Latest / Stuff You Should Know / How House Swapping Works

Transcript

How House Swapping Works · Stuff You Should Know

0:00
Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray.
0:03
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you welcome to Stuff you Should Know
0:08
Speaker 1: from house Stuff Works dot Com. Hey, and welcome to
0:16
Speaker 1: the podcast. I'm Josh Clark with me as always as
0:19
Speaker 1: Charles W. Chuck Bryant. This is stuff you should know. Um,
0:24
Speaker 1: Extreme Home Makeover Edition. Tip of the hat to you
0:27
Speaker 1: as well. Just gave you a literal tip of my cap. Yeah,
0:30
Speaker 1: you don't see people do that enough anymore. Tip of
0:32
Speaker 1: the hat, Tip of the hat to you. Top of
0:34
Speaker 1: the Day, Top of the Morning, Bluck of the Irish.
0:38
Speaker 1: Let's let's let's do this, okay, Chuck, Um, this is
0:41
Speaker 1: going to be one of the worst ones we've ever done. Now,
0:43
Speaker 1: it's gonna be so great. I don't think you're right.
0:46
Speaker 1: All right, we'll see. Um well, I guess we'll leave
0:48
Speaker 1: it to everyone to decide. Well, because then people say
0:52
Speaker 1: that was great, and people say it sucked. Yeah, whatever,
0:55
Speaker 1: and we'll be no, no further along than we are now.
0:57
Speaker 1: We have no idea. Yeah, it's just you and me
0:59
Speaker 1: and Jerry in a little tiny room and it were
1:02
Speaker 1: just completely isolated, totally out of touch with reality, complete
1:06
Speaker 1: so chuck, um, I guess we'll get this stinker started. Huh,
1:11
Speaker 1: that sounds good to me. Do you remember um? Back
1:14
Speaker 1: in two thousand and six, there was a twenty six
1:17
Speaker 1: year old guy from Montreal and named Kyle McDonald. I
1:20
Speaker 1: don't remember him, you will in a second. He did
1:22
Speaker 1: one of the coolest Internet undertakings of all time. Facebook, No,
1:27
Speaker 1: my Space, No, it's not a business. He started he
1:32
Speaker 1: had a red paper clip and he decided that he
1:34
Speaker 1: wanted to trade it until he got a house. That
1:37
Speaker 1: was great, it was awesome. Where did he end up?
1:39
Speaker 1: He ended up getting a house in a place called Kipling, Winnipeg.
1:43
Speaker 1: He really got a house. Yeah, in less than a year,
1:46
Speaker 1: and in fourteen trades, he went from a red paper
1:49
Speaker 1: clip to a pen that looked like a fish, so
1:53
Speaker 1: on and so forth until he ended up with He
1:56
Speaker 1: traded an afternoon with Alice Cooper or a kiss snow globe,
2:02
Speaker 1: and that's when everything opened up. Uh. Corbin Burnston from
2:06
Speaker 1: l A Law remember him. He turned out to be
2:10
Speaker 1: a huge collector of snow globes and he wanted the
2:14
Speaker 1: snow globe, so he offered trade the snow globe for
2:18
Speaker 1: a paid part in a movie he was directing, and
2:21
Speaker 1: the people of Kipling, Winnipeg said, that's it for us.
2:24
Speaker 1: We've been waiting, this is what we want. We will
2:26
Speaker 1: trade you a farmhouse in our city for that part
2:32
Speaker 1: in that Corbyn Burnson movie. Well, who like the mayor
2:35
Speaker 1: of that town, the town together. I'm sure led by
2:38
Speaker 1: the mayor, but the town got a part in the movie.
