 +0000

When you are still in the process of considering a possible home exchange partner, or location, make good use of Google Maps. When you search on an address in Google Maps, donâ€™t make the mistake of sticking to the opening street map you will be provided with. Up in the top right corner of the screen alongside â€˜Mapâ€™ you will see links to both Satellite and Google Earth views.

Click on â€˜Satelliteâ€™ and in most cases you will be able to zoom in and view the actual home you are considering. Use the navigation tools provided in the top left to take a virtual walk down the street, see where the local shops are located, whether there is a park close by, how far it is to the beach, etc.

Of course, when you first open discussions on a home exchange vacation with total strangers, they may be reluctant to immediately supply you with their full address, but they should certainly tell you the name of their street, or at least a close intersection. Then as communications progress and you become more confident with each other, there should be no problem with exchanging full addresses.

I find the Satellite option in Google Maps to be absolutely fascinating. I havenâ€™t been back to where I was born in the UK for a number of years, but with a few clicks of a mouse I can travel back there â€˜virtuallyâ€™ and wander at leisure through my old neighborhood. Such visits can be fascinating.

Budget Travelers Find Value in Off-site Airport Parking

Anne — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 14:31:58 +0000

Off-site airport parking lots have become lifesavers for both business travelers and vacationers alike. Although most major airports have increased the number of parking lots & available space, it can still be an ordeal finding an available spot. Circling the airport to find an open space when you have a plane to catch is very stressful.

Off-site airport parking lots are usually 1-2 miles from the airport itself. These facilities offer an airport shuttle that will take you from the parking center directly to the airport drop-off point on departure. On arrival, these same shuttles will return you directly to your car. Most even offer luggage assistance in addition to refreshments & complementary newspapers. Many of the lots offered covered parking, useful in winter months.

Privately run off-site airport parking facilities are often cheaper than airport-run long-term lots. Travelers can realize savings of 20% or more using the off-site parking garages. For instance, the standard parking rate at Cleveland Hopkins airport is $10 per day. A nearby off-site airport parking facility offers a long term parking rate of $8 per day and offers routine specials discounting the daily rate even further. And if you leave you car with these facilities for a set number of days, the price continues to fall. The San Diego Airport Parking Company offers a rate of $47.50 for a full week of parking. This is a savings of more than 30% from the weekly rate at the economy parking lot at San Diego International.

The savings donâ€™t stop there. Many airport parking lots have an online website where travelers can make reservations and take advantage of online coupons that offer special savings. Frequent flyers can join repeat customer programs to get additional savings and benefits.

Satellite parking lots have other advantages. These parking facilities are offering unique services to make them stand out. USAirport Parking in Denver offers oil changes & windshield repair thatâ€™s performed while youâ€™re away. Many facilities are offering car wash & detailing, tire rotation, and other maintenance services.

Invest In Time-share Through Home Exchange

Anne — Sun, 29 Aug 2010 13:11:30 +0000

All you need to participate in home exchange is a home! You need not have to compare values of the house or search for a swapping partner in the case of a home similar to yours. It just requires identifying a home where you and your family can stay comfortably in the destination you wish to visit. You need to search for a person or a family with whom you would be comfortable exchanging your home with, for a short period of time. In home exchange, you would be taking care of other family’s home, as well as enjoying the country while they would be doing the same from your home.

People who have traveled places would know that the most expensive part of traveling is paying hotel bills. In many cases, vacations cannot last for long mainly because of the sky high accommodation expenses. Holiday home exchange is one of the most simple and intelligent ways to cut down on accommodation expenses. It is an equal trade for both the families and enables both to enjoy the advantages of a home while traveling to another country. However, many people are unaware of the benefits of home exchanges.

Home exchanges have become very popular in major cities in the United Kingdom as it allows you to benefit from time-share. Mostly, people participating in home exchanges prefer to involve their friends or neighbors to entertain their visitors, by providing the home exchange visitors with information regarding the local sightseeing attractions. The idea of home exchange interests a number of families and individual travelers. Many families with children try to swap houses with families who have children of the similar age group. It saves time and energy that is often exhausted in carting around a number of toys and equipment. The individual traveler often finds house swapping a great way of relaxing in the comforts of a home after a tiring day of sightseeing and can spend more time to get to know the area better.

Many retired travelers make great home exchanges, as they are a bit more flexible with dates and the duration of the home exchange period. By far, airfare is considered to be the only major expense on a vacation while swapping homes. Arrangements for exchanging the use of vehicles should also be made to add to the convenience of travelers. In case pets are involved, you may be able to make some arrangements to save on boarding fees, provided your home exchange partner is ready to take care of your pet.

Even home insurance companies favor home exchanges. Such exchanges are often referred to as holiday villa exchanges and make it safer than leaving your home unoccupied for an extended period of time. It is essential to ensure that your insurance policy covers your visitors stay in your home, before you agree to a home exchange. Try to exchange pictures, calls and get to know your visitors, to avoid the fear of letting strangers into your home. Moreover, you can also ask for references to get further reassurance. When exchanging homes it is imperative that you are at ease with doing so. This way you get to enjoy your vacation without worrying about leaving your home and your possessions in the hands of complete strangers.

Many people enjoy vacations with home exchanges. However, some problems might arise among partners who fail to meet one another’s expectations. Though, homes exchanges are a great opportunity to enjoy a new house with a range of amenities, it is important that the home swapping partner should be comfortable with each other. Therefore, it is better to get to know the swapping partner to avoid any regret.

Concentrating on the topic of Torrevieja, Clinton Maxwell writes primarily for http://www.alicante-spain.com . You can learn about his abstracts on Alicante over at http://www.alicante-spain.com .

Budget Travel – How To Get Around

Anne — Fri, 27 Aug 2010 14:33:18 +0000

One of the biggest parts of a travel and vacation budget is often the cost of getting from one place to another. It is important to budget for this important expense, and to consider some unique options, in order to make your travel dollars stretch as far as possible.

When choosing a rental car, it is important to choose the most economical and fuel efficient car that meets your needs. Obviously, the size of your family will impact the choice of rental car, but compact and even subcompact cars can be great for motoring around cities, particularly when it comes time to park in those tight spots. In addition, a smaller car will get better gas mileage, which is no small consideration, especially if you plan to do a lot of daily driving. And if you plan to travel far and wide, it may be important to choose a rental deal that provides unlimited miles, since charges for mileage overages can be quite costly.

When it comes to the decision of whether to accept or decline the optional collision coverage on a rental car, always be sure to see if you are already covered elsewhere. For instance, your auto insurance company may already provide insurance coverage for rental cars, as may your credit card company. If you are covered by these policies, there is no need to accept the costly collision insurance offered by the rental car company. And of course you will always want to top off your rental car with gasoline before dropping it off, as refueling charges by rental car companies are generally quite high.

Of course, there is a far less alternative to rental cars that few people take advantage of, but in many cities public transportation can be a far less costly, and far more convenient, alternative to paying to drive, and to park, a rental car. Public transport does not make sense in every location though, many small towns, and even some larger cities have public transportation systems that are infrequent, inefficient, inconvenient or even nonexistent.

In other locations, however, using public transport makes a lot of sense. In New York City, for instance, visitors can buy a pass that is good on all subways, buses and trains. The cost of a weekly pass can be less than what a visitor would pay to rent a car for a single day.

And public transport provides an additional benefit, it frees the tourist from the hassles, and expense, of parking the rental car. Many locations in New York, for instance, charge $20, $30 or even more for parking, and other major cities are almost as costly.

Getting around using public transport is not as difficult as many people imagine either. Many companies, particularly those located in major tourist destinations, publish guides which give the route numbers to popular destinations, and bus drivers and train conductors in these locations are often quite adept at getting tourists where they need to go.

Budget Travel – Getting The Best Deal On Airfare

Anne — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 14:32:15 +0000

There is no doubt that airfare is one of the biggest expenses of any vacation. Airfare costs can easily represent at least half of the total cost of a vacation, and if you do not get the best possible deal on airfare it is easy to go over budget. There are some important strategies for getting the best deal on airfares, and this article discusses some of our favorites.

One of the things I have learned over the years is that it is almost always less expensive to fly out of the larger airports than the smaller regional ones. While this is not always the case, and it is not true of every small airport, most larger airports have far more airlines competing for passengers. As we know, more competition generally equals lower prices for passengers.

Many of the larger airports are also home to the low cost carriers that have been such a phenomenon in the industry. While Southwest, Jet Blue and some of the other low cost carriers serve smaller airports, many are left out. The great thing about the incursion of these low cost carriers is that they drive down the prices of the major airlines as well.

So, even if you don’t like the open seating, peanuts only policy of a low cost carrier like Southwest, chances are you can still score a good deal at an airport they serve, even on one of the old line air carriers.

Of course the problem with flying out of major airports is getting there. Many people are in the same situation as myself, which is, they have a small, regional airport nearby, with a couple of major airports a few hours further. What I do whenever I need to fly is compare the cost of flying out of my close regional airport to the price I can get if I fly out of a major city. While I have been able to score some excellent deals from my regional airport, in most cases the difference in fare has been at least $200.

I then must weigh the costs of that cheaper ticket against the convenience of local flying. Usually it makes sense to head to the large airport, particularly if I am buying more than one ticket. At a $200 price differential, it is easy to see how much money can be saved for a family traveling together.

One great trick that too few people take advantage of is booking an airport hotel for the night before your flight. This is especially valuable for those early morning flights and saves you having to get up in the middle of the night and hit the highway. Instead, head down the night before, get a good night’s sleep and take the airport’s shuttle right to the airport door. The extra added bonus of this approach is that in most cases these airport hotels allow their guests to leave their cars at the hotel for the duration of the vacation. In many cases this service is free with the hotel stay, and even in cases where there is a fee involved it is usually much lower than comparable parking at the airport.

So instead of paying $10, $15 or even $20 a day to park at the airport, you have a safe, well lighted place for your car during the trip, plus a comfortable place to spend the night.

I honestly don’t know why more people don’t take advantage of this great way to save big bucks on both airfare and parking costs.

Budget Travel To Any Summer Ski Resort

Anne — Sat, 07 Aug 2010 14:33:17 +0000

When most people think of ski resorts, they naturally picture mountains full of fresh fallen snow and people huddled around a roaring fire enjoying a cup of hot cocoa. While this image is certainly accurate, and ski resorts are some of the most popular of all vacation destinations, the prices of these resort getaways can often be beyond the means of the budget traveler.

There is another way, however, to enjoy these upscale resorts for a fraction of their in season costs. Many ski resort locations stay open all year round, and the prices of lodging, meals and local entertainment often drops precipitously after winter has passed.

Visiting a ski resort in the middle of the summer does not mean there will be nothing to do. In fact, many people prefer visiting these resorts in the off season, since their mountain locations provides for a comfortable, activity packed getaway.

For instance, most ski resorts have ample hiking trails through beautiful mountain vistas. All those great cross country ski trails become wonderful hiking and biking trails after the snow has melted, and the scenery can be even more spectacular, and more comfortable, without the cold and snow of winter.

Besides hiking and biking, there are a great many other activities to be offered as well, including horseback riding, fishing, swimming, and other outdoor activities. In addition, many ski resorts use their ski lifts as fun summer sky rides, and open their slopes to such summertime activities as tobogganing down the side of the mountain. The kids in particular love these fun rides.

Another great thing about visiting a ski resort area in summer is that the mountain location often means cooler temperatures. Even when the lowland temperature is stiflingly hot, the temperature in the mountains can be refreshingly cool and comfortable. Of course, it is important to check the monthly weather for your destination and to avoid the rainy season

There are ski resorts in many states around the country, and the northeastern and western parts of the country have a great wealth of these resorts. While many of them stay open year round and offer a host of off season activities, not all do, so it is important to verify the summer activities of the resort you are considering.

It is also a good idea to research the activities that are offered by each resort. With the concentration of ski resorts in some areas of the country, it will be easy to compare the various offerings and choose the one that best suits your individuals needs.

It is also important to research the surrounding area and see what else there is to do when you are not at the resort. While many ski resorts have plenty of activities to keep you busy for days, you will probably want to venture off the property at least a few times.

Choosing a ski resort located near a busy, but not expensive, metropolitan area is a great way to enjoy your budget vacation. Due to the Winter Olympic Games 2006 in Europe the authorÂ prefers the Winterurlaub Resource.

Hire A Pet Sitter — Your Pets Stay At Home Without Tying Down Your Home Exchange Partners

Anne — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 21:55:10 +0000

One great feature of home exchange is that you can “swap pets”. By that I mean each family’s pets stay at home to be taken care of by the exchange family vacationing in the home. Great, if you just have a cat that needs to be fed and maybe cleaned out once a day, but what if you have a dog? Is it really fair to expect your exchange partners to stay close enough to your home to be able to return once, maybe twice during the day to accommodate your dog’s toilet requirements?

For several years my husband and I have solved this dilemma by taking out a membership with a company called SitterCity. In marketing-speak, Sittercity.com is the largest and most trusted online source for child care, pet care, senior care, housekeeping and tutoring with more than a million caregiver profiles nationwide.

