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Table of Contents 1. How do I get started? 1. How do I get started? It’s easy! Click on Register Your Home and the registration form will appear. Fill it in on your computer, and then click “Submit.” You’re registered! It takes about ten minutes. You can also add a digital photo of your home then or later. 2. My friends don’t have a computer. Can they still register? Yes, they can still register. There is a special version of the Registration Form (a PDF file) which can be printed off the Internet. They can fill it out by hand and mail it to us. The address is on the form. To get the printable version of the registration form to give to them, on the main menu, click on Print Registration Form. Then in the upper right corner of the form click “Download This Application.” You can then print this version of the form and it will come out looking much better than if you printed it directly from the Online Registration Form page.
3. Do you have any information I can print and give to friends? You can print out our “Dear Far-Away Friends” letter (a PDF file) which introduces Utah! Home Exchange and contains much of the same information as our home page. On the main menu, lick on Print Info Letter. Then in the upper right hand corner of the letter, click again Print Info Letter. A PDF version of the letter will appear. You can then print that version and it will come out looking presentable to give away. You can also download and print out the registration form as described in
the question above. 4. How does Home Exchange work? What is the sequence of steps? First, you register your own home by completing the on-line Registration Form and clicking “Submit.” If you prefer, you may download the paper version, print it, fill it in, and mail it to us. Be sure you write down your password! You will see your home listed on the website immediately. Your username is your Uthomex listing number. Anytime after you submit the form, you can send us a digital photo(s) of your home. There are directions for this on the Add A Photo page. When you are ready to plan your vacation, choose a few homes with which you would like to swap. At the bottom of each of those listings, there is a button saying “Contact the Owner.” When you click on that button, you will be asked to login with your username and password. If you are already a Uthomex member, the owner’s contact information will appear to you. It does not appear on the website otherwise! (Unregistered folks will be redirected to register first.) You write those people a nice e-mail telling about yourselves and your home, and that you are interested in exchanging homes with them. After several e-mails and phone calls, you will finalize your home exchange
plans! 5. What kind of people do home exchange? Is there a profile? Yes, there actually is a typical profile! Home exchangers worldwide (no matter what home exchange service they use) are typically an upper middle class bunch who are well educated and who like to travel. They are teachers, medical personnel, mechanics, real estate salespeople, professionals and semi-professionals like you and me. In addition to this, the Utah! Home Exchange market niche is mostly members of the Church, so we have even more in common. 6. How do I know exchangers won’t wreck my home? This is the biggest worry or our new members. We are all very protective of our homes! Even so, there are several reasons why this is really not much of an issue. First, no one even gets your contact info until after they register their own home. Second, they are also worrying about you staying in their home! Third, by the time you actually trade homes, your exchange partners will no longer be strangers. You will have spoken on the phone, exchanged several letters and/or e-mails, and maybe even traded pictures of your homes and families. You will feel like you actually know them before the exchange time arrives. You’ll be trading with friends. Fourth, you will most likely put away anything you don’t want exchangers to use. I would lock up irreplaceable small valuables and remove those chocolates I’ve been hiding! Fifth, there have even been studies done about this. In their book Trading Places: The Wonderful World of Vacation Home Exchanging (Rutledge Hill Press, 1991) Bill and Mary Barbour report a study they did of over 2400 completed exchanges. The results were amazingly consistent. Reports of damage were very slight, similar to having guests in your home. There were NO reports of theft. This doesn’t mean that it could never happen, but it certainly doesn’t happen often! Sixth, exchangers generally take very good care of your home. Most report cleaning it even better than they would their own home before they leave! So this is something you have to decide, but in reality, it’s not as
big a worry as you might think. 7. How do I do a Conference Visit Exchange? Register your home as usual, but be sure to check the box “Conference Visits.” If you want to stay with one of our members in Utah during General Conference, you will need to contact them in advance and set it up. You will probably want to do a search on the site to find homes requesting
to host Conference visits, and just contact those owners. Click the menu
button Search By Criteria. 8. What if I’m not LDS? Can I still exchange? Of course! Everyone is welcome. Lots of people come to Utah to ski or ride mountain bikes or whatever. Just know that most of our exchangers are LDS, and have very protective feelings about their homes; so LDS standards do apply to all our exchanges, which means no smoking, alcohol, illicit activites, etc. 9. How do I contact the homeowners? At the bottom of the large information page about each home, there is a button which says “Contact the Owner.” When you click on it, you will be asked to login with your Uthomex listing number and password. Then the contact information for the home will appear, and you can e-mail the owner. If you don’t have a member number and password, you will be directed
to “Join Now” so that you can register your own home. The contact
info only appears to members who have already registered their own homes. 10. Is it typical to exchange cars also? About half of our members also trade a car with their exchange partners. It’s very convenient and it saves you both the cost of renting a car. Check with your insurance company. Be sure the company understands that no money is changing hands, and they are your guests for a limited time. It’s up to you. 11. Do people with children exchange? Definitely! Some people feel like it’s actually the best way to vacation with children, since they can be comfortable in a home environment. Pay special attention to question #13 on the registration form, where it says, “children welcome.” If you will be traveling with children,
you will probably want to do a search on our site for homes that specifically
state “children welcome.” Click the menu button Search
by Criteria 12.
