This used to be my master list of house swap website reviews. But I migrated that to a post for technical reasons. This page remains because it has some useful comments below but I’ve removed the old content. For the updated list of house swap website reviews see: this post
[…] Exchange Hospitality – This service is offered on some home swap websites as an alternative to traditional home exchange. Members can opt to host other members in exchange […]
Dawn, thanks for your wesbite and your helpful spreadsheet comparing 109 home exchange websites! By the way, the French language website which is part of HomeExchange.com is Trocmaison.com used by French Canadians and people in France. We chose HomeExchange.com after our own laborious comparison and a couple of free weeks on other websites proving they were less useful for us. We usually do an ADVANCED SEARCH for suitable exchange partners, based on their location (country, county, city or village, then narrow it down using the map if necessary), facilities of the home concerned e.g. dishwasher, wifi, garden etc. number of people in the exchange household (we don’t want to overcrowd our place), lifestyle (non-smokers etc). If there are too many potential exchange partners (!) we then add our own location. This has proved a successful way to identify our exchange partners; we write targeted requests to a few people, and we have have found some people want to exchange with us, even if they have not noted our location on their own profile.
Thanks for the information Jo. Glad you found a site that is working well for you!
The most important feature on a site is reverse search. Saves you trolling through thousands of homes
Guesttoguest told me they were adding this feature within a few days, but it has not appeared yet, which makes the site arduousto use.
Let’s face it…Homeexchange.com is one of the best. I joined it plus several free sites such as Genee.
P G
Thanks for the input PG. I don’t typically use the reverse search much, but perhaps you are right that I could save time by employing this more. I do find that many people don’t specify where they want to go, making it harder to use the reverse search to get a comprehensive list of your options.
They now have a reverse search
PG