SitterCity is where you can go to find trustworthy babysitters, pet sitters, nannies and other care providers within a few miles of your city. In Dallas, for example, we’ve got more than 24,000 caregivers! Unlike smaller sites, they have hundreds of thousands of care providers across the country to make it easy to find the right sitter for your needs!

As I said earlier, my husband and I always use them when we are home exchanging. We insist upon our exchange partners having at least half of their days in our home free of the responsibility of caring for our collection of pets. If they ask for more, that’s fine too. The SitterCity pet sitter has a definite schedule of days set up and comes to the house twice or three times each day, depending upon how late at night our exchange partners expect to return.

We always provide them with the current sitter’s contact information so that they can get in touch with her should there ever be an emergency, or they will be away from the house longer than anticipated.

This worked out particularly well during our last exchange because it allowed our exchange partners to use our house as a base camp and take several overnight trips away.

But it gets even better. The Sittercity membership gives us access to their entire range of pet sitters, babysitters, nannies and other care providers. If the visiting family has children we can set them up with a baby sitter that we know will be reliable and are often skilled in areas like early childhood education, CPR, and first aid.

Sittercity is also less pricey than using a babysitting agency and lets you search for sitters in your area before you ever have to sign up for their service. That way you can be sure that there are sitters in your area whom you would like to contact before spending a dime.

Because Sittercity is a matchmaking service only, it does not charge any fees for using care providers found on the site! Just your monthly fee for use and you are ready!

13 Great Tips For A Great Budget Travel In Europe

Anne — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 14:39:28 +0000

Here are some of the favorite tips for budget travel in Europe. Actually, these budget travel tips apply to any country that you want to visit!

Budget Travel Tip # 1
Eating with the locals instead of the tourists. This way, you will save some money and enjoy the local food at the same time. Restaurants or eateries that are popular with local residents tend to be the ones with the best meals at a low or reasonable price.

Budget Travel Tip # 2
For a quick and economical breakfast, pick up a roll, some fresh cold cuts and a piece of fruit from the local market. Then enjoy a delicious sandwich and a cup of coffee in the local park. Take in the view and local life around you. You may end up with some great photos while at it.

Budget Travel Tip # 3
When eating out, choose the fixed price menu and the house wine for the best value. These dishes are often a good way to sample the local cuisine.

Budget Travel Tip # 4
Overnight trains are a great way to get from place-to-place and rest or sleep. During your budget travel in Europe, be sure to bring a meal, bottle of water and snack along. That way, you can save money and enjoy your packed meal.

Budget Travel Tip # 5
Snap away! Take loads of pictures of the people you meet during your budget travel in Europe. If you are using film camera, develop them when you get back home as developing at tourist locations can be expensive. Of course, if you are using a digital camera, you can take as many shots and print only your favorite ones.

Budget Travel Tip # 6
Find a website that offers some photographs of local attractions or upload your own from your digital camera. Personalize these shots with an epostcard and email them back to family and friends at home.

Budget Travel Tip # 7
Learn a few basic words of the local language. It will be easier and cheaper to buy things.

Budget Travel Tip # 8
When making large purchases, it is always best to use a credit card. That way you cash lasts longer.

Budget Travel Tip # 9
Like credit cards, ATM cash transactions provide the best exchange rates. You will avoid the sometimes costly fees charged by hotels and currency services when you need cash.

Budget Travel Tip # 10
Many travel locations provide student discounts, senior discounts, etc. If you are not sure a, always ask.

Budget Travel Tip # 11
Plan your budget travel wisely. There are some inexpensive souvenirs that you can get from your budget travel in Europe. For example, stickers, fridge magnets or postcards. For more expensive purchases, remember that the further you go from the tourist attraction, the less expensive the souvenirs will be.

Budget Travel Tip # 12
Go on a tour of the city. A bus pass or subway token is a great avenue for meeting the local people and sightseeing. The public transportation service of most European cites is efficient, clean, safe and easy to navigate.

Budget Travel Tip # 13

Do a Home Exchange!

Want more budget travel tips? Visit http://budget—travel.blogspot.com now and you may save thousands on your next trip.

Basic Guide To Budget Travel

Anne — Sun, 06 Jun 2010 14:34:20 +0000

The world of budget travel is one of the most exciting and interesting, and in today’s world traveling on a budget is becoming more and more of a necessity.

Keeping costs low while traveling is important, whether you are a solo traveler seeing the world for the first time or a family with a carload full of kids heading for the beach or the theme park.

When it comes to coming up with a travel budget, the first step should be to decide what is important to you and where you can cut back a bit.

For instance, some travelers are comfortable spending a bit more for a better class of hotel, while others prefer to save money by using budget accommodations and spend the money they saved on sightseeing or a special meal for the family.

As with other aspects of finance, it is a good idea to create a travel budget. Determine a budget for the various aspects of your vacation, such as hotel, airfare, rental cars, sightseeing, gasoline, etc. Once you have a good idea of what each element of the vacation should cost, it is time to start shopping around for the best deals.

Once you have determined what is most important to you, it is time to start determining how to get the best deals. Often, admission deals on area attractions are the easiest to come by, since many theme parks, museums and other destinations run specials to attract out of town guests.

To score big discounts on area attractions, the best place to start is the web site of the attraction itself. Be sure to check the web site for any specials, such as two for one deals, free admission for children, special reduced admission days, etc.

If you are a member of the military, a senior citizen or a member of an organization such as AAA, there are often additional discounts available.

Most AAA offices sell discount admission tickets to theme parks, museums and other popular attractions within driving distance, and most AAA offices sell discounted admissions to popular attractions like Walt Disney World as well.

The key to making your travel budget stretch farther is to ask about, and take advantage of, all discounts that may be available.

If you are driving to your destination, one great way to make your travel budget go further is to make sure your car is in tip top shape before embarking on your trip.

Small details, such as under-inflated tires or worn spark plugs can really eat into your gas mileage and end up costing you a bundle, especially on a long road trip.

A good map can also be a money saver, since it will keep you from driving around in circles and wasting gas.

Finding your way easily to and from the hotel and the surrounding area will make your vacation more pleasant and less costly.

No matter how you save money on your next vacation, having a budget and sticking to it will help you enjoy your vacation more, and worry less about paying for it.

A Home Exchange Needs Time To Arrange

Anne — Mon, 09 Nov 2009 18:36:13 +0000

I spoke at length the other day with a member who had joined ExchangeHomes.Com a month or so earlier and was becoming frustrated because she had joined with her travel plans for December already set in stone, airline tickets purchased. She told me that she had contacted several fellow members located in her intended location (France), but none were prepared to home exchange with her.

My first question was—when had she bought the airline tickets? She said August. Her ExchangeHomes.Com join date was September 29th.

I explained that successful home exchanging depends very much upon flexibility. Most experienced home exchangers will begin sending out exploratory inquiries a year and often eighteen months in advance of their planned trip. It just isn’t feasible to approach a home exchange in the way she had done: book her tickets, leave it for six weeks, then get around to emailing fellow members and expect them to meekly fall in with her intractable arrangements.

Had she considered that no-one is going to want to book a December flight at short notice—the price would be prohibitive. Also, with Christmas dates involved, what family would want to pack their bags and travel to Melbourne for no particular reason, other than to accommodate her?

On the other hand, had she given the entire home exchange a lot of thought and pre-planning, joined at the beginning of 2009 and begun making contacts then with likely partners, the outcome would more than likely been entirely different.

The moral is: the more time you allow, the easier your arrangements will become. The ExchangeHomes.Com website contains an immense about of information to guide new home exchangers. We even provide what we call our Hints & Advice Book which can be read online, or downloaded onto your computer in PDF format for you to read or even print.

For even more help and “take you by the hand” advice, we also recommend Athena Rickby’s great e-book Home Exchange Academy, which has been dubbed the home exchanger’s bible. It doesn’t recommend or promote any home exchange club, it’s just a wealth of great advice, backed by her 25+ years of worldwide home exchanging.

Home Exchanges With Children

Linda Harris — Fri, 06 Nov 2009 16:00:51 +0000

When you go into a home exchange, your thoughts are usually focused on the excitement of living in a new place for a while.Â At the same time, there is always some level of concern about other people living in your home, particularly if the people you’re exchanging with have children.Â When doing a home exchange with a family with little kids, keep these tips in mind so that you don’t have to worry about what your home will look like when you return.

Don’t Display, Pack It Away
You really don’t have to keep all those fragile little trinkets out in the living room.Â Instead, put any delicate decorations on a high closet shelf till you return, or put them inside a lift top coffee table and request that the lid stay down.Â You’ll be able to get everything set up once you get back, and your home will remain intact.

Lay Down Some Ground Rules
No shoes on the sofa, no eating in the bedroom, no ball throwing indoors.Â If you’re worried that making such requests is rude or presumptuous, don’t be.Â You have the right to set up some guidelines for what goes on in your home when you’re not there, and the parents you are swapping homes with will be grateful that you are being upfront about your expectations.

Close With Cleaning
No matter how well-behaved these kids might be, mess is simply a reality of life with children.Â In order to make sure that you don’t come home to a major cleaning fest, suggest that each of you have the house professionally cleaned at the end of the exchange.Â This way you can expect a clean home without anyone being insulted.

Even with the best laid plans and the most watchful parents, things can still go wrong, so expect to see some signs of wear and tear.Â If you’re still anxious about the idea of a boisterous bunch moving into your home, then maybe swapping with a large family isn’t right for you.Â There are plenty of couples without children who would be happy to exchange homes with you, and that might make for a more worry-free vacation.

Linda Harris writes about family-friendly furniture and home decor at Timber and Textiles.

Home Exchange Photographs Are Important

Anne — Fri, 04 Sep 2009 14:42:36 +0000

This is an old chestnut, and I keep hauling it out, dusting it down and repeating it year after year, but it really is extremely important that you make the effort to add several eye catching photographs to your home exchange listing.

At ExchangeHomes.com we have programming in place to track exactly how people—members and visitors—navigate the website and over and over again we see listings with no photographs being skipped over. In short, no viewable photographs translates repeatedly into ‘no traffic’.

Some people seem to feel that publishing photographs on the Internet is a threat to the security of their home. Well, I’ve yet to hear of this being the case, but there is a very easy solution: just illustrate your listing with photographs of your locality and area attractions, then publish pictures of your home on a secure, password protected website such as PhotoBucket or MyPhotoAlbum. Only provide access to those more personal photographs to fellow members after you have corresponded with them and have established a good rapport. Indicate in the text of your listing that more pictures will be available.

We offer a no questions asked Guarantee: if you don’t get a home exchange in the first year, the next year is completely free, on the condition that you have added photographs to your listing (and your Admin Area shows that you’ve initiated some inquiries with fellow members). In view of our proven lack of traffic to listings without photographs, this provision is critical, because each year we do see a small number of people who join, possibly on the spur of the moment, never add pictures to their listing, never send out any contact emails, in fact never even log on to the site again throughout the entire year.

6 Tips For Setting Up Your Home Exchange

Anne — Mon, 24 Aug 2009 13:47:06 +0000

No-one ever pretends that setting up a successful home exchange is easy. To the contrary, if you don’t live in one of the more sought after locations, it can be a challenge. But a challenge is not an impossibility, quite the opposite, a challenge if viewed positively can be enormous fun!

There are a few points to remember which will often make the task a great deal easier:

1. Use your favorite word processing program to carefully set up a generic email that you can copy and paste into the text box provided in the programmed contact form. This will allow you to send out multiple home exchange inquiries with very little effort on your part.

2. Every city/town/neighborhood has its attractions. Make sure you include all the positive features about yours. If your list is small, take a trip to your visitor’s bureau and ask for brochures, pamphlets, etc. If there is no visitor’s bureau, drop in on a local motel or hotel, all of them have a display in their lobby containing all sorts of local promotions.

3. Don’t limit your contacts to members who list your corner of the world as their desired home swap destination. Pay more attention to age group and family size compatibility and send your attractively worded contact email to everyone living in the area you are hoping to visit. Members may have never thought of vacationing in your town, but that doesn’t mean they won’t consider it.

4. Pay particular attention to members who list their home exchange destination as “open to offers”. You will need to sort the listings under that criteria when you are searching for “who wants to come to me?” otherwise you will miss them, but they are the true gems among your home swapping opportunities. Very often they are long standing, experienced home exchangers who have exhausted their lists of preferred destinations. Now they are simply waiting to see what new offer piques their interest and if you take the
trouble to send out attractive, well thought out opening contacts, it could be yours!

5. You will make your home swap offer much more attractive if you include the family car as part of the deal. Car rental prices are becoming increasingly expensive by the month, inflated not only by the rental companies but also by a list of petty taxes and surcharges that are completely beyond their control.

For your own peace of mind, always stipulate that all drivers have to be 25+ and don’t be afraid to regulate the number of miles the car can be driven. Also, check with your insurance company although there are seldom problems provided the exchange is for 30 days or less.

6. Always, always be courteous and reply to every inquiry you receive yourself. Also, when receiving home exchange requests from other members, keep in mind point 3 above and don’t discount any destination until you are absolutely certain that it won’t work.

