I swooned when I found the Luxe Home Swap website. I love the idea of taking a holiday by swapping homes – how better to get a genuine feel of local life in a new area than to live like a local? But, let’s face it, I don’t want to spend my precious vacation time in a musty old bedsit in the wrong side of town. The chance to live it up in an architect-designed Manhattan loft apartment? Well, that sounds swell.
Luxe Home Swap specialises in matching up folks with desirable homes for extra special holidays at cheaper than hotel prices. It’s a self-described “boutique home-swapping experience”. The website alone is a joy to window-shop on.
Browsing the homes on offer in the ‘people who want to swap with where you are’ category, I’m spoilt for choice. Do I want to stay in a 17th Century apartment in Paris’s Marais district or a glass-fronted beachside home in Tasmania? It’s a tough choice.
It costs £99 to join Luxe Home Swap, and if you don’t get a swap in the first year the second year’s membership is free. It costs nothing to look through the homes and plan the dream local-style holiday abroad, though.
I can swap homes to stay in Beunes Aires, Sri Lanka, Singapore, Alaska, the list is rich and plentiful, and the homes look lovely. It occurs to me that you don’t have to swap just for a holiday, either. Some swappers are interested in longer spells away, a couple of months or so, to escape the city to get that novel written, for example.
I just have to make sure that my pad passes muster too. Hmm, I’ve been meaning to redecorate the bathroom, maybe now’s the time to get to it!
