Savannah homeowner savors free trips abroad as part of home exchange

By Mary Landers

Over the past few years, Savannahian Maria Center has vacationed at a trendy Florence, Italy, apartment where homemade limoncello refreshed her on her arrival. In Bali, Indonesia, she was welcomed to an open-air villa by a staff of 11 including a cook and driver. And last fall she treated her siblings to a stay at a 4,000-square-foot ocean-view home with a pool on the north shore of Kauai, Hawaii.
Her total cost for lodging: zero.
Center, the area manager for the American Diabetes Association, is a member of HomeExchange.com, an online service that matches up travelers willing to swap their houses. She pays a small fee to be listed (currently $119 a year) and then can either request exchanges with other members or wait for others to request a stay at her Ardsley Park home.
She hasn’t waited long in the past. Savannah is a popular place to be, Center said.
“The day after I signed up I got a request from Florida,” she said.
Keghan Hurst, spokeswoman for HomeExchange.com, confirmed the South is popular with the owners of its 40,000 listings around the world, perhaps because it’s renowned for hospitality, she speculated.
“It has a reputation for this good, homey feel and people want to experience it when they’re down there.”
HomeExchange’s motto is “Make yourself at home ... anywhere in the world.”
That’s what the service allows Center and about 15 other Savannah-area members to do. (Full disclosure: This reporter became one of them after interviewing Center.) Staying at a home and being in touch with its owners beforehand gives a traveler inside information that’s tough to get otherwise.
“It’s beyond saving money on lodging and transportation,” Center said. “It’s a cultural exchange.”
In Bali, what Center describes as the “mac daddy of them all,” she and her friends and sister were invited to a full-moon ceremony at a Hindu Temple.
“We went dressed in Indonesian traditional clothes and there was a full gamelan orchestra,” she said. “It was spectacular.”
Exchangers are like-minded people, Hurst said. They love to travel, save money, live like locals and make friends along the way.
Sure, there’s a natural trepidation people have in opening up their home to strangers, Hurst said, but that’s alleviated as members negotiate an exchange. They e-mail, read about each other, see photos and talk on the phone. Most take great pride in making their homes welcoming.
“They’ll ask do you want one percent or two milk in the fridge,” Hurst said. “That’s the relationship you have.”
HomeExchange.com began in 1992 when founder Ed Kushins launched the company’s predecessor Trading Home International with a printed directory. By 1995 it was online, and in 2002 it switched to its current name — it’s seen steady growth ever since. It remains the largest home exchange site though it has competitors including exchangehomes.com and homeforexchange.com.
Exchanges don’t have to be simultaneous. Some listings are second homes, and some people, like Center, are willing to find another place to stay in their hometown while visitors enjoy their place. Center enjoys playing ambassador to Savannah, making sure her guests know where to go and what to do while they’re here.
In this way she’s banked visits to Madagascar, New York and Rum Point on Grand Cayman Island.
And in the meantime she’s made new friends.
“These are people who are well traveled,” she said. “You really meet a lot of interesting people.”