Failing Upwards with HomeExchange – Millennial Revolution

FIRECracker is a world-travelling early retiree. She used to live in one of the most expensive cities in Canada, but instead of drowning in debt, she rejected home ownership. What resulted was a 7-figure portfolio, which has allowed her and her husband to retire at 31 and travel the world. Their story has been featured on CBC, the Huffington Post, CNBC, BNN, Business Insider, and Yahoo Finance. To date, it is the most shared story in CBC history and their viral video on CBC’s On the Money has garnered 4.5 Million views.

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A concerned reader wrote to me today asking me if everything’s okay. Apparently, I hadn’t posted for nearly 2 weeks, and I’ve never missed a post, even days after giving birth. Don’t worry, we haven’t been kidnapped or taken hostage. We’ve just been travelling and running on fumes because jetlag is brutal when you’re a parent.

Last year when we came to Europe with our infant, it was via a transatlantic cruise, so we managed to avoid the whole jet lag experience because the ship naturally synced the time for you by telling you to set your clocks back 1 hour per day until you reach your destination. I took that for granted. I had no idea how painful it is to get over jet lag while taking care of a toddler, who is also jet lagged. It’s no different from being sick yourself, and having to take care of a sick child. It is BRUTAL.

So, if anyone is wondering why we are late on our posting schedule, this is why. Also, this trip to Europe didn’t exact go smoothly, on account of the fact that our HomeExchange host in Zurich cancelled on us due to a family health issue. I’ve been using HomeExchange for 3 years, have done over 20 exchanges and this is this 3^rd cancellation, which isn’t bad all things considering. And every time HomeExchange has come to the rescue. In fact, the shocking thing is that every time we got cancelled on, we’ve “failed upwards” because somehow we ended up with extra amenities or more space than our original booking. Obviously, this could just be luck and your mileage may vary, but what’s been consistent is how well we feel supported by this platform, compared to other platforms (like Airbnb) that we’ve used before. Instead of getting a laughable 10% off when your booking gets cancelled last minute and you have to pay double the price of your original booking, HomeExchange honors their guarantee of finding you a replacement or compensation of up to $120 USD/day to a max of $1800 USD total. They even have their staff reach out and contact the members on your behalf, so you don’t need to do it yourself. Amazing.

The first time we got cancelled on was in Sydney, Australia, and HomeExchange found us a replacement—with a pool!

The second time was last year, when we tried to visit Valencia and a natural disaster happened, forcing us to re-route to Barcelona instead. That time, we had booked a 1 bedroom for the 3 of us, and somehow ended up with a 3 bedroom that enabled our friends to come stay with us too! (the host was wonderful and said it was no problem. This never happens when you try to add more people on Airbnb). Once again, failing upwards!

But this time, when our Zurich HomeExchange host had to cancel, I’m not going to lie, I was extremely worried. Not only is Switzerland one of the most expensive places in the world, trying to find a place for 5 people to stay last minute? Mission impossible.

Turns out even sending out SOS message on our behalf wasn’t able to secure our accommodations for this many people, so HomeExchange told us to book a hotel and they would compensate us $120 USD/day.

Now, if you think about it, the average cost of a hotel is $250 USD/night in Zurich, and that’s just for 1 room. We needed at least 2 bedrooms (which was our original Home Exchange booking), a place with a kitchen, and hopefully not too far from the city center, since we needed to get around on public transport with a toddler. I thought for sure, I’d be out of pocket $200 USD/night and we were staying for a whole week!

As unlucky as it was that our exchange to cancelled, we got super lucky and found a 3 bed 2.5 bath 1100 sqft apartment near downtown for $173 USD/night, taxes and fees included. This meant that after HomeExchange’s compensation, we’d only be out of pocket $53 USD/night, which is unheard of for Zurich prices. Sure, it wasn’t free like our original accommodations, but we ended up with an extra bedroom and a lot more space for us and our friends to spread out. Admittedly, I could’ve found a cheaper 2 bed near the airport and got it fully covered but this 3 bed was too good of a deal for me to pass up.

Now that we travel with a toddler, we can no longer spontaneously find accommodations on the fly, or sleep at the airport, so any cancellations or disruptions to travelling is way more stressful than we were travelling as a child-free couple. This is why I’m so grateful for HomeExchange once again coming to our rescue. The peace of mind that HomeExchange gives me is unparalleled to any other platform for accommodations I’ve ever used and I’ve been recommending them to all my friends, who’ve all loved their exchange experiences too.

If you’re never tried HomeExchange, I highly recommend you try it. After Zurich, we’ve just checked-in to our next exchange and the host gave us the kindest welcome, left us milk and cookies, and even gifted my son a plush bunny that he now sleeps with every night. I love this platform and the peace of mind it gives my family while travelling is priceless.

I’m also happy to report that for a limited time, they are running a promotion from now until Sept 30, where they are giving away up to 500 Guest Points (double the usual 250) for signing up if you use my referral code:  kristy-d61e2. Here’s how it breaks down:

1. Get 100 Guest Points when your complete your home’s profile
2. Get 150 Guest Points when you activate your subscription ($235 USD/year)
3. If you do this before Sept 30, an extra 250 Guest Points will be added in your account on October, 15th.

Guest Points are basically an “IOU” points system used by HomeExchange to enable you to do non-simultaneous exchanges if you can’t do a reciprocal exchange at the same time. They can’t be exchanged for cash because HomeExchange is a battering system and no money exchanges hands between hosts and guests. You can think of 100 Guest Point like $100/night if you were using cash, and to give you an example, my 1-bedroom home in Toronto was worth 96 Guest Points/night. The 2 bedroom Zurich HomeExchange I booked was 200 Guest Points/night, so I got it for 1 week by hosting a couple from Paris in my apartment for 2 weeks.

By using HomeExchange, I’ve saved over $30,000 in accommodations over the years in exchange for a small annual fee of $235 USD/year.  The amazing thing is that you don’t have to pay for a subscription to send messages to hosts. This means that there’s no need to pay until you are pre-approved for a stay, so there’s little risk to signing up.

If you want more details about how HomeExchange works and how to maximize your chances of getting accepted as a guest and how to be a good host, read my posts here, here, and here.

Sign up for HomeExchange here and my referral code to get bonus points is: kristy-d61e2

Full disclosure: I may get some referral Guest Points if you sign up using my referral code. While that’s nice to have, the main reason I’m telling you about HomeExchange is that I honestly believe they are an amazing platform that doesn’t displace locals and actually helps you when you get cancelled on, as I’ve experienced 3 times already in the past. They’ve significantly relieved my stress and saved me money when I travel, and I hope they will do the same for you. As always, we will never recommend any products on this site that we don’t believe in and use ourselves.

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