2:41
Speaker 1: I don't know. I don't know who got a part
2:43
Speaker 1: in the movie. The question didn't come up. Well, where
2:47
Speaker 1: it falls apart was the guy went to Kipling, he
2:50
Speaker 1: accepted the house because he wanted to make the trade,
2:52
Speaker 1: and he turned around and sold it. He's like, I'm
2:54
Speaker 1: not living here, you're kidding. I remember the people of
2:57
Speaker 1: of Kipling, saskatch I wanted, I say Winnipeg, I don't know,
3:00
Speaker 1: says catch a one. Um. They were not pleased. You
3:05
Speaker 1: know where it fell apart from me, Corbin Burnson, terrible, Corbin.
3:09
Speaker 1: If you're listening to this, I apologize for Chuck. I
3:12
Speaker 1: loved you in Major League. He was he was a
3:14
Speaker 1: spectacular jerk, but he wasn't over the top. He did
3:18
Speaker 1: he nailed it. Yeah, Um, Chuck, that guy swapped a
3:23
Speaker 1: red paper clip for a house but that is in
3:26
Speaker 1: no way, shape or form related to our topic today.
3:29
Speaker 1: How swapping that has the word swap in it. That's
3:32
Speaker 1: a nice lead in, Josh. House swapping is more like um, swinging,
3:37
Speaker 1: but with houses rather than spouses. Yes, Josh, it has
3:42
Speaker 1: actually been around since the mid nineteen fifties, and swinging
3:46
Speaker 1: it's been growing like crazy about travelers do this now
3:52
Speaker 1: and they say it's growing at about fift a year,
3:54
Speaker 1: which I mean, you do the math, buddy, In like
3:57
Speaker 1: six or eight years, looks like we'll I'll be house
3:59
Speaker 1: swapping okay, I want'll be saying hotels anymore. Um, I
4:03
Speaker 1: don't think that's true. I mean, yes, mathematically that does
4:07
Speaker 1: make sense. Um, But the the problem is people like
4:13
Speaker 1: me are kind of high strong. You wouldn't not be
4:15
Speaker 1: a good house swapper. No, it's not so much the
4:18
Speaker 1: person in my house. I generally trust people, you know,
4:21
Speaker 1: and I trust my instincts. I'm not gonna there's some
4:25
Speaker 1: some thrill kill colt who loves a good blood orgy
4:29
Speaker 1: is not going to I'm not gonna lend my house
4:30
Speaker 1: to some group like that, right, Um, But I wouldn't
4:35
Speaker 1: feel comfortable in someone else's house. Oh really, see that's
4:38
Speaker 1: probably the opposite of what most people's redicines has to
4:42
Speaker 1: do with. I think it goes both ways, man, Yeah,
4:46
Speaker 1: I like all swapping. Yeah, it goes both ways. And
4:49
Speaker 1: I can tell you the one that I would really
4:51
Speaker 1: really not feel comfortable with really is the hospitality exchange. Yeah.
4:56
Speaker 1: Let's let's go ahead and talk about the three ways
4:59
Speaker 1: that you can do this. And if you've seen the
5:01
Speaker 1: movie The Holiday, I have seen house swapping in action.
5:06
Speaker 1: Was Eva Mendez in there. She was not wait, Queen Latifa,
5:10
Speaker 1: she was not Oh I'm thinking of last Holiday. Yes,
5:13
Speaker 1: The Holiday starred Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslet. She did
5:17
Speaker 1: not appear naked in this one. But the movie The
5:20
Speaker 1: Holiday and Jack Black and the very fetching Jude Law,
5:24
Speaker 1: Cameron Diaz and Kate Winslett swapped houses for holiday, and um,
5:30
Speaker 1: romantic high jinks ensued obviously with Cameron of course, with
5:36
Speaker 1: Jude Law and Kate wins It with Jack Black and
5:40
Speaker 1: l a to London or I'm sorry English country cottage
5:44
Speaker 1: type of thing. So that was house swapping in action,
5:48
Speaker 1: and what they did was called a traditional exchange. Yeah,
5:52
Speaker 1: and that's when you play your vacation at the same
5:54
Speaker 1: time and say I'll stay in your place, you stay
5:56
Speaker 1: in my place. Yes, there's also chuck that I think
5:59
Speaker 1: the trude was far and away the most common and
6:02
Speaker 1: frequent type and appealing because, um, you you all you
6:06
Speaker 1: have to do is own a house. That's it. Well,
6:08
Speaker 1: you own a house in a place where somebody would
6:10
Speaker 1: want to go. Yeah, there's there's different ways around that.
