Luxury homes up for swap

GREAT ESCAPE: Homes from New Zealand on a luxury house swap website include a lodge on Waiheke Island.

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Fancy a holiday with a difference? How about offering your own home for a short-term swap? There's one catch - it needs to be luxurious.

Luxe Home Swap is a new website that has luxury homes for exchange. The site is British but its originator, Debbie Wosskow, says there are more than 500 homes listed, including in New Zealand, Europe, Australia and North America as well as Britain.

Homes from New Zealand on the website include a lodge on Waiheke Island.

Anyone can put their home up on the site as long as they pay the $175 annual fee. Wosskow says she monitors the site daily but in three months of business has not had to remove any because they have not come up to standard.

"The process tends to be self-selecting as people take a look at homes on the site and make a judgment on whether LHS is the site for them," she says.

Wosskow decided to create luxehomeswap.com after trying out a home-exchange site in England and was bombarded with properties she didn't feel were good enough.

While the main advantage of swapping homes is financial, Wosskow says living like a local is an added bonus. Homeowners are encouraged to divulge tips and ideas about how best to enjoy their area.

Wosskow promises the second year's fee will be waived if you don't exchange in your first year. "It's worth mentioning that Australia is in our top-three most requested swap destinations worldwide."

See luxehomeswap.com.

- © Fairfax NZ News