There are other cities in the UK besides London – although some members seem to believe otherwise! Similarly, Troyes is within very easy reach of Paris, Gosford is just up the coast from Sydney and Burbank, Pasadena and Buena Park all circle Los Angeles. Considering destinations outside of the accepted tourist destinations will increase your chances of locating and setting up a successful home exchange substantially.

Home Exchange: I Could Never Do That!

Anne — Sun, 16 Aug 2009 21:06:16 +0000

3 reasons I consistently hear from people why (in their opinion), home exchanging would be impossible for them!

I couldn’t possibly trust strangers in my own home.

Yes you can. Your exchange partners will be trusting you to live in their home responsibly and ethically so why should they be any less trustworthy than you? Home exchanges aren’t arranged in one day, after a couple of emails. In fact arrangements and discussions leading up to those arrangements frequently extend over several weeks, dozens of emails as well as several phone calls, instant messages, etc. Eventually this all culminates in the exchange of a written and signed agreement. In short, you get to know each other very well. You certainly are not “strangers”.
Also, provided you’ve found your exchange partners through a legitimate home exchange company that charges a Membership fee, all their personal information will have been been verified and recorded. In short, they are who they say they are. It’s extremely unlikely that anyone is going to provide their personal contact information to pay for a membership then travel hundreds, maybe thousands of miles to rip-off your new blue-ray player.

I don’t live in an accepted tourist area. No-one would ever want to exchange with me.

Yes they will. A great many home exchangers enjoy experiencing new lifestyles and exploring places off the beaten track. In fact they actively avoid the usual tourist traps, in favor of more stimulating places. They are seasoned travelers, often professionals, and their prime consideration is to experience the true day-to-day living of a country or location.

My home is small and “ordinary”, nothing like some of the homes I’ve been looking at on home exchange sites

You may be surprised. Go back to some of those sites and do a search on homes already on offer in your area. How do they compare? Are there a lot of homes listed? If there are it must be a popular location. Are there very few? Scarcity could work in your favor as well. Published photographs will give you a reasonable idea of the neighborhoods where the homes are listed; are they more up-scale than yours? If not, this could be to your advantage.
How do the homes listed compare for size? Are they similar in appearance? How do the homes that are actually listed compare with the average home in the same general area?

If, when making an unbiased comparison, your home home appears to come somewhere in the middle, maybe not as grand as some, but definitely better than others, there is no reason at all why you shouldn’t expect to home exchange successfully. If, on the other hand, all the other homes still appear to be better, what steps can you take to implement improvements? A coat of paint … another bed … some shrubs and pretty flowers in the front yard … a theme park pass … tickets to a sports venue?

Put yourself in your potential exchange partner’s shoes and ask yourself what you would like to do if you were visiting your location for the first time. Arrange for the necessary passes / tickets then make their existence VERY clear both in your home exchange listing, and in all the inquiry emails you send out.

With all three points I’ve listed, positive thinking and a small helping of ingenuity is the answer!

Home Exchange Is Hard Work

Anne — Sun, 19 Apr 2009 16:21:18 +0000

Since the release of that silly movie “The Holiday”, too many people have labored under the misconception that arranging a home exchange is easy—a piece of cake!

This simply isn’t true. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not putting home exchanging down—just being realistic!

Unless you happen to live in a home that is perfect in every way, and it’s located in a highly sought after location, joining a home exchange club and sending out just one or two inquiry emails is NOT going to represent the total effort required.

First you need to put together an eye-catching, attractive listing including lots of photographs. Listings that don’t contain photographs get passed over—it’s a proven fact. Even worse, some members even view listings without photographs with suspicion, wondering what the member is hiding.

Second you will need to sieve through all the listings and locate everything that could work for you. Flexibility is the key. Without flexibility your chances of locating and setting up a successful exchange are reduced drastically. It’s very difficult to find another member living exactly where you wish to go and who wants to travel to your home town during identical dates.

If you are tied in to specific dates that simply cannot be moved then try to be extra flexible with your location. The United Kingdom is comprised of many more cities than London. The entire UK is served by an excellent road and rail system and because it’s tiny (compared to the US, for example), access to London will never be much more than a couple of hours.

Exactly the same argument applies with Paris, Rome, etc.

You also need to put a lot of effort into your actual contact emails. Just dashing of a line “are you interested in exchanging to xyz?” won’t win you any friends. In fact a fellow home exchange blogger stated categorically that she flat-out ignores each and every email like that. She considers them to be rude and she has no interest in entrusting her home to such people.

Your Admin Area in ExchangeHomes.com allows you to store a “template” email that you can use repeatedly when initiating contacts. The key here is the word “template”. Make the effort to tweak and personalize it appropriately each time. It’s extremely easy to do, just read the member’s listing carefully first and slot in a few pertinent references.

The home exchange code of ethics also requires that you ALWAYS reply, no matter how briefly to every email you receive. Lack of response to emails represents 99% of the complaints we receive from members and often it’s not the result of bad manners.

Here are the most common reasons you may not receive a response to inquiry emails:

The member has changed their email address and forgotten to update their listing.
Their email provider has routed the message straight into their spam folder (which they then routinely empty without first checking).
They are away from home and don’t have regular access to their email.
They or a member of their family may be ill and checking email has slipped down on their agenda.
They are overwhelmed with exchange offers.
The member’s first language isn’t English and they are struggling to understand your email to them

The last point immediately raises another issue. If you are looking for an exchange where the language is different to your own, your offer(s) will put you streets ahead of everyone else’s if you can have your inquiry email translated prior to sending. There are plenty of free translation services on the internet and the result will be far from perfect, but it will show that you are prepared to try. Send both versions of the inquiry email.

The next effort on your part will be required for communicate back and forth between yourself and the members who respond to your inquiries, and the members who initiate inquiries themselves. This stage is crucial. Communicate, communicate and communicate some more. The more communication back and forth, the less chance for any misunderstandings.

Communicate in every way possible: by email, by instant messenger, by phone. Discuss everything that’s important to you (and the people you’re negotiating with) and don’t close any issue until agreement has been reached. Don’t compromise on anything unless you understand and are fully prepared to deal with the resulting consequences.

These communications will quickly eliminate any exchange partners you clearly won’t wish to move further forward with and when you reach the point where you and another member/family are completely happy with everything discussed, always finalize the process with both parties completing and signing a Home Exchange Agreement (sometimes called a contract). Sample Agreements can be downloaded Here.

The Travelzoo Top 20

Anne — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 17:12:18 +0000

After hearing a number of encouraging recommendations from people already subscribing, I signed up for the Travelzoo Top 20 Newsletter just a couple of weeks ago and I’ve already found a bargain, a very good deal for a B&B in Sonoma (this was a completely spontaneous, last minute trip and I didn’t have a chance to look into home exchanging). The newsletter provides a good, aggregated source of deals, and I think they also have exclusive deals with some hotel.

A lot of people post on forums that they are very suspicious of “too good to be true” bargains, but The Travelzoo states the following:

Travelzoo is the most trusted publisher of travel deals. Our team researches, evaluates and tests thousands of deals to find those with true value. We recommend only deals whose accuracy and availability we can confirm. With over 12 million subscribers, we are the largest publisher of travel deals on the Internet.

The Travelzoo Top 20 is the definitive list of the weekâ€™s best travel deals. Every week, our team researches, evaluates and recommends hundreds of airfare, hotel, vacation package, cruise and rental car deals. Only the most competitive make the Top 20. Our Test Booking Center confirms the accuracy and availability of every deal before the list goes out.

A subscription is completely FREE and I was highly impressed with the recommendation I took advantage of. Click Here To Sign Up for the Travelzoo Top 20Â® list.

Replying To Home Exchange Email Contacts

Anne — Thu, 09 Apr 2009 15:05:08 +0000

Unfortunately, 2009 doesn’t seem to be starting any different than previous years. Over the past few weeks we’ve received several complaints from members who have sent out home exchange inquiry emails, only to receive no response.

Thankfully, this has been somewhat counteracted by another member who contacted us full of compliments. She said she had joined on March 1st, immediately sent out just five emails, and within a couple of days received three replies, all positive. By March 15th she had narrowed her selection down to one, and just a week later both parties finalized arrangements by exchanging Home Exchange Agreements.

But to return to the subject of this post. Year after year we always hear from a small percentage of potential home exchangers, unhappy because they don’t receive responses to their emails.

As I’ve written over and over, it’s not always due to bad manners. Over protective email clients more and more divert any email from an unfamiliar source straight to the spam folder, and people seldom check its contents before simply clicking to ‘empty’ it. I checked a member’s activity logs on the web site just the other day because she said she had been a member for a year and never received a single home exchange inquiry. I discovered that twenty two inquiries had actually been sent to her (and they were also listed in her Admin to read). She admitted that she always emptied her spam folder without looking through it first. She also had no idea that copies of all her emails in and out are stored in her Admin.

Finally, sometimes emails never get though because the intended recipient has changed their email address and it has never occurred to them to change it in their listing. Hence no contacts ever reach them. Others set up Yahoo, Gmail, MSN addresses then as time passes, forget to check them. We had a man once complain about lack of replies and inquiries, but he had completely forgotten that the email address in his listing was with Gmail. He had never checked.

Home Exchange and Take Your Pet Along

Anne — Thu, 19 Feb 2009 21:30:46 +0000

Another huge advantage of home exchange vacationing is the opportunity to take your pet with you. This is a definite possibility worth considering if you will be traveling by car or train to your home exchange destination, and even if you will be flying, it’s not out of the question.

Pet boarding facilities are always expensive and most dogs and cats don’t like them. They would prefer to be with their owners. Having said that, make sure your exchange partners are 100% happy with the arrangement; never take a pet without first receiving written permission. Also, don’t take a pet on vacation with you if you’re likely to be busy sightseeing for most of the time. You need to have your pet in an environment where it will be in your company for a good part of the day so that it’s vacation will be enjoyable as well.

Prior to departure make sure that all your pet’s shots are current and check with your vet whether any special shots would be advisable for the area you will be traveling to. Also, have a nametag made displaying your exchange home’s address and phone number and attach it to your pet’s collar IN ADDITION to his regular tag. If your pet is a cat, it’s a good idea to fit it with a cat-harness, should it escape a cat wearing a harness is much easier to grab hold of. A word of warning—don’t buy a cheap harness, cats escape from them!

Home Exchangers Should Not Be In A Hurry

Anne — Thu, 12 Feb 2009 17:23:55 +0000

Over recent months I’ve noticed an increase in members joining ExchangeHomes.com and listing required home exchange dates within a very short space of time. Similarly, I’ve been contacted by members who have received emails inquiring about possible exchanges almost immediately.

I realize that on a few occasions, last minute exchanges are possible, but generally they are not the norm, especially in these economic times. First and foremost, people will need to exchange during dates when it impacts the least, both on their work and their wallets. And that usually requires time.

Normally, to get the best bargains, flight tickets need to be booked quite a long way in advance. Today, virtually everyone is watching the pennies so it’s highly unlikely that too many home exchanges will be set up if the time is so short, only expensive air fares are available.

Home Exchange For ‘Soon To Be’ Retirees

Anne — Mon, 19 Jan 2009 18:29:14 +0000

Lots of home exchangers, as retirement looms close, start wondering if continuing to live in, or in close proximity to a large metropolitan area is such a good idea. While they were working, city life may have been attractive, but in retirement do they really want to continue fighting the traffic and dealing with the rush on a day to day basis? Maybe retirement could be so much more enjoyable in a slower, more tranquil setting.

Another consideration is expense; the cost of living in a big city is usually significantly higher than in a small town, so this as well could be a point worth consideration.

Home exchanging can be enormously helpful in the process of deciding just where to move to. A list of possible locations is a good starting point. From there begin the process of setting up short-term home exchanges to places on your list. Usually, a long weekend is more than long enough for you to evaluate somewhere. Live in a house in a real neighborhood, shop in the local markets, eat out in local restaurants, chat with the locals and neighbors. It won’t take long for you decide whether a location is right for you or not. Frequently intuition plays a big part and you will quickly develop a “nose” for what you want.

For the most part, folk usually retire within the country or state where they have previously lived, but even if your aspirations lead you beyond those horizons, fact finding home exchanges could still be an important tool in your decision making arsenal. Vacations spent in Puerto Vallarta or the Amalfi Coast are one thing; pulling up your roots and moving lock stock and barrel to Vila Verde or Castiglioncello could be traumatic.

A fact finding home exchange could turn out to be invaluable. Here at ExchangeHomes.com I spoke recently with a lady who, for years had dreamed of retiring to the south coast of England from Manchester. She took part in a number of exploratory home exchanges and quickly changed her mind – the reason she gave was her feeling that she would find it unexpectedly difficult to strike up friendships with the people she had encountered in the south. She and her husband completely changed their plans and looked instead at Cumbria and the Lake District, did a couple of home swaps and decided a move to Keswick would be right for them.

It’s also worth remembering that a well chosen retirement location could provide a wealth of opportunities for future home exchanges.