6:15
Speaker 1: If you're in Mobile, Alabama and you want to swap
6:18
Speaker 1: apartments with someone in New York, you might not get
6:20
Speaker 1: a lot of action. Maybe not, But what if the
6:23
Speaker 1: person in New York who's swapping has family and mobile
6:28
Speaker 1: funeral gotta go down a mobile But by god, I'm
6:32
Speaker 1: not going to spend a dime while I'm down there,
6:34
Speaker 1: how swapping it is, Yeah, I'm not gonna pay forty
6:36
Speaker 1: five dollars for that day's in you know, it's said.
6:39
Speaker 1: I was reading them one of the articles that this
6:41
Speaker 1: article on our site was based on, and um they
6:44
Speaker 1: made that point like, sure, if you live in in
6:46
Speaker 1: Manhattan or Rio, you're not gonna have any trouble whatsoever.
6:51
Speaker 1: But um, they said, you can still have a successful
6:55
Speaker 1: swap if you're able to convince somebody who has a
6:58
Speaker 1: house where you want to go of the in charms
7:00
Speaker 1: of Toledo or Tulsa. Then my hometown is an example.
7:05
Speaker 1: Well at the place you wouldn't want to go. Yeah,
7:07
Speaker 1: I think all you need to say is Tony Paco's
7:09
Speaker 1: and people would be all over it exactly clean or yeah. Um.
7:14
Speaker 1: So the traditional exchange is one. Non simultaneous swap is another.
7:19
Speaker 1: This is the rich person swap. You take it. Yes,
7:21
Speaker 1: when you have a like a vacation house and you
7:24
Speaker 1: don't necessarily have to plan your vacation with air as
7:26
Speaker 1: you can just say take my place in uh in
7:28
Speaker 1: Worcester and I'll take your place in Rio. Yes. Rio
7:34
Speaker 1: is the hot spot right now, is um. You could
7:36
Speaker 1: also do non non simultaneous swap where you maybe you're
7:41
Speaker 1: not at home and somebody's using your home but you're
7:45
Speaker 1: not using there's at the same time, but you're banking
7:47
Speaker 1: a credit to be able to use their's in the future. Oh,
7:51
Speaker 1: so I have business in Rio, so you can stay
7:53
Speaker 1: in my house in Atlanta and I'll take you up
7:55
Speaker 1: at a future date to stay at your house in Rio,
7:58
Speaker 1: exactly because my company's for me to go to Rio
8:01
Speaker 1: this time. So I don't have to worry about it, okay, um.
8:03
Speaker 1: And then there's the one that I would find extremely uncomfortable.
8:08
Speaker 1: Do people really do this, Yes they do, and I'll
8:11
Speaker 1: describe some of them momentarily. But the hospitality exchange, it
8:15
Speaker 1: doesn't matter whether I'm the host or the guest, I
8:18
Speaker 1: would feel really uncomfortable. Like my mom was always this
8:22
Speaker 1: very very generous person, and she always wanted to bring
8:25
Speaker 1: home like a single friend or something at the hospital
8:28
Speaker 1: she worked with for Thanksgiving or Christmas, and my sister
8:31
Speaker 1: where all my sister and I were always like, we
8:34
Speaker 1: don't know this person. Now our holiday is awkward. Like, yes,
8:37
Speaker 1: we're helping a stranger, but at what costs? You know?
8:42
Speaker 1: So I've always been like that. I've just I've never
8:45
Speaker 1: liked hanging out with people I didn't know on a
8:47
Speaker 1: really intimate Yeah, but I mean like, guy can hang
8:53
Speaker 1: out with anybody in a bar or whatever. If someone's
8:57
Speaker 1: houses in play or is the setting, it changes every thing.
9:00
Speaker 1: It's just uncomfortable for you. But I'll tell you who
9:02
Speaker 1: is into that, the two point two million members of
9:06
Speaker 1: surfing dot com. Oh those people. Yeah, So I don't
9:12
Speaker 1: even know if you said for sure, what a hospitality
9:14
Speaker 1: exchange is that's when you live with each other. Yeah,
9:17
Speaker 1: that's when you say you can come and stay in
9:19
Speaker 1: my place and while I'm here, be here too, and
9:21
Speaker 1: then I'll just come visit you someday while you're there
9:25
Speaker 1: and we'll just be uncomfortable. But what if they it
9:27
Speaker 1: doesn't go well in the first round and you hate
9:30
Speaker 1: each other. I don't know. I think it was it
9:33
Speaker 1: was free, so maybe you could send a friend, uh
9:37
Speaker 1: remer play like I don't like you, but I have
9:39
Speaker 1: a friend who would love you well. They do say, though,
9:44
Speaker 1: to be fair, that it's not necessarily like you're in
9:46
Speaker 1: a little one room apartment with these people. It works
9:49
Speaker 1: better if you have a large house with maybe a
9:53
Speaker 1: private guest house or some area where you don't have
9:56
Speaker 1: to necessarily be with each other all the time, So
9:58
Speaker 1: that makes a little more sense. Still, not into it
10:01
Speaker 1: if you are into sharing your town with strangers, like
10:06
Speaker 1: let's go see this or let's go to the world
10:09
Speaker 1: of coke right exactly If you can't possibly get to
10:12
Speaker 1: the world of coke often enough, hospitality swaps are the
10:16
Speaker 1: one for you. I love showing people Atlanta that I know. Yeah,
10:20
Speaker 1: that's one of my favorite things. Is to to delight
10:22
Speaker 1: people with the charms of my hometown, because there are
10:26
Speaker 1: many charms in Atlanta, but strangers. I mean, I feel
10:30
Speaker 1: was a friend of a friend that was a stranger,
10:32
Speaker 1: I would certainly do that too, but not I would
10:34
Speaker 1: never log on to a website and just say just
10:37
Speaker 1: come and visit me. I'll show you around Atlanta. All right.
10:39
Speaker 1: So we've clearly established now that hospitality exchanges are the
10:43
Speaker 1: worst idea ever devised by humankind, or that we're just
10:46
Speaker 1: two big jerks, one of the two. So let's stick
10:49
Speaker 1: to the traditional exchanges where you don't meet them, they
10:52
Speaker 1: don't meet you. You just use one another's houses. That's
10:55
Speaker 1: what how It wasn't that movie. So according to Um
10:59
Speaker 1: the Time article house swapping as well, written by a Russo,
11:04
Speaker 1: specifically Francine Russo, Um, most of the people about is
11:09
Speaker 1: an estimate, have already house swapped. So most people who
11:13
Speaker 1: are involved in house swapping I've done it before. They're
11:15
Speaker 1: usually professionals, business people, doctors. It's not a couchsurf situation. No. Again,
11:21
Speaker 1: there is CouchSurfing dot com, and I would advise people
11:24
Speaker 1: to go check that out if you're into hospitality exchanges.
11:27
Speaker 1: Either as a guest or host. Check out CouchSurfing dot com.
11:30
Speaker 1: It's pretty cool. Um. But with the traditional house swap,
11:34
Speaker 1: let's talk about the details, Chuck, Like, what are you
11:36
Speaker 1: going to do? Like, let's say you live in um, yes,
11:40
Speaker 1: and I live in Mobile, Alabama, and you're you have
11:44
Speaker 1: a dead relative in Mobile and have to go there. Well,
11:47
Speaker 1: I'm depressed all of a sudden. But what I would
11:48
Speaker 1: do is fight through that depression first, and then you
11:51
Speaker 1: and I would start exchanging emails with one another where
11:55
Speaker 1: we start to outline specifics of what this is going
11:59
Speaker 1: to entail. Because on the surface it seems easy, like, hey,
12:02
Speaker 1: you just swap houses, but there's a lot of you know,
12:04
Speaker 1: small details. You might have a car that you want
12:07
Speaker 1: to have use of, so what you know, you can
12:09
Speaker 1: use my car. You might have house plants or pets.
