Review date: April 2014
SimplyHomeExchange.com
Founded in 2007
Free for first year, then $47/yr
Privately owned site by Philip and Sally Jackson
English, French, Spanish, Italian, German
1181 swap listings, 290 rental listings
Listings by geographic region:
- Africa: 97
- Middle East: 51
- Asia: 142
- Europe: 654
- Oceana: 88
- North America: 354
- Central, South America and the Caribbean: 84
Searching: There is a map search facility that allows drilling down to state or country and then region within country. There is also a geography based search that uses drop-down menus to narrow down to country and then city. This function does make it easy to quickly see which cities within a country have available properties as those without properties will not be populated in the drop down.
Listings: The listings returned from the search have a good general list of information though it appears that many properties listed on this site do not have pictures.
This site offers the following variations on house swapping:
- simultaneous house swap – this is the traditional model where two parties swap houses for an agreed upon set of dates.
- vacation rental – the usual rental system applies here, and owners collect payment via Simply Home Exchange. There is no additional fee for owners renting through this site.
Site design: Simply Home Exchange has a usable interface, but limited functionality.
Additional features: Rather that run their own email function Simply Home Exchange includes a form for users to fill out, for potential swap partners to contact them directly. Given the other options out there and the number of listings, the main reason to sign up would be the free price.