‘I worked for King Charles for seven years – one key decision shocked me’<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\nJoan, 67, who lives with her husband Noel, in Buxton, Derbyshire, said they do not ‘pay for holiday accommodation anymore’.<\/p>\n
Joan and Noel, who ran an education company before retiring, were looking for ways to make their trips ‘affordable and comfortable’ when they heard about home-swapping from Joan\u2019s sister.<\/p>\n
This prompted them to sign up to LoveHomeSwap in 2017, which later joined the HomeExchange group.<\/p>\n
HomeExchange allows users to exchange their homes and receive GuestPoints to thank them for their hospitality.<\/p>\n
It has a \u00a3180 annual membership fee and more than 200,000 members in 155 countries.<\/p>\n
Joan said the couple have had experiences ‘money cannot buy’, adding: “It\u2019s not possible to put a price on our trips.<\/p>\n
“I would never stay in a home where you\u2019re watching the whales going by.<\/p>\n
“This was a very luxurious, five-bedroom, three-storey property, with whacking great big grounds in the best location.<\/p>\n
“There\u2019s no way that I would have been staying there, so it gives you access to quality, the quality of properties, that wouldn\u2019t ordinarily be available.”<\/p>\n
![\"Joan](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0_JS379581428.jpg\")
Joan with her husband Noel<\/p>\n
Joan and Noel have a one-bedroom holiday home in Criccieth, North Wales, which has views of Snowdonia National Park from a nearby beach – and they use this property for home-swapping.<\/p>\n
She said: “The house that we live in, in Buxton, is old and quirky, so it\u2019s not so easy for somebody to walk into it.<\/p>\n
“But when we bought the holiday home that we have in Criccieth, in my mind, we would exchange it.”<\/p>\n
Joan said ‘experiencing places as a local’ and meeting new people are the best parts of home-swapping.<\/p>\n
The couple completed their first home-swap in Paris, staying in a quirky ‘student pad’.<\/p>\n
The space was small – effectively a ‘garret’- and the couple had to climb over a roof strut to get into the kitchen.<\/p>\n
But it was well-located, with ‘the cheapest beer’ in a bar next door.<\/p>\n
Joan said: “We would come home in the evening and go into this student bar with cheap beer \u2013 a pint was probably around three euros.<\/p>\n
“These places are local, so one of the key things for me is that you could stay in a hotel, but that\u2019s sterile.<\/p>\n
“These home exchanges are never sterile.”<\/p>\n
They also stayed in a ‘swanky apartment block’ in Bangkok, Thailand, which had an infinity pool and ‘wonderful views over the river’.<\/p>\n
Joan and Noel have stayed in other ‘posh properties’ with large gardens and swimming pools, as well as family homes with chickens, cats and gardens to look after.<\/p>\n
They even met someone in Tasmania who built his own property, using car ports – and it was surrounded by wallabies.<\/p>\n
Joan said: “We did a big trip to Australia, and we did what they call a reciprocal exchange, but it was non-simultaneous.<\/p>\n
“It was an arrangement where they had a flat underneath their main house, and they picked us up from the airport, took us out, showed us around and we played cards with them.<\/p>\n
“They had a friend who, up in the hills, just beyond the national park, had built himself a crazy house.<\/p>\n
“So we were saying about seeing wallabies and our hosts said “oh, come up to our mate\u2019s place” and it was a quirky, mad place made of car ports and glass.<\/p>\n
“We would never have seen that or met this guy otherwise. He was a real hoot.”<\/p>\n
Joan said she is always ‘respectful’ of people\u2019s properties and belongings.<\/p>\n
She insisted she has never had a negative experience hosting or staying in another home.<\/p>\n
Joan added: “That\u2019s one of the joys of home exchanging because, even if you\u2019re only doing it online, you get to know other people, you make friends with people.<\/p>\n
“It\u2019s not just about the property, it\u2019s about the people as well.”<\/p>\n
This autumn, Joan and Noel are spending three weeks in the Dolomites, in Italy.<\/p>\n
They also have other home swaps coming up, including a trip to Malta next March.<\/p>\n
Joan said: “Life only goes in one direction, so you should hurry up and do it.”<\/p>\n
She added: “The main thing is that money cannot buy the experience of being welcomed into someone\u2019s home and being in a proper local living community.<\/p>\n
“The advice and guidance from hosts helps you plan and make the most of their area \u2013 you get an insider view.<\/p>\n
“I am out of touch with prices since I don\u2019t pay for holiday accommodation any more, but I have effectively travelled the world and not paid for accommodation.”<\/p>\n
Don’t miss the biggest and breaking stories by signing up to the BirminghamLive newsletter here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The couple have saved at least \u00a345,000 with home exchanges across the worldJoan on the yacht where Prince…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":401820,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7708],"tags":[7709,7714,7713,533,2832,532,2831,7710,519,7711,7712],"class_list":{"0":"post-401819","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-royals","8":"tag-british-royal-family","9":"tag-catherine","10":"tag-catherine-middleton","11":"tag-kate-middleton","12":"tag-prince-of-wales","13":"tag-prince-william","14":"tag-princess-of-wales","15":"tag-royal-families","16":"tag-royal-family","17":"tag-uk-royal-family","18":"tag-william"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115155653604304863","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401819","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=401819"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401819\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/401820"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=401819"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=401819"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=401819"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
![\"Joan](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/0_JS379581573.jpg\")
Joan on the yacht where Prince William apparently had his stag do<\/p>\n