Home Exchange and Insurance

Anne — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 16:44:27 +0000

One detail that many home exchangers tend to leave until the last minute, is discussing their plans with their insurance broker. Immediately you decide to embark upon a home exchange it’s definitely a good idea to sit down with your broker so that you can familiarize him with your plans. Once he understands the concept of home exchanging, there should be no problems. Virtually all insurance companies companies are happy when they realize that your house wonâ€™t be left empty during your trip. If youâ€™ve also arranged to swap cars, your existing insurance should cover the guest driver, but to be certain check with your insurer.

When drawing up your Home Exchange Agreement / Contract, stipulate that in the event of an accident, your guests should compensate you, not only for the deductible, but also for any increase in your premium. It’s also a good idea to book your tickets using a credit card that offers some level of trip cancellation insurance that would cover your expenses if your exchange was to fall through at the last minute and you had to pay for hotels and car rentals.

Reference: ExchangeHomes.com Home Exchange Agreement

Home Exchangers Who Have A “Smashing” Time

Anne — Tue, 04 Nov 2008 17:05:00 +0000

Over and over again, the question I’m asked above all others is: suppose I try home exchanging, how do I deal with any damage or breakages that occur in my home during the exchange?

This issue has been covered in great detail on the ExchangeHomes.com website, in earlier posts on this blog, in our Newsletter, and in stored copies of email replies, but I thought a good solution might be to write a new, especially detailed post that I can then refer people to directly. Repeatedly reinventing the wheel with a fresh response to every inquirer wastes an enormous amount of time.

First, I will list the basic, commonsense precautions every home exchanger should adopt to protect their possessions:

Golden Rule Number One: ALWAYS try to home exchange with people or a family similar to your own. If a retired couple with a houseful of expensive antiques and treasures exchanges with a couple with young children, they are asking for trouble. Even the most well behaved children can be clumsy and awkward and accidents can occur without any naughtiness or misbehavior being a factor.
Golden Rule Number Two: Set aside an “off-limits” area of your house, ideally a cupboard or closet that locks. Then take a careful tour round your home and take EVERYTHING that is of especial value, either monetary or on a personal level, and lock it away in that closet. To give items a personal value is very simple: if you would be especially upset by their loss or breakage, they need to be locked away.
Golden Rule Number Three: NEVER embark upon a home exchange without both parties first completing and signing a Home Exchange Agreement or Contract, samples of which can be downloaded from Here. In that Agreement detail very clearly what resolutions are required should any breakages or damage occur.

I’ve been continually involved in the Home Exchange concept since ExchangeHomes.com began back in 1986—that’s 22 years! In all that time I’ve never received a report of malicious damage, theft or vandalism of any kind.

What the inexperienced skeptic doesn’t give consideration to is that fact that home exchanging involves two families, not just their own. While the other family is residing in their home, they are in sole charge of their partner’s home and possessions. This fact alone provides a great incentive to treat the home entrusted to you with immense respect and care.

Look at it this way, home exchanging has been around and steadily gaining in popularity since the 1950′s. After more than half a century, would it really continue to be so popular if it didn’t work? The Internet loves to report negative issues so if there were any disasters they would have been well documented.

Another good suggestion is that people new to home exchanging should try to exchange with members who are experienced. They can then obtain references from previous exchange partners, or maybe earlier partners have taken advantage of our Feedback option where they can leave reports for all to see.

Home Exchange and Natural Disasters

Anne — Thu, 16 Oct 2008 16:25:29 +0000

While the recent wildfires were raging in Southern California, we received a phone call from a member who was actually participating in a home exchange involving a home located close to the areas being devastated. The family were from the UK and had two young children. With absolutely no experience of this type of natural disaster they had no idea of how to cope, or what procedures to follow. The husband explained that they were caring for their home exchange partners’ two cats—what did they do with them if they were required to evacuate?—and he was also very concerned about an expensive Porsche Cayman parked in the garage for which he had no keys.

He explained that before phoning me, he had tried repeatedly to call their exchange partners in their home in the UK, but had been unable to reach them.

As luck would have it, I was able to put him in touch with my daughter who lives just a few miles away from his exchange home. She has survived many Southern California natural disasters, both wildfires and earthquakes, so she was quickly able to advise and guide him. Good fortune also prevailed inasmuch as the fires did not require our member (or daughter) to evacuate.

Coping with earthquakes has already been covered in an earlier post. Click Here to read.

Again I will stress the importance of leaving clear and concise instructions for your exchange partners in the event of any type of emergency, especially if the care of pets is involved. Similarly, if you own a valuable car—off limits to your home exchange partners—in could be prudent to provide them with means of moving it in a crisis.

Home Exchange I.D. Should Always Be Included

Anne — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 16:14:51 +0000

It’s strange how very often we seem to receive batches of emails and phone calls all relating to a similar subject. The current point being raised addresses members who choose to conduct their correspondence outside of the the web site, but completely fail to include any reference to either their own Listing I.D. of the I.D. of the home exchange they are writing about.

The rule of etiquette is simple: when corresponding with anyone directly (not via the ExchangeHomes.com web site) about your exchange offer, always include in your message clear reference to the home you are interested in by Listing I.D. AND the I.D. of the home you are offering in exchange. This will make it instantly clear to the recipient exactly who you are.

Remember, the majority of members, especially if they are proactive, will send out multiple home exchange inquiries, plus they may have more than one home listed. You will make the flow of information so much easier if you always begin with the necessary references.

Of course, members who make a point of conducting all their correspondence via the web site have the job done for them, because every outgoing email is programmed to contain all this information, plus copies of every email sent and received in safely stored in your Admin Area for later reference.

A Home Exchange Vacation Really Can be Free!

Anne — Tue, 30 Sep 2008 17:34:17 +0000

Home Exchange vacationing has always been lauded as a means of free vacationing or free travel, which technically it isn’t, because families and individuals still have to travel to and from their home exchange destinations. It’s also been all too evident recently that the price of travel has been increasing exponentially.

So—I thought it was about time I shared a method my brother uses, and has passed on to me, where even the traveling can be 100% free as well.

Use a credit card with mileage rewards!

No—I mean REALLY use the credit card for absolutely everything—grocery, gasoline, paying utilities, buying clothes for the kids (and yourself!), medical and dental expenditure—EVERYTHING!

The clincher is that at the end of each month the outstanding balance on the credit card is always paid off in full—NO EXCEPTIONS. Instead of writing checks or using your debit card for various day to day transactions, leave all your cash in the bank and use it to pay your credit card, then the next month begin the entire process all over again.

My brother does exactly the same thing with all his business expenses as well.

Both last year and this, he used his accumulated mileage rewards to take his family (wife and two children) to England on vacation, flying out of San Francisco. All their travel expenses were covered and of course, they exchanged homes. This year the exchange included a car; last year it did not, but he was able to fund a rental car with mileage rewards.

Of course you have to be disciplined and always pay the balance in full every month, but when the routine is established that’s easy enough, after all the necessary money should be sitting in your bank. Another nice touch—deposit your paychecks into a savings account and transfer out just the amount necessary to pay the credit card balance. The fact that it’s not available in your checking account will force you to use the credit card, plus it will earn a little interest for you.

Home Exchangers First Time Experiences With Earthquakes

Anne — Wed, 30 Jul 2008 14:28:10 +0000

I was busy working at my desk yesterday morning when I received an IM from my daughter who still lives in Southern California informing me that they had just been hit by a fairly big earthquake. During the years my husband and I had lived in Southern California we had experienced many earthquakes including two major ones – the Northridge Quake on January. 17, 1994 with a magnitude of 6.7 and before that the Whittier Narrows Quake on October 01, 1987 with a magnitude of 5.9. Of course there were many others, but these two affected my family specifically.

Actually residing in the area you tend to become blasÃ©—if you live in California you have to, after all earthquakes are often a part of everyday living. But, it gave me pause for thought regarding home exchangers. Here we are at the end of July—there must be thousands of home exchanges currently taking place in California and I bet virtually none of the participants had ever encountered an earthquake in their lives before.

I realize it could be a difficult subject to broach without scaring off potential home exchange partners, but clearly written advice and directions covering how guests living in your exchange home should react to and deal with an earthquake should almost certainly be left in an obvious place. Here is a link to a very useful “What to Do After an Earthquake” List provided by the Red Cross.

Weekend Home Exchanging – A Sign Of The Times?

Anne — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 14:50:52 +0000

I’ve always found that many of our Home Exchange Members have not sat back and settled for merely one home exchange per year. We’ve constantly heard from members who have been much more inventive and participated in multiple weekend exchanges as well.

Two pairs of members immediately spring to mind: the first are in Southern California with homes in Newport Beach and Lake Tahoe; the second are in Europe with homes in Greater London and Boulogne. From what I’ve heard, both sets treat each others homes as virtual ‘second homes’ and constantly arrange weekend exchanges.

But now, with the cost of travel quickly becoming prohibitive, I’m hearing more and more that many members are relinquishing their usual long term annual vacation in favor of several weekend, or possibly four day home exchanges much closer to home.

One member I spoke with yesterday was very positive about making this shift in arrangements. She and her family live in a Philadelphia suburb and in past years have exchanged to Hawaii, Vancouver, Mazatlan and Dublin. This year they have already completed a weekend home exchange to Bridgeport and they are planning a second exchange shortly to Washington. She said they are currently looking to arrange a fall exchange to upstate New York, possibly for four days.

She said if the price of air travel becomes more affordable again, they would like to make a home exchange to Paris, but they are a family of four and with the cost of everyday living skyrocketing, such a trip is currently way beyond what they can afford. She agreed that even driving the distance involved in a weekend exchange costs twice what it would have done not too long ago, but for them it’s still within their means, especially since they traded in their gas guzzling SUV for a four cylinder Toyota.

Talking with her reminded me of a post I made a year ago in this blog covering my own weekend home exchange experiences. You can read it by clicking Here!.

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Home Exchange Arranged Display Option

Anne — Tue, 08 Jul 2008 14:27:45 +0000

I’ve just been checking through some of the home exchange offers listed on the ExchangeHomes.com web site. Either ExchangeHomes.com members are completely ignoring the option to mark their listings as “Exchange Arranged”, or many especially attractive exchange opportunities appear to remain available for the months of August and September.

I asked one member, who I know has definitely set up an exchange, why she had not utilized the “Exchange Arranged” option and she raised a very interesting point. She lives in an especially attractive area and normally receives an ongoing list of home exchange requests. However, last year she marked her listing as “Exchange Arranged”, and immediately the requests dried up. As she pointed out, she expects to travel at least once or twice every year throughout future years, so just because her plans are complete for 2008, she doesn’t want to create a negative impression and repress new inquiries.

So, I think the moral is this: if you see a listing that’s attractive to you, but it’s marked “Exchange Arranged”, the likelihood is they are just referring to this current year. By all means email them with an exploratory inquiry for future years. We constantly repeat that home exchangers should try to plan ahead and this scenario is an example of exactly what we mean.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Internet Access In Home Exchange Homes

Anne — Mon, 07 Jul 2008 13:59:31 +0000

For some time now, our ExchangeHomes.com web site has offered two distinct alternatives when describing the Internet access available in the home you’re offering for home exchange:

Dial Up

High Speed

Unless listings are edited by their owners, each defaults to the “Dial Up” option.

Since this was added, new members of course have selected accordingly, but I’ve noticed that very few members who had joined previously have actually made any changes.

For your own benefit, I strongly encourage everyone to do so. Many of our members and visitors are either small business owners or are in jobs that necessitate they maintain Internet access via high speed connections even while on vacation. Consequently, if your listing indicates that you have dial up access, when it’s actually high speed, it could result in lost home exchange inquiries.

Editing your listing will take only a couple of minutes out of your time and it could produce some very positive results!

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange Cars and Vehicles

Anne — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 13:18:43 +0000

Many home exchanges also include a car exchange. Yesterday I came across this “Before You Go Vehicle Safety Checklist” by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA). It’s intended as a pre-vacation checklist for people driving their cars on vacation, but it occurred to me that it also works extremely well as guidelines for home exchangers prior to leaving their vehicle(s) for their exchange partners’ use.

Tires â€” Check the air pressure in all your tires, especially the neglected spare. To get an accurate reading, check pressure when tires are cold, meaning they haven’t been driven on for at least three hours. In addition, take five minutes to inspect your tires for signs of excessive or irregular wear. If you find irregular tread wear patterns, it means your tires need rotation and/or your wheels need to be realigned before you leave.

Belts and Hoses â€” Look under the hood and inspect all belts and hoses to make sure they are in good shape with no signs of blisters, cracks, or cuts in the rubber. High summer temperatures accelerate the rate at which rubber belts and hoses degrade, so it’s best to replace them now if they show signs of obvious wear.

Wiper Blades â€” Examine your blades for signs of wear and tear. If they aren’t in tip-top condition, invest in new ones before you go.

Cooling System â€” Carefully check your coolant level to make sure it’s adequateâ€”orâ€” if it’s time to have your cooling system flushed and refilled, have it done now. You’ll want to avoid your engine overheating.

Fluid Levels â€” You’ll want to check your vehicle’s oil level. If it’s time or even nearly time to have the oil changed, now would be a good time to do it. In addition, check the following fluid levels: coolant, brake, automatic transmission, power steering, and windshield washer. Make sure each reservoir is full and if you see any sign of leakage, take your vehicle in to be serviced.

