Hi there,
Since we lived in Almussafes we had wanted to try home exchanges. Diego had a colleague from Iberdrola who had been doing it for years and he was delighted.
We thought we would do it as soon as we changed our residence because we imagined that nobody would be interested in visiting Almussafes.
We also had the idea that we needed to have a house and not an apartment to make exchanges, but it is not like that, you can be on the platform regardless of the type of housing you have.
After traveling as digital nomads since mid-2020, I was disgusted and fed up with finding dirty tourist accommodations, without equipment, with multiple problems and where they would leave you a negative review if you dared to ask for a blanket because you were cold.
By going to someone’s home, even if it wasn’t spotlessly clean like I like it, it was going to be a lot cleaner than most hotels and Airbnbs. Plus, I was going to have no problem cleaning and leaving it to my liking.
We were going to find a well-equipped kitchen, working internet, at least one dining table to work at, etc.
Beyond the money you save on accommodation, for me it was more important to be able to go to a home where I would not be going through the miseries and needs that I had gone through with Airbnb accommodations having paid.
So, already in Porto with the house completely arranged and functional, we registered in home exchange.
We were guided by the profile of other people with more experience, and we created a very complete and detailed profile to avoid wasting time.
We wanted reciprocal exchanges of more than 15 days, and we did not accept smokers, pets, or children.
In addition, we stated that the maximum number of guests was 2 and that they would stay in the room downstairs. Later, we were flexible about the rooms we shared.
We had two work areas in our house (desk + chair) and needed to have two comfortable work areas in the house we were going to.
We put on the profile that we were not interested in exchanges in Spain because we had too many requests from Spain and had no interest in returning.
Also, although I speak French, I put in the profile that we only spoke English, Spanish, Italian and Portuguese.
Since I must speak French if I go to France, it makes sense that if a French person contacts me, he/she would do it in Portuguese or English.
My house seemed pretty normal to me and nothing special, so we were very surprised by the huge number of contacts we received and the number of notifications when our house was saved as a favorite.
Although we hated the house because of the many problems we had had in Porto, we felt it was a good decision to buy that house because it had a very good location, no neighbors and it was impeccable and very comfortable.
Our first exchange was with Hopi, who guided us to close our first exchange with her.
Then we closed an exchange for 3 months in Australia.
We felt very fortunate to have that house and we had not even had time to explore and start contacting people.
In these two exchanges we had closed we really liked the human side and the empathy and willingness of the people we were managing the exchange with.
Something unthinkable in Airbnb, where you pay and you have no possibility to ask or demand anything, not even cleanliness.
Generally everything is exchanged: cars, bicycles, paddleboards.
What we have done is to search for flights once it is clear when we want to do the exchange. Then we communicate the flights with dates and times and once we match the flights, we buy the tickets, send them to each other and then we close the exchange.
On each side of the platform, we each do a job to ensure that the other person will have everything they need when they arrive:
- Send a guide detailing the use and operation of the house (how the heating works, recycling, how to use the washing machine, etc.).
- Indicate what you do not share and where your personal belongings are kept.
- Instructions for access to the house
- Leave the house clean.
- Leave the car clean.
- Leave a small grocery shopping so that the person arriving will have something to eat at least for the first day.
- Give recommendations for sightseeing and places to eat depending on the tastes of the other person.
- Leave emergency contacts.
- Be available as much as possible to help that person when he/she has questions or needs information.
In other words, you must make a significant investment of time to ensure that the people arriving are going to be okay, just as the other person does for you.
With those two exchanges we were happy and if we managed it well, we could spend more than half the year traveling and really live like locals in those places.
Here you can see the email home exchange sends with one week to go before the exchange begins:
