Home  |   View Exchange  |  View  Rentals |  Long Term | Price | Guide

Home Swap Newsletter

September through November  

Feature Article

You have decided to try a home swap, now what do you do to find an exchange?

If you started a new business, lets say on a busy corner in downtown Manhattan New York, you likely wouldn't need to do a lot of advertising.  However if your business was in a residential or more rural area, you would want others to know about your business.  The best way to do this is to advertise.  

Using the same scenario for home exchanges, if you are a member and have a listing for a beach house in Hawaii, a flat in Central London, apartment in Manhattan or a villa in Tuscany, people will come to you searching for an exchange.  One of our London home exchange members has shared that she receives well over 100 offers for an exchange every year. 

The rest of us need register our exchange plus go out and let others know that we are open to a home exchange.  If your home is in an out of the way area or not tourist oriented, we encourage you to send out heaps of inquiries, and put a bit of effort into explaining about your home, neighborhood and area. As Global is network of several home exchange clubs, we suggest you take advantage of the worldwide membership offered and send our lots of inquiries to support your listing on Global and on our partner sites.  Global membership provides you with a complimentary membership in three European based multi-language home exchange clubs. These clubs are closed to their members only plus members from Global.

When you add your house swap listing to our database, you are not just "placing an advertisement", you are joining a membership group of people, all with the desire to arrange home exchanges. If everyone just enters their listing then sits back, never initiating any contacts themselves no one will ever make a single exchange!

Submissions to our newsletter from Members

Judith, a longtime  Sydney Australia member writes: We are leaving Nov 8 2007  for exchanges in London, Istanbul, Malta, Bodrum, Syria and Berlin -  thanks to the Global home exchange network. We love it and make great use of it. Thank you. Sydney Australia member 

Dan, a two year member from Florida writes;  I am intrigued! In the past 18 months my family has received offers from over 30 destinations.  Many of the people who wrote me indicated that they were members of other clubs.   Are these people not finding exchanges with their own agencies?  Why would anyone pay $50 to over $100 a year to register their home with one agency, then have to look for exchanges elsewhere.  Seems like a lot of energy and money wasted.   My registration expires in January.  I will absolutely renew. Why not..  My cost to join Global two years ago was around $ 40.  I have had no difficulty in arranging exchanges with others who paid two to three times that amount.  

Why two data bases?

At the moment, the website that you are on is a hub with information and links to listings from those who registered with Global Home Exchange and Global Pacific Vacation Homes.  We are planning to have one database that displays only home exchange listings, on this site, our Global Pacific site will eventually advertise vacation rentals and our database at homexchange.4homex.com will host either bed and breakfast or be a regionally specific vacation rental site.  

Some of the appearance and feature  upgrades will be completed in December/January, then by mid 2008 we will look move ahead with centralizing each site to display only one type of accommodation.

Half the fun is getting there?

Thanks to a retired West Jet Airline Captain for sending this "paraphrase" of a memorable safety PA from their Flight Attendants. In his own words...


"I was flying to Vancouver from Toronto this weekend, and the flight attendant reading the flight safety information had the whole plane looking at each other like "what the heck?" (Getting Toronto people to look at each other is an accomplishment.) 
So once we were airborne, I took out my laptop and typed up what she said so I wouldn't forget. I've left out a few parts I'm sure, but this is most of it." 

(BEFORE TAKEOFF)

Hello and welcome to WestJet Flight 438  leaving from Toronto to Vancouver. If you're going to Vancouver, you're in the right place. If you're not going to Vancouver, you're about to have a really long evening. We'd like to tell you now about some important safety features of this aircraft. The most important safety feature we have aboard this plane is The Flight Attendants. Please look at one now. 

There are 5 exits aboard this plane: 2 at the front, 2 over the wings, and one out the plane's rear end. If you're seated in one of the exit rows, please do not store your bags by your feet. That would be a really bad idea. Please take a moment and look around and find the nearest exit. Count the rows of seats between you and the exit. In the event that the need arises to find one, trust me, you'll be glad you did. We have pretty blinking lights on the floor that will blink in the direction of the exits. White ones along the normal rows, and pretty red ones at the exit rows. 

In the event of a loss of cabin pressure these baggy things will drop down over your head. You stick it over your nose and mouth like the flight attendant is doing now. The bag won't inflate, but there's oxygen there, I promise. If you are sitting next to a small child, or someone who is acting like a small child, please do us all a favor and put on your mask first. If you are traveling with two or more children, please take a moment now to decide which one is your favorite. Help that one first and then work your way down. 
In the seat pocket in front of you is a pamphlet about the safety features of this plane. I usually use it as a fan when I'm having my own personal summer. It makes a very good fan. It also has pretty pictures. Please take it out and play with it now. 
Please take a moment now to make sure your seat belts are fastened low and tight about your hips. To fasten the belt, insert the metal tab into the buckle. To release, it's a pulley thing -- not a pushy thing like your car, because you're in an airplane -- HELLO! 
There is no smoking in the cabin on this flight. There is also no smoking in the lavatories. If we see smoke coming from the lavatories, we will assume you are on fire and put you out. This is a free service we provide. There are two smoking sections on this flight, one outside each wing exit. We do have a movie in the smoking sections tonight ... hold on, let me check what it is . Oh here it is ... the movie tonight is "Gone With the Wind." 

In a moment we will be turning off the cabin lights, and it's going to get really dark, really fast. If you're afraid of the dark, now would be a good time to reach up and press the yellow button. The yellow button turns on your reading light. Please don't press the orange button unless you absolutely have to. The orange button is your seat ejection button. 

We're glad to have you with us on board this flight. Thank you for choosing WestJet, and giving us your business and your money. If there's anything we can do to make you more comfortable, please don't hesitate to ask. If you all weren't strapped down you would have given me a standing ovation, wouldn't you? 

(AFTER LANDING)

Welcome to the Vancouver International Airport. Sorry about the bumpy landing. It's not the Captain's fault. It's not the Copilot's fault. It's the Asphalt. 
Please remain seated until the plane is parked at the gate. At no time in history has a passenger beat a plane to the gate. So please, don't even try. 
Also, please be careful opening the overhead bins because "shift happens." 

We hope you enjoyed our Newsletter.  Please return to our home exchange home page to learn more about home exchange.  We welcome your contributions to our newsletters.  Please forward them to us on our contact Global form

SPECIALTY AREAS

Global specializes in USA home exchange, USA vacation rentals, Canada home exchange, Canada vacation rentals   

BC homeexchange and BC vacation rentals 

BC  Vancouver Island Bowser Campbell River Comox Cowichan Valley Gulf Islands Nanaimo Qualicum Beach  Parksville Port Alberni Sproat Lake Tofino Shawnigan Lake Sidney Sooke Victoria Okanagan Big White Kelowna Osoyoos Penticton Shuswap Lake Sun Peaks Vernon Fernie Kootenay Lake Golden Radium Hot Springs Windermere Chilliwack Vancouver Whistler  Sunshine Coast West Vancouver Cariboo Chilcotin Northern BC   

Site Map |  Privacy |  About Global |  Contact Global