Property

Logistics manager Amanda Maynard, from Sydney, says she saved about $30,000 on accommodation costs in Britain on a seven-week holiday. Maynard is one of a growing number of holidaymakers who house swap.

Not just houses

Simply put, house swapping involves exchanging your house or apartment for someone else’s over an agreed period. It may also include car swapping and pet minding.

Maynard swapped her semi in the Sydney suburb of Balmain for a centrally heated cottage that dated back to the 1700s, in a Suffolk village in the UK with just 100 other houses and 300 residents. She also swapped her car.

“I did it because my neighbour in Sydney does it every year with an Italian family for three months – it’s a great way of taking an extended holiday without the hotel costs.”

Maynard swapped with British business woman Carolyn Hammond.

“I looked at the rental option in Sydney and the cost was ridiculous,’’ says Hammond, who is swapping again this summer, this time in Glebe, another inner-Sydney suburb.

Insider tips

“There are huge cost benefits. Even just a few weeks’ stay in Sydney at a hotel would be almost prohibitive.’’

Chan & Naylor accountancy firm managing director Sal Carrero swapped his $1 million renovated terrace in Sydney’s Annandale for a $2 million apartment on Madison Avenue, New York, for five weeks. “It was the best holiday we ever had.’’

Carrero says the owner’s friends showed them through New York’s museums and best places to shop.

“One of her friends took us to Greenwich Village. On the July 4 celebrations a friends of hers with a big penthouse had a party for 100 people, including us, with fireworks. We would never have experienced that if we stayed in a normal hotel. We would do it again, any day.’’

Carrero says it took him about six months to set up the house-swapping deal and he warns given New York is a premium location, it can be difficult.

“Someone from New York doesn’t always want to come to Australia.’’

Carrero, who is in his 50s, used seniorshomeexchange.com because “they are in the same age group [and] would have the same interests”.

Venturing overseas

Aussie House Swap co-owner Nick Fuad has attracted 2500 members since he set up the site in 2003 from his base at Lismore on the NSW north coast. For an annual registration fee of $65, owners can swap houses and apartments from Geraldton to Gundagai, as many times as they like.

Most of Fuad’s business is domestic but some house swappers have become so enamoured with the process and the cost savings that they are venturing overseas.

“We started it because there was a niche for domestic house-sitting and so we focused on Australia and New Zealand,’’ Fuad says.

“There is still a huge focus on domestic – around 80 per cent – [but] the high dollar is increasing international travel.’’

Fuad says the average house swap lasts from one to two weeks but some stays can be for as long as six months.

“Coastal areas and main cities are the most popular,’’ he says. However, country towns that have annual festivals – such as Tamworth in NSW, which hosts a country music festival – are also popular.

Expectations vary

There are potential downsides to house swapping. One problem, Fuad says, is that some owners don’t leave their houses or apartments as clean as they could.

“Touch wood we have not had any disasters [but] we have had a couple of complaints over the past eight years.

“All of them were around house cleanliness. Some people have higher expectations than others – some have no expectations.’’

But what happens if someone trashes a house? Fuad says this has not happened but a perpetrator would be immediately removed from the site.

“It would then be up to each person’s insurance company. This is why we recommend to all our swap members that they spend time finding the right swapper, that they email and talk over the phone to ensure both parties are a suitable match.

“We also recommend our members use a house-swap agreement, which we have on the site.

“As each swapper is living in each other’s home, there is a mutual trust and respect.”

It is up to the house swapper to ask for references from their swap partner so they feel comfortable, but most are put at ease after their first phone call.

“The house-swapping community is generally trustworthy and respectful of their swap partner’s home and possessions,’’ Fuad says.

Melbourne-based music teacher Cath Dowling, who has participated in several house swaps, says “cleanliness has not been a problem. If they are educated, working [people], they will often have similar standards” to hers.

The commercial accommodation sector says it is not concerned about the popularity of house swapping.

Accor spokesman Peter Hook, representing Australia’s largest hotelier, says the holiday patterns of Australians have changed dramatically over the past 10 years.

House swapping is starting to wane in popularity, Hook says, because people want service and they now prefer two to three-day breaks.

“The last thing people want as part of a long-weekend experience is spending half their life doing the washing up and the drying.”