Home exchange involves a great deal of trust. When you agree to share your house with someone, you are trusting they will treat it as their own and they are probably expecting you to do the same with their home. That’s why it’s important to know in advance your partner’s preferences so you can have an idea on their housekeeping habits and check if they match yours. HomeForHome offers many tools you can use to find and get in touch with possible exchange partners.

However, no mater how careful you are when selecting your home exchange partners, you are most likely never going to find things exactly the way you left them once the swap is over. Something may be misplaced, missing or even broken, but you need to keep perspective about minimal changes, tidiness or even small repairs. This works both ways, you never know if maybe you put something in the wrong place in your partners house.

Remember why you got into home exchange in the first place. Whether it was to experience new things or even to save some cash, the main idea of any vacation is to relax and enjoy you time away, so you shouldn’t let yourself be stressed by small things while you are away (like keeping track of where everything goes with a measuring tape) or, when you get back to your home. Be understanding. It could work the other way around too, you may find things cleaner or more organized!

If you come across the misfortune of breaking anything or something unexpected happens, it would be considerate and important to leave a note to your swap partner explaining what happened. Cordiality and good sense are two important qualities in a home swapper.