12:12
Speaker 1: You might have mail that you want picked up. You
12:15
Speaker 1: might have your refrigerator only opens if you if you
12:19
Speaker 1: hike up the left side first and pull the door open.
12:22
Speaker 1: There might be a little tricks to your house. You
12:24
Speaker 1: gotta jigger the dead bolt from the inside if you
12:27
Speaker 1: want to leave the house. So you gotta get all
12:29
Speaker 1: those little details out in the open, so you know
12:31
Speaker 1: what you're dealing with. You're also going to be leaving
12:34
Speaker 1: the keys of your car, the keys to your boat,
12:37
Speaker 1: the keys to your a t v s. Everything, Like
12:40
Speaker 1: you're giving these people your life. Um, if you are
12:45
Speaker 1: a friendly sort or a suspicious sort, and you have neighbors,
12:48
Speaker 1: friends and relatives that live in the area who will
12:51
Speaker 1: listen to your commands, you may command them to drop
12:54
Speaker 1: by and introduce themselves, maybe to act as tour guides,
12:57
Speaker 1: maybe to just say hi, maybe to just give even
13:00
Speaker 1: more advice find out if everything's going on, Like you
13:04
Speaker 1: were switching lives with people for a minute a week. Well,
13:08
Speaker 1: in the movie The Holiday, the reason that Cameron met
13:13
Speaker 1: Jude Law was because that was Kate Winslet's brother. Okay,
13:17
Speaker 1: so you are sort of switching lives. And the reason
13:19
Speaker 1: Jack Black was there because I think I can't remember,
13:23
Speaker 1: but it was Jack Black. He was there. He was
13:25
Speaker 1: the neighbor or something and he knew where somehow. So yeah,
13:28
Speaker 1: I was reading another article that this article was based on.
13:31
Speaker 1: I think it was in Budget Travel, um, and the
13:34
Speaker 1: woman who was talking about house swapping was saying that, Um,
13:37
Speaker 1: she she and her I think mother were staying in
13:40
Speaker 1: this Paris flat and they were living Francois life, like
13:44
Speaker 1: they were eating at his favorite beast rode down the street,
13:46
Speaker 1: and they were like fixing his leaky sink and talking
13:50
Speaker 1: to his neighbors outside, you know, his flat, that kind
13:53
Speaker 1: of stuff. So you can expect, like, if you're if
13:56
Speaker 1: you kind of keep to yourself, you're probably not gonna
13:59
Speaker 1: house swap in the first place. But if you if
14:01
Speaker 1: you're looking to come out of your shell trade houses
14:04
Speaker 1: with somebody, well, and they say, that's another great reason
14:07
Speaker 1: to do this, if you're if you want a more immersive,
14:09
Speaker 1: non touristy experience. I've never even rented an apartment from someone,
14:15
Speaker 1: but I'm keen to go to a foreign country and
14:18
Speaker 1: live in a neighborhood apartment rather than a hotel. Like
14:21
Speaker 1: I like hotels for a minute, but at at the hospitality,
14:25
Speaker 1: all the fakeness, it's all it's all rings faults to me. Oh,
14:28
Speaker 1: you're crazy all the way from me. It just is
14:32
Speaker 1: so fake to me. I I but you know it's fake.
14:34
Speaker 1: You know that people are paid to be nice too.
