A mother-of-four has revealed how she has saved an estimated €50,000 (£41,487) pounds while travelling the world over a period of 16 years with her family.
Fionnuala Brennan, 53, from Tramore, Ireland, has managed to holiday around the globe, including in America, Australia, and Italy, by exchanging her home.
The 53-year-old, a lecturer at Southeast Technological University in Waterford, has completed 87 exchanges since starting, saving her thousands of pounds.
Fionnuala’s preferred platform, HomeExchange, works in two ways: the Classic Exchange, where two families swap homes, either simultaneously or on different dates.
Or tourists can use ‘guest points’, which means they can stay in a home without giving their own abode up, and earn points at a different time by letting people stay at their property.
Despite Fionnuala hearing about the platform from a friend when she was 30, she didn’t use the website until after she had her fourth child in 2008, which made travelling via hotels too expensive.
‘With four kids, we felt it was just too expensive to go anywhere, so we decided to give it a go,’ she told Femail.
Now, the mother-of-four has made lasting memories with her husband and children around the globe and even favours it over other travelling arrangements due to the authentic experience it provides.
Fionnuala Brennan (pictured centre right), 53, from Tramore, Ireland, and her family (pictured) have travelled around the globe via HomeExchange
The mother-of-four, who is a university lecturer, first decided to travel via HomeExchange to save money
Fionnuala and her family’s first HomeExchange holiday was in France: ‘We flew to Nantes and stayed in the Vendee in a little seaside town.
‘We live in a little seaside town in Ireland – so, we were swapping an Irish seaside town for a French one and our own family home for a family home in France, which was perfect.
‘They had young children like ours. Their house was full of Lego and all the toys; the kids had a really great time.
‘It was a very easy holiday, and they were very relaxed, with a garden and swings, slides, and we were within walking distance to the beach.’
‘When we started doing it in 2008, it was all direct exchanges. So that’s more challenging because you need to find somebody interested in coming to the southeast of Ireland, and that’s what we did for the first number of years.’
‘We were doing European exchanges for the first few years, and it was mainly French families who were on the Home Exchange website and then we started going to different places.
After having four children together, staying in hotels when on holiday became too expensive for Fionnuala and her husband
Fionnuala believes that travelling with HomeExchange can offer a more authentic way to experience a foreign country
The family have enjoyed trips across the globe together, including in America, Australia, France, Italy
‘We went to America, Australia, Spain, Italy, and other European destinations. So those were direct home exchanges…and we often swapped cars as well.
‘Of course, because we have four kids, we needed a seven-seater car and often swapped with similarly sized families and that worked well.’
By saving on accommodation, Fionnuala and her family can splash out on other parts of the holiday, such as airport transfers to make the route as easy as possible for her family.
But while holidaying in a hotel typically takes a small amount of preparation, arranging a home exchange can take a little while longer.
Fionnuala explained: ‘So we would get our house ready, and there’s always work to do in that, getting things fixed and doing all the repairs, cleaning up, and leaving the place lovely and neat and tidy.
‘So that’s a challenge and perhaps not everybody’s on for doing that before they go on their holidays, but I will say there is huge pleasure in coming back into your home and everything’s fixed and working and in great shape.’
She added: ‘We’ve never had one where anybody left the house in a worse condition than they got it.
‘They leave it just as clean and tidy as we left it and often in better condition, so that has never been a concern. There’s a huge amount of trust in it because you’re in their home while they’re in yours.’
Without HomeExchange, Fionnuala and her family would not have been able to experience as many countries
The houses Fionnuala and her family visit are often equipped with bikes and toys for the children
While the family saves money by exchanging their home, the biggest benefit for Fionnuala is the authentic experience.
She explained: ‘I was in Estonia, in Tallinn, a beautiful city, for a work conference, and I didn’t want to stay in a hotel.
‘I was there for the week, and I stayed in a little studio apartment beside a family home.
‘I was able to have coffee in the garden and the family was there and it just felt safe and comfortable and it was a much more authentic experience than staying in a hotel.
She added: ‘I was with Estonian people and [I had] a great sense of comfort. You feel like you’re traveling and getting to know somewhere else in a real way.’
The mother-of-four said that exchanging homes is also often a sociable way to travel, saying: ‘Often people will let their neighbours know that you’re coming or their relations will drop in and check in that you’re OK.
‘There’s a great sense of community… you get to know different people and how they live and it’s a really positive thing.’
Elsewhere, the family have enjoyed trip in Rome, France, America, Malaga, Lucca, Lake Como, Cadiz, and Venice to name few.
Fionnuala warned that holidaying via exchanging homes might not be suitable for those who are super house proud
The mother-of-four said that HomeExchange can be a good route when travelling with children because people’s homes are typically more equipped than hotels
A highlight for her children was spending Christmas in Sydney in a home exchange, with a family who spent the 25th December in Ireland.
While it’s hard for Fionnuala to give an exact breakdown of how much she’s saved in total, in the past one year alone, she’s saved £6,700.
‘While I’m estimating the cost of what we might have gone for otherwise, the quality of accommodation we stayed at with the swaps was much better than the hostels, Airbnbs or whatever we might have opted for, and a few of the trips would not have happened if we had to pay for accommodation.
‘So, how I would put it is that we travel like people who are much better off than we are.
‘We manage to travel and stay in beautiful places, beautiful homes in beautiful locations and we do that regularly.
‘So, to put a number on it, it’s difficult, but over the 16 years you can be sure that we have saved more than €50,000 no doubt.’
While she still stays in the occasional hotel or Airbnb, Fionnuala finds home comforts are often unbeatable.
‘There’s great comfort in staying in a home that just has everything in it. If you cut your finger, you’re going to find the first aid kit or you’re going to find the parasol for when it’s a hot day.’
However, the mother-of-four warned that home exchange might not be for everybody.
She said: ‘I’ve recommended it to lots of friends and it hasn’t worked for everybody.
‘It does work for most people, [but] it’s not inclined to work if people are very precious about their house, and it makes them uncomfortable to have strangers stay in their home.
‘So, I think if you feel like that, then don’t, don’t put yourself through it,’ she said.