Is home swapping really free?

Sometimes, people ask: “If home swapping is free, why do you charge a fee?” Well, if you know the 48 dots, you know that our mission is help you roam free. So, we don’t charge a fee for home swapping at all. That’s right. Simple as that. Home swapping on the48dots is totally free.

We’ll say it again: We charge $0 per swap, $0 in membership fees.

So, how do we make money?

How do we run a home swapping technology platform if we don’t charge anything for making the swap? How do we support the very important aspect of home swapping, which is trust and safety on our platform? Simple: when members can’t make a swap (and yes, not everyone will want to go to your home at the same time or even at a different time) then we offer the option to book.

Why do we take any fees at all?

We have to take fees for booking homes so that we can support the ecosystem. Vacation home swaps should be free to stay in, but the reality is, house swapping services cost money to enable safe swapping. We have to create the technology that lets you list your home and browse other homes for swapping. We have to power our platform with trust and safety tools. We use other services to make sure your data is secure. And, we are constantly trying to evolve our platform with new features that you all ask for! So, there’s a small fee that we take per booking to let us serve you and help enable you to roam free.

That covers our costs to maintain the home swapping service. So, we think it’s a win-win.

Are you the only free home swapping platform?

There are some smaller ones that are supported by donations.

Most larger home swapping sites charge a fee. They usually do it on a membership basis. They also charge for points if you want to buy them. Fees typically range from $89 - $275 for yearly membership.