The secrets of the family that holds the record of house Exchange in Spain :” this hooks a lot”
Update
Saturday,
24
April
2021
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01:12
Thanks to their small apartment in Tarragona, this globetrotting family adds up to 170 House exchanges around the world. From Bali to Los Angeles and from Sydney to Riviera Maya, he tells us how they have managed to make all their vacations an adventure.
One of the houses enjoyed by the family in Australia.
Elisabeth, Peter and Shaila are like ministers. They have a full schedule, but they, full of destinations to go on vacation. Weekends, long weekends, summer and Christmas. You know what they’re gonna do. all the rest of the year. It’s not because they’re billionaires. It’s because they’re experts in the art of home exchange. This family of Torredembarra, Tarragona, are the Kings of this mode of travel in our country. No other Spanish member of HomeExchange, the industry’s leading platform, has managed to exchange their home for as many times: up to 170 exchanges worldwide. And adding up. They even got married during one of these holiday barters… in Vegas.
“Last year we were told to have everyone’s rooms,” says Elisabeth without giving much importance. Even the pandemic has failed to deter them. “In 2020 we made about 25 trips, a little less than other years in which we have made between 30 and 40, more or less,” he lists on the other side of the phone. “This it hooks a lot because I think it’s a completely different way to travel, where you meet wonderful people.”
She is a teacher and her husband Pedro is dedicated to the internet world. Shaila, your daughter, has grown up packing. The little girl is in charge of doing the “mattress test”, throwing herself on the iron to the bed every time they arrive at a new exchange house. Together, this globetrotting family have managed to go on vacation to lavish homes, from Bali to Los Angeles and from Sydney to Riviera Maya.
Some of these exchanges will not be forgotten in life. “In Vietnam we live in a mansion of supermegalujo. I even had an artificial road passing through the House. I think it was worth three million euros. I can tell you things that are hard to believe.”
A house near the sea
But let’s break it down. House Exchange has existed for a lifetime. It’s as easy as me going home and you going home. Then, in the late 90s, at the dawn of the collaborative economy, it went online. Today HomeExchange is present in 187 countries around the world. In Spain there are 74,000 houses on the platform. What will this family of Torredembarra have to be so successful? How is this apartment for people from all over the world to travel thousands of kilometers to spend a few days in it?
“Well, it’s not a big house. It’s a small two-bedroom apartment. Between 50 and 60 meters. That’s right, close to the sea, ” Elisabeth admits. So? “It is because we have achieved many points“. This is one of the secrets of this family. The exchanges, he explains, can be simultaneous, that is, your house for the ma at the same time. They can be non-simultaneous or at different times. And they can be through the Points you add each time you lend your house.
A getaway to Andorra and a wedding in Las vegas
Elisabeth and Peter’s is valued at 200 points. “One of the tricks is be willing to receive many people“. Then there’s what they call the “Home Exchange spirit,” that desire for your guests to be at ease. “When you start trading houses you realize that every family brings out the best in themselves so that you are well and enjoy that experience.”
The teacher says that they have never had a bad experience since that 2010 in which they decided to debut in the world of exchange to spend a weekend in Andorran. Soon they were emboldened because almost the next trip was to USA. But they went through the fears that everyone would go through. Elisabeth did not trust one hundred percent so she also booked a hotel in case they arrived and there was no home.
For when a Lord of Las Vegas offered them, in addition to lodging, to marry in Elvis and Olivia Newton-John, they were already convinced that this was the best way to travel. “Leaving your home to a stranger is a difficult step, but the experience is much better than going to a hotel. I’ve come to go to a house and find myself glasses and the book let the owner read the previous day.”
The pandemic has made them choose closer destinations. First regional, then autonomous and finally by Spain. What was possible as the perimeter limits were opened. After having lost an apartment they had built in Tokyo to watch the Olympics last year and having to give up the only exchange house that exists in Maldives for last Christmas, this summer they will travel through Cerdea, Mallorca, Menorca and Ibiza. That s, the next end of AO return in a big way: a house in a resort of Dubi to see the Universal Exhibition.
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