Lights â€” Ensure all the lights on your vehicle are in working order. Check your headlights, brake lights, turn signals, emergency flashers and interior lights.

Air Conditioning â€” Make sure that your air conditioning system is functioning properly, especially if you’re traveling with those who are sensitive to heat, such as children and seniors. If the air is not blowing cold, it’s a good idea to have the system repaired before you go.

Emergency Roadside Kit
It’s advisable to put together an Emergency Roadside Kit to carry with you. The kit should include: cell phone; First Aid kit; flashlight; flares and a white flag; jumper cables; jack for changing a tire; work gloves and a change of clothes; basic repair tools and some duct tape; a jug of water and paper towels; nonperishable food, drinking water, and medicines; and extra windshield washer fluid.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange Members Should Not Forget The Need For Travel Insurance

Anne — Sat, 31 May 2008 14:47:40 +0000

I received this especially useful advice from a home exchange member last week and thought it would definitely worth publishing in this blog and sharing with everyone—

Do not forget to include travel insurance in your to do list before planning your home exchange vacation. Most people take travel insurance lightly and never discuss travel insurance in detail with their travel agents. It is important to know what your travel insurance covers you against in the event of any unforeseen situations which may subject you to a financial loss or otherwise.

Travel insurance covers different features and it is up to you to choose and ensure you are adequately covered. The first and most common is Trip Cancellation/Interruption coverage. Most of these policies cover cancellations due to weather, sudden illness, death and emergencies whilst at home or abroad.

Another common type of travel insurance is for medical emergencies. This type of coverage is particularly useful if you plan on traveling to underdeveloped countries, or for individuals with an on going illness that might require medical attention at some point during the home exchange. These policies will reimburse you for the cost of doctor visits, medication, and sometimes even medical evacuation out of the country. It’s best to check with your insurance provider regarding the details, as travel health coverage policies vary widely.

It is also possible to obtain travel insurance that will cover non-refundable tickets in the event that a trip has to be canceled for any number of reasons. Some coverage plans will sometimes cover missed connections as well, which can be a lifesaver in the event of a flight delay or over-crowded and/or confusing airport terminal.

For longer trips, or for frequent travelers, a comprehensive insurance package is probably the best value. These usually provide a wide variety of coverage, and some even allow you to choose what kinds of coverage to be included. Since it’s impossible to know what problems might arise during your home exchange, these policies cover all the bases so that you have protection against monetary loss in the event of nearly any emergency.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

A Home Exchange That Includes A Car Exchange

Anne — Mon, 05 May 2008 15:07:01 +0000

A great many home exchanges include exchange of the family car. It’s an ideal arrangement that will usually save the exchange partners a substantial amount of money in car rental fees.

A member from the UK has contacted me with this question:

We’re in the middle of arranging an exchange with a family from Los Angeles. We’ve indicated in our home exchange offer that we would also like to exchange cars, but this family has a two teenagers who drive and I’m very uncomfortable with the prospect of them let loose on the streets in our car. Can I stipulate that only their parents drive?

Absolutely. Never be afraid to make any stipulations, be they about cars or anything involved in the exchange. Make your requirements absolutely clear during the discussion stages of setting up a home swap, then document them as part of your written Home Exchange Agreement. Make sure the agreement is signed by both parties and that both retain a signed copy.

Actually, it’s likely that your auto insurance company would decline to cover any driver from the USA under the age of 25 anyway, and teenagers almost certainly. Irrespective of an issue with teenagers, make sure you inform your insurance agent of your exchange. Make it absolutely clear that home exchangers count as “guests” in your home, not tenants or renters. In fact, it’s always a good idea to discuss your intention to participate in home exchanges well in advance with your agent. You will then have plenty of time to iron out any issues and enlighten him if he’s never heard of the home exchange concept.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange and CHECtravel

Anne — Thu, 01 May 2008 18:32:18 +0000

A Major Step Forward to Certify Home Exchange Clubs

Copied directly from the CHECtravel website:

CHEC is a response to the demands of home exchangers and exchange club owners themselves. Together a need was recognized for an organization that could create and maintain professional standards for exchange agencies, as well as a code of conduct for individual exchangers.

End of quotation.

At the moment just ten home exchange clubs are certified by CHECtravel and we encourage all potential home exchangers to join a club displaying the certification you see displayed to the left. The logo indicates that the the club has been assessed and approved by an independent committee consisting of club owners, industry professionals and experienced home exchangers. All CHEC-certified agencies have agreed to uphold CHEC’s high ethical standards of behavior for themselves and their members.

We also urge all our members, whether they be new or experienced, to join CHEC as a home exchanger. >> Click Here for more information.

Also, as an initial promotion, CHEC has told us that they are offering five of our Full (advertising) Members a free, one year membership. These will be awarded on a strictly first come, first served basis. To qualify you as a Full Member, you must enter the I.D. Number of the property you have listed with us when you sign up, plus, you must indicate that you are a member of ExchangeHomes.com .

Just as on our website, your privacy is paramount to CHEC. They never display any names or contact information in their member area database. All they list are city, country, exchange agency and exchange club number, with a direct link to the listing on our site. That way CHEC members can find fellow CHEC members in preferred destinations and home exchange agencies.

Even if you miss out on a free membership you should consider joining. Again, quoting from the CHEC website:

Individual CHEC exchangers benefit from the safety and security provided by CHEC member clubs. CHEC members enjoy peace of mind when exchanging with a fellow CHEC member who adheres to the same ethical standards.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Go Go Kidz Car Seat Wheels

Anne — Sat, 12 Apr 2008 15:01:11 +0000

It’s not my intention to turn this into a commercial blog, but when I see an item I believe may be of benefit to both home exchangers and travelers in general, it has to be worth a few minutes of my time to bring it to everyone’s attention.

A number of years ago, I came across a stroller that was a godsend to families traveling with babies and toddlers because it was narrow enough to wheel up the aisle of an aircraft. I recommended this stroller in an issue of our home exchange newsletter and subsequently heard from a large number of parents who either bought one immediately, or subsequently read about it in the newsletter archives. Then I heard that the company manufacturing it had ceased production. I continued to receive inquiries about the stroller, but unfortunately all I was able to do was pass on the bad news.

Then last weekend while in DFW airport on a trip from Dallas to Southern California, a young mother went cruising by with her toddler riding in a car seat on what looked like luggage wheels. I was quick to catch up to her. What is that? and where did you find it?

Go Go Kidz car seat wheels she explained.

Go-Go Babyz Infant Cruizer
with Graco Adaptor Car Seat
Accessories -$ 189.95
Retail Price: 229.95
You Save: $40.00

Needless to say, when I got home I was straight on the Internet searching for more information! The cost seems a little expensive at around. $189, but well worth it! Mom (or Dad) and baby get to cruise through the airport in a regular car seat—down the jet bridge—and down the aisle of regular narrow body aircraft, and better yet the parent only has to install the car seat one time when they reach their destination.

Again, it’s called Go Go Kidz Car Seat Wheels. The link to above will take you directly to Happy Mothers, a reputable (I’ve checked them out) online store. Currently they are offering a saving of $40, Free Shipping and no Sales Tax.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

A Home Exchange Membership Involves Hard Work

Anne — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 21:42:56 +0000

Home Exchange Blog:
We make a point of recording all the activity of our members in various administrative logs. Not for any purpose other than to record how they navigate and use the web site. It has often proved to be a very useful tool when planning site improvements. One very useful record the logs do provide us with is exactly how often members log in to their Admin Areas to edit and update their listings and to initiate contacts with fellow members.

Whenever a member contacts us to take advantage of our guarantee whereby if they don’t arrange a home exchange during their first year, their second year is free, I always check their activity during the year using the logs, and as often as not find virtually none. It’s a sad fact that these people have found the concept of home exchanging sufficiently enticing to have enrolled a membership, but that’s as far as it went. Two members who recently requested a free second year had joined last year, both in February, then never logged in to their memberships again. No photographs had been added, not a single email sent out. Clearly they had forgotten all about us until our ‘Membership Expiring’ emails arrived in their in-boxes.

Similar to these members is the winner of Know your Trade’s ’Capture The Crown’ contest in 2007. This lady’s listing won’t expire until later this summer, but to date, after receiving notification of her win she went online and set up her listing, but has never logged in since. No photographs added to her listing, not a single contact email sent out. It appears to have been a complete waste of a very well intentioned prize.

Of course sometimes people are extremely fortunate and do manage to successfully set up a home swap without any level of participation themselves, but it’s very, very rare. In fact if everyone followed this line of (in)action, the whole concept of home exchange would have died a death many decades ago!

The logs of virtually all the successful members record a high level of pro-activeness and participation, and if asked, they all will readily admit that this translates into half the fun. I never pretend that locating and setting up a successful home exchange is easy, but it can, without a doubt be memorable and extremely rewarding.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange Listings Without Photographs

Anne — Sun, 10 Feb 2008 20:35:47 +0000

With the launch of our new home exchange web site, we introduced a new search option that allows both visitors and members to search our database of listings and specify that their results should only show listings that have photographs. We included this option because many people had requested it. They did not want to waste their time sifting though listings where the owner hadn’t even made the effort to nicely illustrate their home exchange offer.

Since our new web site went live just over a week ago we’ve carefully tracked the use of this search and I’ve been amazed by the results. Of the people who click the “More” link at the foot of “Our Latest Home Exchange Listings” on the home page, 47% then click to show only listings containing photographs. Obviously not everyone searches on Latest Home Exchange Listings, but for those that do this figure is especially significant and carries a very obvious implication: if your listing does not include photographs, its probably not even being viewed.

The solution is simple. Pick up your camera and get clicking. You don’t have to own a thousand dollars worth of photographic equipment to produce pleasing results; even bottom of the line digital cameras churn out pictures that are more than adequate for display on the Internet. Just make sure your photographs are light and bright and in focus, show the front and back of your house, plus the major rooms that your exchange partners will be using. Looking at photographs brings a definite sense of reality to your home exchange offer; without them, people may wonder what you are trying to hide.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

The Importance of a Home Exchange Agreement

Anne — Sat, 05 Jan 2008 17:58:21 +0000

I’ve been talking over the last few days with a long time member who states she and her family were let down at the last minute by a family with whom she believed she had a firm, committed arrangement.

Unfortunately, what she didn’t have was a written Home Exchange Agreement.

The lady sent me copies of the emails that had transpired between both parties, but they were limited in their content. She freely admitted that virtually all discussions had taken place over the phone—with no written verification—ever!

ExchangeHomes.com states as follows in our Terms of Membership:

“If we ever hear of a member canceling an exchange once a firm commitment has been made and tickets have been purchased, that member will be blacklisted and barred from future membership with ExchangeHomes.com and a warning will be issued to all other clubs.”

However, to enforce this commitment, we first need to receive irrevocable proof, and without question, the best form of this is a signed Home Exchange Agreement. Hearing an unfortunate and usually sad story from one of the parties just isn’t enough.

What makes this story even more regrettable is the fact that the family who complained to me are experienced exchangers with a number of successful home exchanges behind them. I suppose they should be count themselves fortunate that if they have never “bothered” with written agreements, they haven’t encountered a similar problem before.

ExchangeHomes.com publishes an e-book we call our Hints and Advices Book. It’s available for both members and visitors to read online, and we also provide a PDF version for download. Included is a suggested Home Exchange Agreement which anyone can copy and use.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange: Never Pin Your Hopes On One Listing!

Anne — Tue, 27 Nov 2007 17:26:07 +0000

Occasionally I am contacted either by phone or email by someone viewing the ExchangeHomes.com home exchange website, who is planning a trip to a very specific location and has found just one listing matching where they hope to go. When our completely revised website goes live, these people will be able to join as Associate Members and contact this listing without making any financial commitment, but until the transition is completed and in place it is still necessary for them to join as Full (paid) before they can initiate contact.

In the past I have always suggested to these people that joining is probably not a good idea. Why? because nine times out of ten they will contact the solitary listing they have their hopes pinned upon, only to receive a negative and disappointing response.

Very occasionally a lucky member will strike a bullseye straight away, but more often than not they find it necessary to contact quite a few potential home exchange partners before finding a likely exchange that they can move forward with.

Over the weekend I spoke with a lady who lives in Mobile, Alabama. She is planning a trip to Hong Kong in a very specific time frame in 2008, but the listing she was interested in indicated travel plans to the UK between December and February. Normally I encourage members to approach any listing they are interested in, but for non-members I don’t consider that to be a fair proposition. They pay to join, receive a negative response and are left high and dry. Not a good situation for us, and certainly not for them.

In the scope of things, very few home exchangers are able to find a listing located exactly where they want to go, matching their dates and listing their town as their destination. A much more likely scenario involves multiple email contacts and a great deal of flexibility. That’s the reality.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange Plans For 2008

Anne — Mon, 12 Nov 2007 17:23:00 +0000

As we start looking towards the end of the year, and, of course Christmas, savvy home exchangers are also beginning to form their plans for 2008. The euphemism about the early bird catching the worm always holds true for home swapping. Of course, as new members continue to join throughout the year there will always be golden opportunities appearing on a daily basis, but year’s end is when the “opportunists” can strike. Let me explain.

