Hospitality Exchange, Couchsurfing and Home Stay,

Staying with the locals

A great way to travel around the world and meet people and pay nothing for accommodation

I wasn’t familiar with home stay, in some cases it is called hospitality exchange but basically you stay with the locals while you're on holiday. So in 2007 while looking on the internet for budget accommodation I came across a few websites which spoke about free accommodation. I found several which offered this service and was intrigued.

It is particularly popular with backpackers, touring cyclists and families wanting to travel on a budget. However it is great for anyone young or old looking for free travel accommodation. But it's not just about free accommodation as you get so much more out of it.

Advantages of staying with locals

• Meet local people
• Learn about the culture
• Find interesting place to visit not normally seen by tourists
• Find out about local history
• Free Accommodation
• A much more stimulating holiday
• Meet new friends on a global scale

One of the organisations is Couchsurfing. It is a database of people offering travelers free accommodation in their home. This sounded very interesting so I joined the free database and stared to examine the site more thoroughly. I thought it sounded a little too good to be true and what about all those strange people out there. How did you know what they were like?

Types of people it appeals to

• Easy going and flexible
• People backpacking wanting free accommodation
• Families who want a broader holiday experience
• People on a budget or who want to travel for a longer period
• People who enjoy meeting others

This was our accommodation in Switzerland and we had a great time meeting people from all over the world

I joined and it was an amazing journey from then on. Here is basically how it works and further down the page you’ll read about our experience of hosting and as a traveller. There are numerous other stories from people.

How it works

1. List yourself on one of these websites, fill in a profile about yourself and start to search for the accommodation in the city or country you are going to visit. You may be offered a couch, a floor space, a tent in the garden or your own bedroom and bathroom.
2. Request the dates that you want to stay; one or two days is usual to start with and then if you like each other you might be able to stay longer.
3. Email hosts and request your stay – you might need to email a lot to get a few replys. Give a few weeks notice or even longer to see what the response is.
4. When you do get a response check out the hosts references and read between the lines - if not much is said then look at other references. Have they been vouch for?

   ---

   Travelling with Couchsurfing

5. The type of hosts vary from a students household to a family home. This should be listed on the profile of the host.
6. Let the host know when you are arriving and it is a good idea to take a small gift like a bottle of wine or chocolates. If you change your mind you must always let the hosts know.
7. When you are staying with the host you need to ask the them what is expected of you. You should plan to feed yourself, however sometimes they will offer you a meal, maybe you’ll offer to cook or wash up or help in some way. This will often depend on the person you stay with. If you don't you could outstay your welcome.
8. You must be easy going and flexible in case the home owner needs to alter their plans. Sometimes the hosts will give you the door key and you can come and go as you want, other times they will expect you to leave when they do.

Travelling with couchsurfing There several organizations that offer this service through a website database,Couchsurfing. is the largest, with the most user friendly website. It also enables you to cross check references on people profiles. hospitality Club. is next the most popular but there are others including Global Freeloaders. In all cases you must remember that it is your responsibility to check people out.

Look at this page on how to organize a successful stay.

We tested it out with a BBQ

To find out if Couchsurfing was OK we decided to host a BBQ at my house (a bit brave) to see who turned up and if they were crazy people or people just like me!

Fifteen people turned up and it was great, we talked about travel and how to organise a good trip using Couchsurfing. It went all day and into the evening and there was lots of conversation about travel and the types of people they’d stayed with.

Hosting travellers in our home

We have had many people stay over the few years we’ve been hosting couchsurfers and it is a pleasure to have them in the house. There have been singles, young couples, older couples, a lady with her dog on the way up the east coast and travelers from all over the world.

House swapping is another way you can host and be hosted, but you do need a home to exchange as this is a reciprocal agreement, even if not done at the same time. We have organized many of these exchanges too.

In May 2007 it was our turn to do the traveling. I had lined up a mixture of Couchsurfing and house swaps and left some nights free. We were quite nervous doing our first surf and being older than the average Couchsurfer we wondered how we’d be received.

Our first host lived in Berne in Switzerland. She is in her early forties and is lovely. She has a teenage son and he was always interested to meet these people she had in her home. When we arrived there was already a couple from the US.

We all helped towards dinner and when we sat down she commented there were people from four continents; Africa, Australia, America and Europe. There were three different languages being spoken but people were speaking in English to communicate.

By the end of the evening I felt so privileged to have been part of the evening. The conversation was broad and stimulating, the people were quite extraordinary and I was excited about this whole thing.

We slept in a spare room at the top of the building – about four floors up. We had a mattress on the floor and a little window. It was clean and comfortable and I could have slept there for a week if I needed to. We toured around Europe for four months and then called in to see the same hosts on our way back. This was the first of many fantastic experiences.

I think that Couchsurfing has made hospitality exchange and home stay trendy and it appeals to a broad range of people - which is great. They now have over 1.5 million members around the world.

Travelling with couchsurfing

Do you have a story about Couchsurfing or Homestay you can share with us?

Do you have a great story about Couchsurfing or homestay? It could be about a communication problem because you didn't speak the language, or a complete cultural contrast that suprised you. It might be something really unusual that you saw or trying to use the public transport system in a strange city.
Please share it with us and add a photo or two.

What Other Visitors Have Said

Click below to see contributions from other visitors to this page...

Back to Accommodation Type

Leave - Hospitality Exchange and go back to Free Accommodation For World Travel home page