Sometimes one half of a couple has to convince the other half about the wisdom of home exchange. Here are some testimonials from HomeExchange members about what it took to convince their skeptical partners. And the very happy results.
It took me five years to convince my husband to do HomeExchange. As a retired US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel with high security clearance, he just couldn’t wrap his head around it. Then we started exchanging and a year later our dog died. I asked my spouse to give me five years of travel before we got another dog. He agreed. Last year at Christmas I said “OK, it’s been five years. Do you want to get a dog?” He replied “Let’s keep traveling.”
-Marianne, CA, USA
It took me a while to persuade my husband that HomeExchange was a good idea as he was rather reticent to have strangers in our home. Our first exchange to Durban, South Africa, in 2013 for five weeks was magical with our two teenage children. We followed this the next year with an exchange in the UK in Chichester, the town where we had met at college. We have belonged to HomeExchange for a couple of years.
-Julie, UK
Thank goodness I discovered HomeExchange. We were sceptical at first, signing up and browsing homes. Then we received a half-price membership offer and thought “We only need to get a one-night stay and we have covered the cost of subscription; there really is nothing to lose.” So we subscribed and haven’t looked back. We have received fantastic value for money in our exchanges, but more importantly we have met some wonderful people from all over the world and experienced their worlds.
-Claire, UK
I gradually found answers and began to seriously consider the possibility of testing HomeExchange. I commented on this to my wife and, as expected, her first reaction was suspicion, that you had to be crazy to do something like that and it was a high risk, that it might work out… or just the opposite. Then I told her about all the real experiences I had read on the internet and she was slowly convinced. Finally we decided to join HomeExchange.com, taking advantage of the first 14 days free and see what happened. I soon received the first inquiries and was struck by how people with much better houses than mine were willing to exchange. All our doubts finally disappeared once we entered our first exchange house. You feel a mixture of excitement and responsibility for taking care of it, and I understood that probably our exchange partners had a similar feeling when reaching our home, which reassured me. Now we can’t imagine any other vacation than exchanging.
-Sergio, Spain
I had to convince Pierre, who was hesitant about the idea of lending the home he had only just finished (Pierre did all the work on it), but after a bit of perseverance and web surfing together to review home exchange websites, we decided to go for it.
-Elodie, France
Once we had moved to a very touristy place (l’île de Ré, in France), I said to myself “Hm, if we were to try out HomeExchange, that might allow us to take a bit of a vacation.” My spouse was skeptical. What? Leave our home to perfect strangers? Leave his guitars? His CDs? What if it was all a scam? After some discussion (I can be quite convincing), he agreed to give it a try. So we forged ahead. We cleaned up the apartment that too is one good thing about HomeExchange: we clean our apartment regularly), took photos and posted our listing. The response was almost immediate! Amazing!
-Stéphanie, France
As a teenager, a long time ago, I was an exchange student from Brazil to the US and lived with a family in New York state for one year. To this date, I am close to the family that hosted me during that year. Since just last Monday, when I finished my first home exchange, I have been thinking that this program is like the one I did as a teenager, but for families. I think it’s one good way to promote peace among people. My husband, who in the beginning was a little skeptical about the exchange, now wants to look for new ones!
-Sueli, Brazil
With my husband’s reluctant agreement, we did our first exchange with a couple from Victoria, British Columbia (Canada). Since then, we have exchanged with about eight different homes in Victoria because it is absolutely our favourite place in the world. What started out as a financial arrangement has become so much more. We are always astounded as we rave about home exchanging that so many people hesitate and absolutely won’t even consider allowing strangers to live in their home. One couple we exchanged with made the comment “It takes a certain kind of an adventurous, trusting, and reliable person to embrace the gift of exchanging.”
-Robin, CA, USA