I always advise members to search the listings paying particular attention to any and all listings located wherever they are hoping to visit. Even if a listing they are particularly attracted to indicates a destination other than their own, no harm will be done by sending them an attractive, well put together inquiry. I constantly hear reports about successful home exchanges with just such beginnings, in fact a couple of my best and most memorable swaps have commenced with emails beginning something like:

“Hello – I know you haven’t listed ***** as where you want to visit, but let me tell you about our home and our location …..”

In fact one of my earlier postings referred to just such an inquiry my husband and I received. Take a look at: Back Up Contingencies.

I also recall hearing from one of our ExchangeHomes.com members some time ago who were anxious to relate their story about an exchange that they initiated with just such an inquiry. This pro-active approach worked for them and both parties had enjoyed a great time. As I recall, they lived in Alberta, Canada and needed to exchange with Oxford. They had located an Oxford listing, but it’s owners hadn’t even considered Canada, let alone Alberta. They had been enticed and won over with an exceptionally well written inquiry and a link to lots of photographs.

At this time of the year, many members who joined during the early part of 2007 will have arranged and completed their home exchanges for this year, yet it’s likely that most of them won’t get around to updating their listings with their 2008 plans until they receive their renewal notices. These are the true gems just waiting to be contacted and seduced!

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

My Most Difficult Home Exchange Question

Anne — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 17:46:40 +0000

When I tell them, people find it hard to believe that the most difficult question I’m frequently expected to answer is: “What are my chances of getting a home exchange?”

There are so many variables involved, I would have to be thoroughly dishonest to even pretend to provide an up-front answer to that question.

Instead, I realized a long time ago that I can best help whomever is asking this question by providing them with a list of points or questions of my own:

Have they checked out our database of members to see how many are located wherever it is they hope to visit? Are they prepared to broaden their horizons a little?

Are they flexible with their exchange dates? Rigidly expecting to exchange between dates that are set in stone will undoubtedly reduce their chances of locating a swap substantially.

How much effort are they prepared to devote to their membership? Hard work and success invariably go hand in hand. A member who prepares a well written, informative contact email which he then takes the trouble to personalize to each individual inquiry boosts his/her chances of success enormously. On the other hand, someone who joins, views his membership as nothing more than an advertisement, and sits back expecting dozens of offers to fill his mailbox, will invariably be the one complaining that her membership with XYZ club was a total waste of time.

If they themselves live in a less than well known location, have they done their homework and prepared a list of features that will make it captivating and entice likely exchange partners?

Are they offering a car exchange as well? Car rentals are prohibitively expensive and a willingness to offer a car will definitely add extra appeal.

Are they on the ball with checking and responding to their emails? If they are corresponding with a fellow member who has to wait several days for an answer to a question, that member will very likely loose interest, especially if she’s received other potential inquiries.

I suggest that the person asking my opinion on his or her likelihood of obtaining an exchange reads those questions carefully and if they can truthfully answer “YES” to all of them, then they can conclude that their chances are excellent.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

More About Home Exchange and Telephones

Anne — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 20:55:08 +0000

To continue with the discussion about telephones as they relate to your home exchange arrangements:

At the beginning of this year we switched cold turkey from a traditional land-line to a Vonage VOIP (voice over Internet Protocol) service and I have no hesitation in saying it’s the best move we ever made.

Shortly afterwards we made a home exchange with a couple in Mexico and they were over the moon with Vonage’s rates for them to call home while they were away – just $0.01 per minute. Their total bill amounted to less than one dollar!

We are currently finalizing plans for a home swap with Italy next spring and our partners were absolutely delighted to learn that they will be able to call home for just as long as they like at no cost to them whatsoever. Calls to most of Europe are free! It seems to me that this is all good stuff when adding persuasive enticements to information about your home.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange and Telephones

Anne — Fri, 19 Oct 2007 19:03:42 +0000

Years ago, the ubiquitous telephone was a very fundamental item. It sat there in virtually every home and barely raised any discussion in home exchange arrangements beyond the usual agreement that each party pays for its own calls.

Recently however, subtle changes have crept onto the scene and today, quite a few homes no longer have a land-line telephone, as families members are all equipped with their own individual cell phones. Land line phones are progressively becoming redundant.

In addition, many travelers are also subscribing to “cellular world phones”. Without a doubt, all the development appears to be evidenced in cell phones, while the poor old land-line phones are being abandoned in droves.

Last year, about 8% of U.S. households that subscribe to cellphone service had given up their land-line phones, up from 5% in 2004 and 4% in 2003, according to a survey by Forrester Research Inc. in Cambridge, Mass.

Households are ditching home wired phones faster because cell phone service is getting cheaper, wireless coverage is improving and fewer people need their land lines for access to the Internet, according to the survey of about 4,500 households with cellphones in the fourth quarter. More than six million households and nearly 6% of the total U.S. population rely exclusively on wireless phones, according to Forrester.

Forrester also found that cord cutters are getting older. While the practice is still more prevalent among the under-35 crowd, 9% of U.S. mobile subscribers between the ages of 35 and 44 gave up their home phones in 2005, up from 3% in 2004.

This trend could have a negative effect upon home exchangers, especially if the home swap is between different countries. One party could possibly find itself in a home without a phone!

One solution would be for the wireless family to leave one of their cell phones behind for their exchange partners to use (with the usual agreement that they pay for all their calls). Another answer could be to set up the computer in the wireless only home with a PC Calling Service such as Yahoo Voice. It’s incredibly economical with calls between the USA and UK costing just 1c/per minute.

This service doesn’t necessarily have to be set up by the home owner either because if the visiting family travels with a laptop computer, they can set it up with Yahoo Voice in advance. You can use your PC’s microphone and speakers, but a headset improves quality (and privacy). And if you’re not online, calls go to voicemail (which you can check anytime for free).

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Qualities of a Good Home Exchange Participant

Anne — Mon, 15 Oct 2007 15:52:23 +0000

Out of the blue, I was asked the other day, what criteria defines a “good” home exchange participant. The question gave me pause for thought – not because I had any difficulty in answering, but because there are so many points that can be attributed to a good home exchanger, my response needed to be constructed wisely.

In the end I concluded that I could best answer by offering a list of ten features usually possessed by a home exchanger whom I would adjudge as being “good”.

They check their emails regularly (at least once daily) and respond promptly to every inquiry they receive.

They keep their home exchange listing up to date with dates, destinations etc., and always keep their email address current.

They never send out “spam” inquiries. Each inquiry they send is geared to an individual listing.

They describe their home and its environs honestly, accurately and fairly.

They never ever renege on a firm home exchange agreement. This represents the worse offense possible.

They never spring unexpected household chores or maintenance tasks upon their guests. They discuss and agree such matters in advance.

They leave their own home clean and welcoming for their guests with basic groceries in the kitchen, the beds made with fresh linens and cuddly towels in the bathrooms.

They prepare a “Home Exchange Book” listing emergency phone numbers, local services that they use (plumbers, electricians, mechanics, etc.), appliance manuals, restaurants they recommend, etc.

They never bring additional people into the exchange home without prior arrangement with their exchange partners.

They leave their exchange home exactly as they found it – clean and fresh and welcoming for their partner’s return.

If anyone would like to add any points to this list, I’d love to hear from you!

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange Back-Up Contingencies

Anne — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 16:34:38 +0000

I remember that years ago in newsletters and posts I frequently stressed the importance of always having back up arrangements available—just in case. I have to admit that recently I’ve let this advice slip, until my own recent dilemma brought it very much to the forefront for me again.

At the end of last month, my husband and I had an exchange arranged with a couple in Washington (the state, not the city). They had contacted us months ago because their daughter was commencing university at Texas A&M in the Fall Semester and they were anxious to travel down with her and spend a few days helping her get settled in.

My spouse and I had no special need to visit Washington, but their location in Bremerton seemed idyllic and we’d been induced by the detailed and descriptive offer they’d sent us. Why not spend a week in such a delightful area?

Communications and arrangements had progressed smoothly, then just three days before the exchange a medical emergency made it impossible for us to travel during that week. What on earth was to be done? I found myself truly a victim of ignoring my own advice because I had absolutely no contingency plan available.

In the end the fates saved us. I mentioned our predicament to my hairdresser and she was quick to offer us the use of a vacant rental apartment that she owned. Of course it wasn’t appropriate to provide a tiny apartment for our exchange partners who were expecting the use of a large family home, so my husband and I moved in there for a week, and or house was free exactly as planned. Unfortunately we didn’t make it to Bremerton ourselves as we had hoped, but our partners have offered us the use of their home for a week next spring when they will be away on a cruise.

The moral of this story is—you never know. Assume the worse and have an alternative plan to fall back upon. Think of it this way, a home exchange is not a hotel where you can pick up the phone and cancel a booking. Canceling a home exchange means total disruption for your exchange partners which usually includes expensive air fares.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange Requires Detailed Discussions

Anne — Wed, 19 Sep 2007 16:11:56 +0000

I heard this week from a somewhat disgruntled member from the US who had returned recently from an exchange with a family in the UK. He was delighted with the home he and his family had exchanged with, but he had been horrified when he climbed into the exchange car and discovered it was equipped with a stick shift.

My first question was: hadn’t he asked for full details about the car during discussions leading up to agreeing upon a home exchange? Also, hadn’t his exchange partner thought to include such pertinent information when he supplied his home exchange details?

It transpired that both parties had supplied very little information other than the size of the homes being offered, so in the circumstances it was a miracle that apart from the car, their home swap experiences passed without any more significant glitches or problems.

It really is critical that everything is discussed right down to the most minute detail before finally agreeing to go forward with a home exchange. Discussion is a pillar supporting the wntire arrangement. ExchangeHomes.com offers a Hints and Advice Book which can be both read online or downloaded via a PDF file, and only recently I gave an in depth review of an excellent new guide that I endorse wholeheartedly: Home Exchange Academy.

Both books walk you through the entire process of selecting and setting up a successful home exchange and both emphasize the need for in depth discussions. Home Exchange Academy supplies its readers with really excellent sample Home Exchange and Car Exchange Agreements and a great template for your Home Exchange Book – the document all exchangers should assemble to familiarize exchange partners both present and future with their home, its foibles and its surroundings and neighborhood.

Over the years (we began in 1986), I think I can fairly say that 99% of the home swapping problems we’ve heard about would never have occurred had the proper discussions taken place during the initial stages. Everyday items that seem small and insignificant to you may be a major problem for your visitor.

You may be used to your four storey home with some bedrooms at the very top; others could view that as a huge impediment. Your flat located in a busy street with a restaurant below it may be ideal for your lifestyle; others may hate lying in bed listening to late night diners leaving. You drive your stick-shift car day in and day out and never stop to visualize someone used to nothing but automatics trying to drive it.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange Academy eBook

Anne — Sun, 02 Sep 2007 14:28:51 +0000

Home Exchange vacationing has been around for in excess of half a century and during that time, countless businesses have sprung up, eager to reap a living from promoting the concept.

A few have weathered the trials of time and still remain today, but the vast majority has fallen by the wayside, although quickly replaced by fresh contenders.

This has left the inexperienced swapper with next to no guidelines, no course of action when selecting a club to join. A few books on the general subject of home exchange have come and gone, but none have taken the aspiring home exchanger by the hand and walked him through the entire process step by step. That is, until now â€¦

A brand new e-bookâ€”Home Exchange Academyâ€”has just hit the market and I see it as a winner! Athena Ricky, the author has been home exchanging with her family for more than twenty five years, sheâ€™s the veteran of more than forty swaps so itâ€™s not difficult to see where her depth of knowledge springs from.

The opening title describes the e-book as a â€œBlueprint to Swap Homes For Your Next Vacation and Get Out Of The Hotel Rutâ€, and thatâ€™s a perfect summation. Home Exchange Academy could not be more detailed. It explains exactly how to compare all the clubs presently available, what to look for on their web sites, plus the red flags to guard against.

Once a club has been chosen the author explains right down to the last detail exactly how to set up a listing, what text and information must be included. She also has some excellent suggestions for integrating more photographs and information than the website listings can accommodate.

Also covered in extensive detail are: correspondence between members, developing likely inquiries, preparing your home for an exchange, writing Home Exchange and Car Exchange Agreements, and creating a Home Exchange Book which provides visiting guests with detailed information about your home and its idiosyncrasies, emergency contacts and phone numbers, recommended local restaurants and attractions, plus much, much more.

Samples of these documents are incorporated in the e-book, plus purchasers can download actual working copies in Microsoft Word and PDF formats from the e-books website.

May potential home exchangers marvel at the notion of vacationing almost anywhere in the world, without ever having to pay for accommodation, but because of reservations about allowing â€œstrangersâ€ into their home, they continually resist making a commitment and joining a club themselves. I think this e-book does an exemplary job of allaying all those unfounded fears. As the Ms. Rickby so succinctly states:

â€œThe question Iâ€™m most often asked by the uninitiated is: How do you trust complete strangers to live in your home for two weeks?

My response is usually concise and along the lines of: â€œHow do they know they can trust me?â€

I think those words speak volumes!