Can I bring pets?
13. Can I make more than one exchange per year? Certainly! Your registration gives you access to exchange as many times in a year as you like. Some of our retired members can actually go quite often! 14. How did Home Exchange get started? You may be surprised to learn that Home Exchange has been around for over 50 years. It started with teachers exchanging houses for school vacations. 15. How can you afford to do this for free? We can’t. That’s why the price is going to have to eventually to go up. See our Prices section. It’s just that we really believe that this is something which will become a benefit to all of us, so we’re sinking money into it to get started. Hopefully, it won’t always be a money pit! Someday it may even turn a profit! 16. Does one of the exchange houses have to be in Utah? For example, could someone in Brazil trade with someone in Florida? You could actually live anywhere in the world, and trade worldwide with any other members of our organization. The homes could be anywhere. One does not have to be in Utah! 17. My house isn’t very fancy. Will someone still want to exchange with me? Most people are interested in the location. If the location is right, the size of the house is not so important. On the other hand, if you or your home has something special, exchangers may decide to come anyway! Just give a good, honest description of your home and your area. Then you get busy and start contacting owners where you want to go. 18. Why should I choose Utah! Home Exchange? There are lots of exchange companies out there, but we are the only ones specifically trading in and out of Utah. Our marketing niche is people like you and me. 19. What about insurance? There is no one set answer to this question. Many companies will still cover you. The only way to be absolutely certain is to contact your insurance company and have your exchange partners do the same. Be sure your insurance company understands the length of the exchange and that no money is changing hands. If the exchange is under 30 cays, often there is no problem. If it turns out for any reason that you can’t do a simultaneous swap,
you can still do a hospitality exchange. Then you are simply guests in their
home, and at a different time, they are guests in yours. The owners are at
home during the guest’s visit. 20. Does Utah! Home Exchange guarantee each home? No. We can’t guarantee each home. There is no possible way we can visit and inspect all the homes listed on our site. We rely on the good faith of our members to accurately portray the size and condition or their own homes. If you have questions or concerns about a potential exchange home, you should satisfy yourself by asking more questions before you make a commitment. 21. Does Utah! Home Exchange arrange the exchanges for the members? No, you will do that for yourself. We simply provide our members with the contact information of other members, and let them arrange their own trades. In that way, each party is in a much better position to assess whether they and their homes are right for each other. 22. How do I search for a specific type of home? Use our really neat Search By Criteria page. You can search for whatever criteria you like. 23. What if my partners back out? This can be the ultimate vacation disaster! Your plans are all made, and then sometimes there’s a death in the family, or you change jobs and have to move, or something really drastic occurs. A couple of points of prevention may help. First, never buy airline tickets until you receive a signed contract. Second, if your partners sound uncommitted, they probably are, and you should use caution. Third, never back out of an exchange yourself. If the unthinkable happens, and you must back out after exchanging contracts, let your exchange partners know immediately. You should make every effort to find one or more replacement families for them to exchange with at their expected time. You should also offer to exchange at a different date, if possible. Utah! Home Exchange reserves the right to remove any listing from our site,
without refund, if the owners cancel after exchanging contracts without providing
a suitable replacement. 24. Do we have to use the Utah! Home Exchange written contract? There is no legal requirement to use the contract. Some people have made successful exchanges with no contract. The advantage of the contract is that both parties realize they are committed to that exchange. A second use for the contract is to give you an idea of the things you need
to discuss with your exchange partners before you get to their house. Even
if you decide not to use the written contract, look it over anyway, so you
will know what kind of questions to ask to make everything run smoothly. 25. Can I leave part of my family (children, grandma, visiting uncle) at home when we exchange? This has the potential to be an uncomfortable situation. In fact, it’s the only thing that home exchangers generally will complain about. Our advice is, don’t do it! Find somewhere else for them to stay when the other family comes to your house. At the very least, be upfront about discussing the possibility with your exchange partners during the negotiation phase. Don’t let them be surprised! 26. I want to have my grandkids (or other guests) come stay during our vacation exchange. Is this all right? It’s very common for exchangers to have guests during their stay. Just be sure that the owners know about it in advance. They should know the names and ages of your guests, and when they will be there. In some cases they may have to notify their apartment managers, etc. in advance. Discuss this before you sign contracts. 27. I don’t know what to say when I first contact another member to propose an exchange. Help! On the main menu, click on Initial Contact Letter. It will give you a sample letter and some ideas to get you started. Just do it! It’s easier than you think.
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