I am new to home exchange and I have been searching through a lot of listings. There are many excellent postings but there are also a lot that left we wanting more information. I am almost always traveling without a rental car and relying on public transportation so I need to know how easy it is to get to the home and how easy is it to get around once I am there. How close is the grocery store, the bus stop and nearby restaurants and bars? I also look at the pictures closely to see if it will work for us. Many places leave our entire rooms so I either have to send messages or usually I just go on to the next listing. This is the same issue I have been seeing on Airbnb but they have a lot more reviews which I can usually rely on. I wrote a blogpost (on my non-monetized blog) about what I am looking for a couple of years ago about what I am looking for in a host. Dear Hosts, - Howbillrolls Of course, now I am a host and havenāt fully followed my own suggestions yet. Hopefully we can all get a bit better so we can all get some more connections.
I completely agree with you Bill! Having a good and detailed description, good photos, an honest presentation of your home (not listing 5 baby cots and 3 blow up mattresses in a home designed for 5) and a profile description giving an outline of who you are is very important. I would say though that exchanging canāt be compared to renting. Members need to āget to knowā their hosts/guests and build up a relationship based on trust when they exchange.
Itās good to include the measurements of beds; mention if there is access to a downstairs bedroom / bathroom;if there are cleaning fees ; and any essential information that would make you the ideal exchange partner, or not.
Itās also important to do your research on how the site works. Many new members get frustrated because they havenāt taken the time to read the available information. Tips can also be found here on the forum, but also on the facebook groups reserved for subscribed members.
Hereās a link to help
https://help.homeexchange.com/hc/en-us
Definitely Bill, logistical details such as if and where a car can be parked, and whether it is free or not, and far away or not.
Bear in mind that some of the nitty gritty can be in the House Guide, not necessarily all in the profile (not sure AirBnB uses house guides, to pick up on your comparison) For example, I explain in the home guide, in detail, 3 ways to get to our home from the airport, bus, subway or cab. So, if you are left wanting in reading the profile, remember there is usually a house guide and perhaps not every detail is as crucial to you in selecting a home.
Bill, I also think there is a responsibility of people to review the listing and read the description. A good example is our parking. I clearly describe parking in an upper and lower drive in the listing and state we have no street parking. I still had someone review that we only had a small narrow drive and their visiting kids had to park on the street which is not allowed. They luckily did not get ticketed but just one good example. And when people come to an area they have some responsibility to look at what is there. I can tell you in my area grocery etc. but I donāt know what you want in restaurants and attractions. Are you a biker? a hiker? surfer? are you mobility impaired? That is more a more in depth conversation for after you request. Of course the listing touches on it but be prepared with questions on your must haves to see if it is a fit. For instance in my area you can get by on uber but moneywise it might make more sense to rent a car. And you can take the bus but mostly it goes to the university and back.
Totally agree, we have added airports and also where they fly to as well as ferry ports and the destinations to make things easier. I am new to HE and find that hardly anyone does this. Could @HomeExchangeTeam add something to the profile to make this clear. Even make it a points criteria if within 2 hours travel time.
Home exchange could have nearest airports section. Not sure public transport of other types could be standardized enough to be its own section.
Good listings are important, but I still think that HE havenāt got the filters for searches quite right yet. For example, we are only interested in simultaneous reciprocal exchanges (we only have one home), for at least 6 weeks (unless theyāre in our own country of Australia), and there is no way to search for this under the present filters. Of course, people can tick āreciprocalā but they canāt identify sim or non-sim. As it is now, I have to trawl through a huge number of listings, go into individual calendars to see the type of exchange wanted and the length of time required.
The majority of reciprocal are simultaneous ( yellow calendars). If a member is interested in non- simultaneous they should use green and in that case you can choose green and yellow filters . As you arenāt iteresred in non- simultaneous you should only meed to filter yellow.
It seems you may be making finding exchanges more difficult than necessary. Finding a simultaneous exchange for 6 weeks in Australia must be a big struggle! I only have one home and almost every exchange Iāve done out of 64 hasbeen for guestpoints. You may easily find guests wishing to come to your home from Australia for points, then youāre free to go where you want, when you want. 