I especially like the authorâ€™s clearly expressed decision not to promote any current club above another within her book. She chooses not to reveal which clubs she herself belongs to and never so much as mentions any club by name. Instead, she walks her readers through how to search for, and list all the current clubs by dint of Google, Yahoo, etc. Surely, this tactic alone will keep her e-book fresh for significantly longer than would otherwise be possible, plus no club can feel slighted or complain because they have been left out.

For full details on this excellent e-book, go to: Home Exchange Academy.

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Home Exchanging is Just the Beginning When Saving Money

Anne — Tue, 17 Jul 2007 14:24:02 +0000

Most people pay far more than they need to when they travel. This is the first of several posts I shall be making to this blog and also to the Exchangehomes Forum, listing how the savvy home exchangers can continue saving significant amounts of money.

Tip One: Travel Out of Season

Without a doubt, traveling out of season when no-one else is, is a great way to save significant money. When you travel at high demand, peak vacation time, you can quite easily end up paying double, possibly even triple the cost of your ticket. On the other hand, if you travel out of season, you will discover that airlines will sell you a ticket at a much reduced price. It also offers the great benefit of no crowds, in comparison the usually busy locations are almost serene.

Tip Two: Be Flexible With Your Dates
You will usually find that airline fares tend to be cheaper Tuesday through Thursday. Utilize one of several online fare finders that allows you to search for flexible dates such as CheapTickets.com. Fares are normally cheaper if your stop-over includes a Saturday.

Tip Three: Plan Ahead and Book Well in Advance
By booking early, as long as a year in advance you could reap huge benefits.

Tip Four: Shop Early in the Morning
It’s a fact that airlines post their best fares around 6AM PST. Even better, shop on Tuesdays or Wednesdays. Airlines know that a lot of travelers are shopping for tickets on Mondays, so they wait to lower their prices until these days.

This series will continue later.

Home Exchange – Who Pays What?

Anne — Thu, 28 Jun 2007 15:18:36 +0000

The overriding golden rule of home swap vacationing is that as far as the perceived price of the vacation property is concerned, no cash whatsoever changes hands. That’s the fundamental joy of home exchanging – no hotel bills, no rental costs.

Other bills need to be addressed during the discussions leading up to your exchange. Normally the home owner pays the utilitiesâ€”electricity, gas, water, phone, cable, etc. If either exchange partner orders pay-per-view films, they normally pay for them. Similarly each pays for their own long-distance telephone calls.

If exchanging cars is part of the deal and your insurance company charges a processing fee to add your exchange partner’s name(s) to the policy, this becomes another matter for amicable agreement, although my personal recommendation is that the policy holder pays.

Before the home exchange takes place it’s important to come to a mutual agreement as to how payment for any damages or accidents is resolved. Be pro-active and take a tour of your home noting any items you would be broken hearted to lose. Lock all those items away in a cupboard and clearly indicate it to be out of bounds. With the best intentions in the world, accidents can happen, and it’s so much easier to take these steps rather than find yourself at loggerheads with your home swap partners over an ornament you see as irreplaceable.

Likewise, only exchange cars after first coming to an agreement covering any and all financial incidents. The partner using the car should always pay the deductible in full should there ever be an insurance claim. And if you are the type of owner who inspects the car with a magnifying glass whenever your wife drives it, maybe including it in the exchange isn’t such a good idea.

Goodwill always seems to prevail and with careful forethought and planning complications very seldom arise. From my own home exchange experience we have never encountered any serious problems. Our home has always been there upon our return, the car in the garage and no unexpected bills or demands in the mail!

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

ExchangeHomes Membership Competition

Anne — Wed, 27 Jun 2007 14:43:18 +0000

In an endeavor to further develop the ExchangeHomes Member and visitor community, we’re going to launch a competition to “kick start”, so to speak, our new ExchangeHomes Forum.

Does anyone have a particularly good home exchange or budget vacation tip? Yes – of course you do!!

So visit our brand new ExchangeHomes Forum and get writing!

Each month I (Anne), will review all the tips and tricks you’ve so kindly posted and award a free 12 months ExchangeHomes.com membership to the one judged to be the best. If less than 5 tips are submitted in one calendar month, those that have been submitted will roll over to the next month. Monthly winners will be announced here in this blog, and in the ExchangeHomesForum on the 15th day of the following month, and should the winner already be a member of ExchangeHomes.com, their 12 months prize will be added to their current membership.

In addition to the prize listed above, we also reserve the right to publish any that we consider worthy in our ExchangeHomes bi-monthly newsletter.

The ExchangeHomes Forum only went live just a few weeks ago and as of now we’ve had a pleasing number of sign-ups, but very limited contributions posted. So – let’s get the community spirit going and you could win a free membership into the bargain!

Best of luck.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange and Sports Fans

Anne — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 13:06:04 +0000

A great many people who home exchange are sports fans. Consequently, if the home you are offering to swap is located within easy reach of any sports venue, make sure you include this information in your listing.

The possibilities are virtually endless. Horse racing fans would love to participate in a home exchange which allowed them to attend the Epsom Derby, Royal Ascot, the Kentucky Derby, the Cheltenham Festical, the Prix de l’arc d’Triomphe, the Melbourne Cup, or maybe the Breeder’s Cup.

Formula One fans would love to set up a home exchange close to one of the Grand Prix venues (there are 17 of them), and there are lots of soccer fans all around the world who would give their right arm to attend a Manchester United game or maybe a game in the new Wembley Stadium.

Oarsmen could easily be tempted by a listing informing them that they would be close to the Henley Regatta; cyclists would probably love to see the Tour d’France.

Your options are enormous. Every sport imaginable has its own highlight events which attract droves of fans and home swappers should use these to their best advantage. Investigate how exchange partners can obtain tickets and mention that you’ve done this in your listing.

Sporting events very often make an otherwise mundane home exchange location into a prime destination, you just need to point out that your small town is actually just ten miles away from Epsom or twelve miles from Indianapolis. This information could make all the difference to the interest you generate in your listing.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Weather At Your Home Exchange Destination

Anne — Mon, 18 Jun 2007 16:52:30 +0000

An ExchangeHomes.com member has shared some very fundamental, but often not thought of advice for her fellow members. Before agreeing to a home exchange in an area you are not at all familiar with, first make absolutely sure that their climate at the time of year you are considering is something you are quite literally “comfortable” with!

Jennifer explained:

“My husband, young family and I had always thought of sunny Florida as the ideal holiday destination. Living as we do in England, the films and pictures we see of Florida’s beautiful blue, sunny skies were an enormous temptation and this is the destination we listed in our home exchange offer.

We exchanged with a charming family from Winter Park, close to Orlando and DisneyWorld last July. We got all the sunshine we could have dreamed of, but what we didn’t anticipate was the accompanying dreadful, drenching humidity. We spent the entire two weeks in clinging, perspiration soaked clothes, trying to console two cranky, complaining young children.

Florida natives told us that the savvy time to holiday in Florida in between November and March. Definitely NOT between June and September. We just didn’t know ….”

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Pets and Your Home Exchange – More!

Anne — Mon, 11 Jun 2007 13:32:59 +0000

A few weeks ago I wrote a post about the pros and cons of agreeing to care for your exchange partner’s pets. I pointed out that while caring for their cats is not generally too much of a tie, dogs are a different proposition. All dogs need to be allowed out to take care of business a minimum of three or four times a day.

In my earlier post I suggested that the owning exchange partner could arrange to have his/her dog kenneled for just a limited time should the guests in the house wish to travel away for a full day or overnight. However, I’ve now come up with a much better alternative. Pet sitters.

A professional pet sitter can arrange to visit your home during any period of time when your guests may wish to travel further afield. A professional pet sitter is often licensed, always insured and will charge anything between $12 (Â£6) – $20 (Â£10) per visit. An extremely good deal.

Over the weekend I had the opportunity to talk with a lady who has been a pet sitter for 10+ years. She is dedicated to her business, to her clients and most especially to the animals she cares for.

It had never crossed my mind to suggest integrating the services of a pet sitter, but it really makes sense, and allows both home swap parties to enjoy the best of both worlds. Your pets can remain in their familiar home surroundings yet your exchange partners need never feel tied to the house.

The one further suggestion I would make, is for the visiting partners to let the home owner know the dates and times when they plan to travel away. As the pet sitter I spoke with pointed out to me, during the summer months and over holiday periods she is often booked solid several weeks in advance.

Pet sitters usually leave business cards in veterinarians offices. You can also search for those local to you on the following web sites:

National Association of Pet Sitters
Pet Sit Center
VetClick

Plus you can always check your local Yellow Pages, or Google the term “pet sitter”.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange – Leaving a Little “Thank You” Gift

Anne — Fri, 08 Jun 2007 16:30:34 +0000

As anyone who has participated in a home exchange will agree, as the exchange date nears you will have devoted a lot of time and energy to getting you home ready for your exchange partner’s arrival. If you’re anything like me the house will have undergone a major “spring cleaning”, the yard/garden combed to remove every weed and errant blade of grass. I always leave the fridge and kitchen cupboards stocked with plenty of staples, and being a “fluffy towel freak” myself, I often buy lots of nice new towels.

So, assuming that your exchange partners have gone to just as much trouble, at the end of an exchange it’s always a nice gesture to leave them a small gift and “Thank You” note. You don’t have to go overboard because it really is the thought that counts. It conveys an immense amount of pleasure and bonhomme to arrive home at the end of a vacation to find a bottle of wine or box of chocolates on the kitchen counter along with a personal note of appreciation.

Over the years I’ve found some delightful little gifts when I’ve arrived home: wine, chocolates, flowers, potted plants, a doormat emblazoned with “Welcome Home”, a gourmet cheese, pottery, glassware, and scented candles to name just a few. Those that were neither edible, drinkable or perishable have all been kept as special mementos serving to remind me of vacations past, and all the notes are kept safe in an album.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange and Swapping Cars

Anne — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 21:01:45 +0000

As I advise members all the time, offering to exchange the family car as part of the home exchange deal is one of the best incentives you can include. Car rentals are currently very expensive – on a recent trip to the UK my husband paid more to rent a car than he did for his flight across from Dallas. Also, in a weeks time we have family visiting so I’ve rented a 7-seater van to accommodate everyone. The cost for 7 days is $450.00 and that’s in the US. In Europe expect to pay significantly more!

With a little additional planning, vehicles can usually be exchanged very amicably. Never be afraid to stipulate restrictions such as no driver under the age of 25, not to exceed 1,000 miles (just an example here), and always stipulate that the car should not be driven outside of your home country.

Most insurance companies don’t object, once the situation is explained to them, because often the person you are dealing with has never heard of home exchange.

Be sure to make it absolutely clear that you require coverage for a guest or friend to drive your car, NOT someone who is renting your home.

Over the years I’ve heard of just a couple of instances where an insurance company has flat out refused to cover their clients home exchange partners. The most common occurrence is that they will charge an administration fee to add a name to the policy. Members have also run into difficulties if their home swap is for more than 30 days. As a rule of thumb, 30 days is usually the limit before insurance companies do wave a red flag.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange References and Contracts

Anne — Wed, 06 Jun 2007 20:00:21 +0000

I’ve just finished reading an article posted on a real estate blog featuring home exchanging as a means of affordable vacationing.

The author listed some good points regarding locating and arranging an exchange, but I believe she placed way too much emphasis upon advising her readers to insist upon references and a formal contract. References probably serve little purpose other than to satisfy the requesting party that they can be produced, and in reality what does that prove? What do the references document? That the exchange party is good at his job? That his neighbor thinks he’s a good guy? How do either of these statements equate with him being a good home exchanger who will look after your home?

If references are important to you, then the only ones that will really carry any weight will come from previous exchange partners. But where does that leave first time home swappers?

A lot of home exchangers genuinely are placed in a comfort zone when their likely partners provide them with references and there’s nothing wrong with that. But I strongly believe that in the end, gut feelings are what should be relied upon. A gut feeling that can only be achieved after a period of time involving lots of communications, questions, answers, reviews, chats on the phone, photographs, videos and finalized agreements.

Similarly, formal contracts mean absolutely nothing. ExchangeHomes.com encourages all members to exchange written agreements covering all points have have been discussed – we publish guidelines and a sample copy on the website. These should be read carefully both both home exchange parties and only considered final when everything each considers to be important has been agreed upon. But they cannot be viewed arbitrarily as legal documents. No-one should enter into a home exchange with the intention of suing their exchange partner if they put 200 more miles on the car that was agreed.

Just keep it straightforward and simple. Ultimately, the secret is to allow plenty of time so that everything is discussed and agreed upon. This and this alone is the recipe for a great and successful home exchange.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Weekend Home Exchanges

Anne — Tue, 05 Jun 2007 20:43:01 +0000

The majority of our members plan one major home exchange every year or so, and many of them also make multiple “weekend exchanges”. I find that the word “weekend” is generally used fairly loosely to cover anything from two to four days.

Weekend exchanges represent exceptional value. During the 25+ years I lived in Southern California I made on average three a year. My rules of thumb were simple: Never look beyond a two hour flight and always select a home that’s no more than an hour’s drive from the destination airport. This usually meant a minimum of my precious time being lost traveling.

