Kind of like the movie” The Holiday” ( Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet swap houses).
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Don’t know the movie but it sounds like a great plot line. I have never swapped houses however. But have had some wonderful stays in beautiful places.
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Hm… I like that idea, but have a few questions (sorry - can go to PM if we should).
Do you have to have special insurance for this? Do you worry about your valuables? Do people get well vetted before they join? I’d love to trade houses for a week ish with some people I know, but the idea of doing it for people you don’t is a little scary to me.
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PM sent. I have no special insurance, but the site does provide insurance, and I remove jewelry from easy access, but the art stays on the walls, not that I have anything especially pricey. An essential sense of trust in humanity, if with precautions, is essential. I’m an old hippie with a Quaker background, so doing this is in keeping with my general approach to life.
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We visit family a lot (including cross country drive annually), often stay in hotels. Sometimes Airbnb etc for a longer stay with big group. I am in registered with many different chains - Hilton, BW, Marriot, Hyatt, IGH .. and BookingDotCom. Mostly I try to accumulate points with Hilton, though that really is only in the range (over time) of $10/night savings, so I often explore various options for best price.
I do like having the Hilton app on my phone, easy to use / check places. Typically price is about the same as other methods, which annoys me a bit since we are loyal-isg customers and should get discount 
. The Hilton member benefit that I like is that usually we get a more liberal cancellation policy (night prior vs 3 day or 7 days in advance). But it is always good to check because recently there was a case I checked out of curiosity - I think it was a NYC location recommended in an article or something. Hilton app price was significantly higher than other online booking methods.
TIP - Make a cellphone contact for each loyalty membership, put the member# in the Notes section. It can come in handy when needed at registration on the phone. (When on website and app, tis usually auto-remembered, still good to sometimes have at your fingertips.)
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Prior to Covid, I traveled to the UAE fairly frequently for work. AMAZING breakfast buffets, but no pork, so chicken sausage/bacon.
They catered to pretty much every cultural background, so you could get foods typical for American, European, Asian, etc.
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The Homewood Suites we like in NY has mostly same breakfast buffet each day, a big assortment including special diet items. In addition to the usually baked goods and eggs and sausage (chicken I think), corn tortillas and stewed chicken (with salsa etc) are always there. Also chia pudding and overnight oats, I think both with oat milk. I think it is a smart move, can cater to families groups with a variety of dietary preferences.
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I’ve stayed in a Homewood Suites a few times in a certain city and while not pretending to have 10/10 food, I would think most can find something suitable to eat.
The one thing that I mostly find terrible in these otherwise adequate hotel breakfasts is baked goods like muffins or bagels. Blah.
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We stayed at the Aiden by Best Western in Sedona last year. H and I got up early and went to Sedonuts because I’d heard a lot about it and wanted to try their donuts. Got a half dozen to go. Went back to the hotel and stopped in the breakfast and they had the best pastries I’d ever seen at a “free” hotel breakfast. Luckily we were on a road trip because several of those pastries also ended up in our cooler to supplement later mediocre breakfasts.
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Sounds interesting. Do you only exchange homes with the people who stayed with you or can you exchange with others?
I have family members in the south of France (great place to visit) and family members in NYC (great place to visit). They have done house exchanges for vacation - the France people going to NYC at the same time the NYC people go to France! Unfortunately we do not live in a hugely desirable spot for them to visit, lol.
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This started in France, with the French, but Europeans in general are enthusiastic home exchangers.
The points system is what makes this work for me. My travel needs for lodging are quite specific and I don’t “go on vacation” for the most part, but travel in conjunction with visiting friends and family. I’ve never done a direct exchange, though have been asked about a few. Florida, mid summer? No. I like to be in warm places in winter, and would not expect anyone to come to the upper Midwest in winter without a specific purpose. But football weekends and graduations are when I can offer an exchange rather than making folks pay big money for other lodging.
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I know a university professor who utilizes a terrific program with limited membership… just other worldwide universities. Great for sabbaticals, temp assignments etc.
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I would love to do a home exchange with someone that is in the west that has a place not too far from skiing for the month of February or March. I would like someone to stay at my place with our 2 cats while we were skiing. We are in Southern California 2.5 miles from the beach. You can walk to restaurants, public transportation, 3 grocery stores, the movie theatre and an upscale shopping mall (1 mile). We have offered our home to family and friends when we are skiing, but only had a couple of takers. I am hoping that some of our family and friends that live in colder places might come to stay once they are retired.
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Circling back on this, confirming I did get my points for my Hilton stay that I booked thru Priceline. I didn’t do anything beyond directly calling the hotel after I booked the stay and asking them to add my customer loyalty number to the reservation.
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Home exchange - when I got married, 26 years ago, my aunt exchanged her 3 bedroom 1.5 bath flat in Covent Garden (London) for a 10 bedroom 10 bathroom estate overlooking the ocean in Palos Verdes, CA…why? Because my grandma’s wedding gift to me was paying airfare for all my cousins and their families (scattered among Australia, New Zealand and Wales) to come to the event - we all grew up together (I grew up in Australia and New Zealand) it was an amazing gift - the catch, they had to find their own place to stay - their mother (my aunt) joined a home exchange club, and cherry-picked the home closest to where my grandmother lived. It was an amazing experience for all. They exchanged for a month, with my aunt letting the (older) couple use her car as part of the exchange.
At the time I don’t think anyone was concerned about personal affects, just treat the place as you would treat your own. There were 3 generations under that huge house’s roof.
My pre-wedding dinner was there - we all prepared, cooked, cleaned up after.
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Love that story!
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Wow! Great story!
We have stayed at everything from budget to very high end hotels. When we visit our kids (who, depending on traffic, live an hour to at times 2 hours apart) we will get a hotel or airbnb if we are going to stay longer than a few days and don’t want to overstay our welcome at their home. DH and I agreed to alternate between a hotel (he likes the comfort, pool and gym) and I prefer a 2+ BR air bnb with kitchen and w/d so we can have grands sleep over comfortably. At times we try to find a place half way between the two, sometimes closer to one than the other. Walkability is also desired. We recently we found a comfortable, not-budget but not high-end hotel, relatively new, where we got a 2 BR 2 BA with full kitchen, huge pool, huge hot tub and full basketball court (the 5 yo GS spent literally hours there) with nice gym including a peloton, and well appointed complimentary buffet breakfast. It was sort of half way between our s’s and their families. The walkability wasn’t great (though DH did get a burger nearby). It was perfectly comfortable and we will likely use it again.
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Take the time to wait for a receipt when checking out. Two of the last three hotels had a higher rate than when we checked in (Choice and Marriott).
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Also, make sure the emailed receipt does come through. A couple of times we stayed at Marriott properties the email never arrived. And the stay mysteriously vanished from my account. Thankfully I still had the reservation email.
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