Holidaying Brits should consider Home Swap

Released on: March 01, 2012, 10:07 am
Author: LHS
Industry: Travel

The number of people going on home-swap holidays is set to double to 3.2 million in 2012, according to research carried out for Love Home Swap.

Founded in October 2011 by serial entrepreneur Debbie Wosskow, LoveHomeSwap.com is a secure holiday home exchange website with users in over 70 countries. Its aim is to help people save money on their holidays, while staying in accommodation which is as good as a hotel, or even better. Wosskow says: “You can holiday without ever having to pay a hotel bill again.”

Wosskow herself has been on five home swap holidays. She had the idea for the site after watching the film The Holiday, in which Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet swap homes. The following year she set up Luxe Home Swap, a site for luxury properties, which has been incorporated into Love Home Swap.

You can view our property list without being a member. After signing up, you can send secure messages, arrange a swap, and sign a digital contract to confirm the details. The details of an individual swap are entirely up to the users. You can swap two weeks at your house in London for a week at a luxury house in the Seychelles, or for a month in a flat in New Delhi. You can also agree to borrow each other’s cars, insurance permitting.
Love Home Swap is the world’s only home swapping site with social media connectivity. Its Facebook Connect feature allows you to see which of your Facebook friends are on the site, and which of our other users share a mutual friend with you on Facebook.

You can try the website for four weeks for only £1. Then, for a flat rate of £99 per year, you can set up as many swaps as you want, anywhere in the world. Premium membership, at £199, gives users a holiday concierge service, and access to the ‘trust centre’, where you can check that other users are genuine.

We have received positive testimonials from dozens of happy house swappers. For example:
In one successful property exchange UK based Faye stayed at a condo with a pool in Tel Aviv. She felt she had a ‘more personal holiday experience’, and was able to stay in a ‘great neighbourhood’ where there are no hotels. The homeowner left a list of his favourite places in town, and Faye ‘really enjoyed going where the locals go’. She saved around £500 by using the site.

Audrey from France stayed in New York’s glamorous Upper East Side. Ironically, the condo she was staying at, for free, was once a luxury hotel. Audrey enjoyed using the gym in the building, and found ‘shopping heaven’ on nearby Madison Avenue. She saved ‘lots’, and even got ‘a wonderful welcome bottle of wine’.

Contact Details: The Home Swapping Company Limited The Office Marylebone, 12 Melcombe Place, London NW1 6JJ, United Kingdom.