I always flew out of my local, municipal airport which also cut down considerably on big airport hassles. It also made it extremely easy for car exchanging – I simply parked my car in one of the perimeter parking lots and called my exchange partner to inform then of its specific location. Upon their arrival they then took the shuttle bus to pick up the car.

Before the advent of cell phones this wasn’t quite so simple however. Back then the easiest means of communication was the answering machine.

Over the years I’ve done weekend exchanges with my (then) young daughters and husband, with my aging mother, with just my husband, and a couple of times when he was away on business, on my own. These solo home swaps were particularly memorable, probably for no reason other than that once arranged, they forced me to make specific plans for myself. Normally if my husband is away I devote even more time to working.

From Southern California a great many attractive destinations fit my criteria: Mexico, Northern California, Oregon, Arizona, New Mexico, Nevada, Colorado, Utah ….. Now we’ve moved to Northeastern Texas a whole new range of possibilities has opened up for me. Florida will work, so too will all the states in between. I definitely plan to swap with Kentucky so that I can visit some of the great thoroughbred breeding farms.

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Our Many “Open to Offers” Members

Anne — Sun, 27 May 2007 15:11:01 +0000

It’s an almost daily occurrence for people to either email or phone and say that they cannot locate any member indicating in their listing that they wish to exchange with wherever it is that they are located.

The first question I always ask is, have they checked out the listings stating that they are “Open to Offers”, and usually they have not. In fact, the majority have never even noticed our reminders throughout the web site, explaining the value of this search option.

We have many, many home exchange members who either include “Open to Offers” in their list of exchange destinations, or who list it exclusively. This is especially true of more experienced exchangers who have exhausted their list of must visit destinations and are now quite literally sitting back, waiting to be enticed to somewhere completely new.

Members approaching the owner of a listing indicating that they are Open to Offers need to realize that their email needs to be especially captivating. They have this one critical chance to grab their attention and convince them that their home, their town, their country should be their destination of choice!

In fact I would go further and state that those members (you know who you are), who dash off a one line email – “Hi, saw your listing, would you like to visit Deluth this summer?” are wasting their time.

Carefully prepare an email in your word processor describing your home, your location and all its attributes. List all the reasons why you believe they would have a great home exchange experience. Figuratively speaking “sell” your home and the neighborhood to them.

If you are writing to several likely exchange partners, prepare a detailed “form” email, but spend some extra time personalizing each one to its individual recipient. Mention some points about their home or their locality so that it’s obvious you truly are writing to them as individuals. Then cut and paste each one into the listings email form.

Follow these directions and your likelihood of securing an exchange with Mr., Mrs. or Miss Open to Offers will be greatly enhanced. Good luck!

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

No Response To Emails

Anne — Thu, 17 May 2007 20:29:11 +0000

We have been hearing again from disappointed members who send out exchange offers but fail to receive any sort of a response. This is a continuing gripe being dealt with by all the home exchange companies as well as the blogs devoted to home exchanging. The excellent blog Home Exchange Travels opened this Wednesday’s post with a reference to the problem.

It really is disappointing when you join a club and send out your first contact emails, only to receive nothing in return. Even a short “no thanks” is better than absolutely nothing. As I’ve already explained in earlier posts there may a whole list of reasons why they don’t respond – they may be away, their Internet provider may have routed your message straight into their spam folder (a more and more frequent explanation), they may be overwhelmed with emails and just missed yours. Or, they may simply be lacking in basic good manners.

It could be the way you worded your inquiry. Many more seasoned home exchangers are immediately put off when they receive an email similar to: “Want to exchange in August. Take a look at my listing number 26***”. One or two have been very candid with me and admitted that whenever they receive impersonal messages similar to that one, they just hit the delete button.

Perhaps the following suggestions will help increase your chances of getting responses:

Never send out standard, impersonal messages such as the example above. Use your word processor to prepare detailed information about your home, family and local area to copy and paste into all your messages but take the time to personalize each message before you actually send it. On the ExchangeHomes.com website you won’t be able to address the people you are emailing by name because of our privacy guards, but you can mention anything that especially attracted you to his/her offer because everyone likes to hear nice things about their home and its surroundings!

Say if you can be flexible on dates and/or length of exchange. Indicate that once they have viewed your offer, you will be willing to answer any questions they may have. Direct them to any additional photographs or videos you may have posted on one of the multitude of free picture hosting web sites. Make it obvious that you are genuinely interested in their offer and are prepared to make every effort to make an exchange happen if they too are interested in exploring the possibility further.

In closing, always ask them to reply to your message as soon as possible as you are anxious to hear back even if they aren’t interested your offer right now. Explain that this will then allow you to look elsewhere.

I hope this helps. Previous postings on this have also covered this same difficult issue and I suggest you take a look at them as well.

Home Exchange and the Spam Dilema Posted 2007/04/05. (Previously posted in January 2007 on our old BlogSpot Blog.
ISPS Spam Tools Posted 2007/04/18.

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Home Exchange Keys

Anne — Thu, 10 May 2007 14:51:01 +0000

Home Exchange Blog
Our members have always been particularly inventive when thinking of ways to supply their exchange partners with keys, both to the exchange home and to the car. Car keys come into the arrangement if (as if often the case), family number one drives the car to the airport and parks it there for family number two to pick up upon arrival.

If you are parking the car in a regular public airport parking lot, I don’t advise you to leave the keys in one of those magnetic containers you can clamp underneath the car. This makes it all too easy for the enterprising car thief. A lot of members mail a second set of keys to their exchange partners and when they park the car at the airport, they phone the other party with its exact location. Even if the other party is already in transit, they can phone home upon arrival and listen to your message on their answering machine.

A better idea is to park the car in one of the private parking lots such as The Parking Spot. A lot of the major airport hotels also rent out parking spaces to non-guests. Cars parked this way have their keys stored with the parking attendants and it’s a simple matter to arrange for your home exchange partners to collect the vehicle upon arrival. All these companies provide constant buses between the terminals and their parking lots, another factor that makes this arrangement particularly attractive.

House keys can also be mailed to your exchange partners in advance. The most common method is to simply leave them with a neighbor. Again, I would definitely not recommend leaving them under a stone or flowerpot!

When we exchanged with a couple on the Big Island of Hawaii two summers ago, they mailed us a key to their mailbox, then upon departure, they locked their house keys in the mailbox for us to collect. At the end of the exchange we simply left all the keys on the kitchen counter top.

I’ve also heard of a family who installed a digital lock on the back door of the home and provided their swap partners with the code. They left front door keys at a pre-arranged spot inside the home.

Speaking of codes, if your home is equipped with a security system, don’t forget to set your guests up with an access code before you leave and be sure they know what is is! I heard once about an incident where the home owner in London programmed in a code for his exchange partners but completely forgot to let them know what it was.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Pictures In Your Home Exchange Listing

Anne — Sat, 05 May 2007 20:29:39 +0000

Home Exchange Blog
I’m constantly being asked by members what is the single most important thing they can do to make their home swap listing stand out. I always tell them the same thing – add photographs as quickly as possible.

A lot of members add pictures immediately they join, others do so within a few days. A small minority never do.

A picture speaks a thousand words and our web logs show that home exchange listings displaying pictures get clicked on many, many more times than those that don’t.

Following through on that recommendation, take a look at your pictures after you’ve loaded them (and probably, after we’ve add a chance to edit them for uniformity). Are they bright, sharp and distinct? Do they do a good job of illustrating your home and/or your surroundings? If they don’t, get out your camera and take some replacements.

If you’re really adventurous open an account with a web site such as MyPhotoAlbum.com and set up some online albums you can direct potential exchange partners to. You can have an album for your home, another for your neighborhood and another for family pictures. If you have a video camera you can also post some video clips.

Use these online albums as an enhancement to your online photographs with ExchangeHomes.com, not to replace them. You must have attractive pictures within your home exchange listing to initially grab attention.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Do We Run Checks On Our Home Exchange Members?

Anne — Sat, 21 Apr 2007 15:47:44 +0000

Home Exchange Blog
One question I’m frequently asked by people new to home swapping is, what checks do we run on our members. Of course, the answer is none. I then hasten to add that in return for a small membership fee, no home exchange organization can be expected to fork out quite significant amounts to pay for member screening.

The ExchangeHomes.com website contains guidelines and a great many suggestions that members should carefully follow, all as part of locating and setting up a home exchange.

Without a doubt, home exchangers are an honest, trustworthy group of people. In the 21+ years that ExchangeHomes.com has been promoting home swapping vacations, I’ve never received a report of dishonesty, theft or malicious damage of any kind, but if formal personality investigations are viewed as essential to any individual members, there are a number of Internet based companies they can hire to carry them out.

New or potential members initially see trust as purely a one-way deliverance. They expect fellow members to immediately trust them implicitly, yet they want to know how we clear everyone else. As I explain to them, when a home swap takes place, each is occupying the other’s home. That fact alone creates an enormous sense of responsibility and trustworthiness. It also helps that we are not an “open” site (see my post on 07 Apr 2007). We know all our members.

Members who have already completed home exchanges can usually obtain references from previous partners and these can be very reassuring to new members. Other types of references are of no value whatsoever. Job references have no bearing on how a person conducts his family and personal life, while “personal” references from friends and neighbors are worthless.

As I say over and over, the best way to assess a potential exchange partner is to allow plenty of time to get to know them before committing to a firm arrangement. Exchange lots of photographs (remember, it’s a two-way operation), see if you can exchange video clips of the families, the homes and the neighborhoods.

ExchangeHomes.com Allows each member to publish up to six photographs with their listing, but I suggest that they also utilize a site such as MyPhotoAlbum.com where they can post an unlimited number of photos and video clips and send links to likely exchange partners.

Never be afraid to ask questions and if the person being asked starts behaving like a politician and tap-dancing around giving a straight answer, drop the discussion and look elsewhere.

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Caring For Pets On A Home Swap

Anne — Mon, 16 Apr 2007 20:08:07 +0000

Home Exchange Blog
Many members of ExchangeHomes.com indicate in their listings that they would appreciate having their pets cared for by their exchange partners and that they are happy to reciprocate.

Before accepting this responsibility, home exchangers need to be fully aware of the task they are undertaking. Cats and similar small pets are usually fine, but if they agree to take care of a dog, they will need to return to house at least once during the day to allow him to go outside and take care of business. Just this simple necessity will restrict their activities and very probably mean no day-trips away from their exchange home.

Sometimes the pet owner is able to incorporate the help of a neighbor or friend who can pop in during the day. Another alternative is that they make arrangements for you to drop the dog off at a local kennel just for short periods on the days you’ll be traveling away.

Just make sure both parties think through all the implications ahead of time and NEVER agree to any sort of pet care you’re not 100% comfortable with.

Over the years I’ve heard of some really great stories involving home exchange pets. Geese, goats, llamas, pot bellied pigs, ponies, horses, birds – all have delighted their visitors. I also heard about a parrot that swore like a sailor and a dog that refused to let the family back into the house.

If there are children in the exchange party, taking care of new pets can make the trip especially memorable for them. It can also require an enormous amount of tact from parents when little Joey wants to take Bengi home with him at the end of the vacation!

© ExchangeHomes.com All rights reserved.

Home Exchange NOT Rentals

Anne — Fri, 13 Apr 2007 15:41:08 +0000

Home Exchange Blog
As more and more of the so called “home exchange” web sites bolster their listings by going hybrid, and accept out and out rentals, the few remaining true home exchange sites are losing out badly in the perceived numbers game. On paper, the companies that boast 10,000 and 15,000 listings appear to offer significantly more opportunities for the as yet uncommitted home exchanger, cruising the web sites for the best deal for their money. They simply don’t realize that a huge chunk of those listings are rentals.

As I see it, these potential home exchangers are getting duped. So too are the press who are only interested in numbers.

ExchangeHomes.com (and a few other companies who began back in the ’80s, around the same time as ourselves), have always recognized that a percentage of home exchangers do have second (and sometimes third) homes, and wish to use these properties for home exchange, and then for the remainder of the year utilize them as rentals. To qualify to list them with us, the prerequisite is that they must first list them for home exchange.

ExchangeHomes.com also stipulates that the owners of these properties do not use the website to actively tout them as rentals to fellow members. First and foremost they must be for home exchange.

When the opportunity arises to discuss this ethic with members and visitors, they all wholeheartedly agree with me. They searched on the web for home exchange opportunities, not rentals. As one member so eloquently put it – “I thought the companies touting home exchange want us to believe that home exchange offers something that is far superior to rentals. So why then do they then contradict themselves and list rentals?”

More and more we are turning away people who try to join and list a straight rental. Often they will call us and complain that they cannot remove “home exchange” from the list of options (it’s a default).

It’s such a pity that when a potential member contacts us, one of their first questions is always: how many members do we have. I explain that they should be asking a) How many members do we have in the area they wish to visit, or b) How many HOME EXCHANGE members do we have. But, their skepticism is easy to detect, just below the surface.

I sincerely hope that the clubs who have ethics similar to our own stick by their principals. I also hope that the press will catch on and begin asking for a truthful breakdown of some of the others’ listings.

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