House exchanges continue to increase and France is the main market.
In 2023, the main player, Homexchange, saw its exchanges in France increase by 53% compared to 2022 and with the Olympic Games, the figures should soar.
So how do you go on vacation when you have a limited budget, two teenagers, a dog and a cat?
This is what the author of these lines experienced last summer, going there in June and leaving in August.
“Once the homes of family or friends have been put aside, and everyone's desire for adventure or relaxation has been heard, we have to do the math and face the facts.
Staying in a hotel for a week in Italy by the sea - this is the destination ultimately chosen - is not an option.
There remains one solution that we have heard about for a long time but at first glance is not very reassuring: the exchange of houses.
Open our Parisian apartment, a daily witness to our family life, to strangers?
Sleeping in strangers’ beds?
No matter, we're taking the plunge: you have to register on the platform, it will be Homexchange, the best known.
For 160 euros of annual membership, we have access to an interface strangely resembling that of Airbnb.
But instead of rental prices, there is a points system.
This is good news so that our last reservations disappear: it is not necessary to exchange your house in the strict sense of the term as in
The Holiday
, the film which made the site known to the general public where Kate Winslet and Cameron Diaz will sleep at each other's houses.
Your house is evaluated by the platform and each night is worth a certain number of points.
You can lend your house to one person and go sleep at another's house on another date.
The icing on the cake, creating your profile allows you to collect points and we decide to look for an address for our vacation before lending our apartment, which worries us the most in this adventure.
“Very quickly, we got used to it in this small village”
Torre di Palme, a small village clinging to the hillside above the Adriatic Sea in Marche.
Monica Cavalletti / stock.adobe.com
So it will be Italy, if possible a large house above Rome, not far from the sea and with a swimming pool, whose owners accept friendly animals (since, to complicate the test, we will be traveling with our dog and our cat).
Once all the filters are in place, surprise: there are still houses in our criteria but not necessarily where we would like them.
No matter: we expand the search area and send requests via the platform's messaging system.
The answers arrive within hours, always cordial, sometimes even adorable, but it's always no.
The house is already rented via another site on these dates, the owners will finally be there or no longer want to rent in August... Not discouraged, we continue to the point of no longer really looking at what we select, provided that the dates correspond, that it is in Italy and close to the sea. After around thirty requests and a few days of doubts, a positive answer finally arrives!
A month and a half later, we packed our bags for Torre di Palme, a small village clinging to the hillside above the Adriatic Sea in Marche… A region we had never heard of before.
The advantage of our accommodation, apart from the fact that it was still available in August, is that it is not worth many points: around a hundred per night when our Parisian apartment is more than double that.
Obviously, for this price, the small village house that we discover, after having simply retrieved the key from a
keybox
, is in its original condition.
It is a holiday home renovated in the 1980s with two bedrooms, a small bathroom and a somewhat dark living room.
What we imagined as a roof terrace from the photos is in reality a small landing overlooking the alley.
But the postcard view of the Adriatic Sea and the aromas of the neighboring pasta restaurant immediately make us feel like we're on vacation.
Very quickly, we got used to it in this welcoming little village.
In the morning, we drink our espresso with the locals in the only bar before heading to the beach while the tourists come to visit the old stones.
In the evening, Torre di Palme empties and it is a privilege to wander the medieval streets in complete tranquility.
We will remember these holidays for a long time...
Back to Paris
Back in Paris, the routine resumes and, with the fall school holidays, requests to come to our apartment flood in.
We'll have to take the plunge.
After much hesitation, we responded positively to a mirror family: a couple with children of the same age and a small dog, living in Brussels.
Seeing their apartment tidy and decorated to our tastes on the site reassures us.
After emptying the refrigerator, putting a few boxes of items of sentimental value in the cellar, sticking posters on the walls of the teenagers' bedroom covered in photos and doing some serious cleaning, we are ready.
A video call to our hosts allows us to get to know each other and explain how the coffee machine works, and we leave the keys under the doormat.
“Back home, the apartment is perfectly clean, no sign of our hosts except a box of Belgian chocolates”
For four days, apart from a message on arrival and another on departure, we will not know more.
Back home, the apartment is perfectly clean, no sign of our hosts except a box of Belgian chocolates and a thank you card on the coffee table in the living room.
On our account, the points fall and the question “
do we continue or do we stop?”
» arises at the family council.
The answer is unanimous: of course, we continue!
The absence of money involved made us put our expectations into perspective, the trust given by our various hosts filled us with gratitude and we were ultimately happy to lend our apartment.
The following holidays, we borrowed a house in Finistère where we built huge fires and enjoyed the home cinema.
With the arrival of good weather, we found a fishermen's house in Noirmoutier and once again lent our apartment at the foot of Montmartre to a family coming from the south of France to visit the capital.
Looking forward to our next destination.”
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