14:36
Speaker 1: It's not like I think that they actually like me
14:38
Speaker 1: or anything like that. I don't care, right I'm at
14:43
Speaker 1: the hotel. I don't share, no trust me. I love
14:45
Speaker 1: hotels a little bit because I didn't get to stay
14:46
Speaker 1: in them as a child. We didn't what we were
14:50
Speaker 1: poor teachers and we can't. That's funny that you bring
14:53
Speaker 1: up teachers, Chuck, because this whole thing, the whole thing
14:56
Speaker 1: was started in ninety three by a group of teachers
15:00
Speaker 1: who founded Inner Vack International Vacations so that they could
15:04
Speaker 1: cheaply swap or make sense rental places or they have
15:08
Speaker 1: to make ends. Me that that makes total sense. So
15:10
Speaker 1: that's where house swapping actually came from his teachers. I
15:13
Speaker 1: didn't know that. Now you do, Uh, what's another good
15:17
Speaker 1: reason to how swap? Josh? Or what's something you can
15:19
Speaker 1: do forget good reasons? What's something else you can do
15:22
Speaker 1: to be a good house swapper? What can you offer? Um?
15:24
Speaker 1: You would also, well, you want to treat this like
15:27
Speaker 1: it's you want to treat the other person's house like
15:30
Speaker 1: you are hoping they're treating your house. Well, yeah, right,
15:33
Speaker 1: So let's say you break a dish. You would leave
15:35
Speaker 1: a note and say I broke this dish, I'm very sorry.
15:38
Speaker 1: Here are all the pieces, but here's also money to
15:41
Speaker 1: write here's also money to replace it, and if it's more,
15:44
Speaker 1: let me know and I'll send you the difference or whatever.
15:46
Speaker 1: Or better yet, just replace something if if you can
15:48
Speaker 1: replace it. If you can't, sure, um you it's probably
15:52
Speaker 1: still a good idea to leave a note, unless it's
15:55
Speaker 1: just something that they're never gonna right exactly. Um. You
16:00
Speaker 1: will probably also want to restock the fridge when you leave.
16:03
Speaker 1: You want to clean up. Um, you want to If
16:07
Speaker 1: the car catches on fire, you're gonna want to pick
16:09
Speaker 1: up the phone and say your car is on fire. Yeah,
16:11
Speaker 1: a big, big oops. You should probably let them know. Um,
16:15
Speaker 1: And it's nice to leave a little parting gift, sure right. Um.
16:19
Speaker 1: You also uh want to take care of their pets
16:22
Speaker 1: if they've asked you to take care of their pets,
16:24
Speaker 1: bringing the mail. These kind of things are usually worked
16:26
Speaker 1: out ahead of time, though. Yeah, they say it's a
16:28
Speaker 1: good idea a lot of times to having a letter
16:31
Speaker 1: of agreement that's not a legal document, but it just
16:33
Speaker 1: kind of outlines expectations for each other because in the end,
16:37
Speaker 1: what you want is just a positive experience. You don't
16:39
Speaker 1: want to come home and say my plants are dead
16:41
Speaker 1: or my dog is uh dead. Gosh, if I wasn't
16:44
Speaker 1: gonna say that, I was gonna say hungry, but dead
16:47
Speaker 1: from hunger. Dead from hunger. Uh. So you want to
16:50
Speaker 1: have reasonable expectations, and apparently these uh websites who run
16:56
Speaker 1: these places say that it generally works out pretty well
16:59
Speaker 1: and the the biggest problems that usually have are differing
17:03
Speaker 1: expectations that aren't outlined really specifically, right, um, usually a
17:07
Speaker 1: differing expectation of or differing definition of cleanliness. Yeah, that's
17:13
Speaker 1: the same. You ever go on Yelp and read hotel recommendations,
17:18
Speaker 1: It's awful people are I mean, that's something's got to
17:21
Speaker 1: really be wrong with a hotel for me to to
17:24
Speaker 1: log into a website and complain. But you should see
17:26
Speaker 1: the stuff. People complain about the quality of the chocolate
17:29
Speaker 1: left on their pillow, and their expectations are so ramped
17:33
Speaker 1: up for some of these folks. It's just it's the
17:35
Speaker 1: same with hotels. Yeah, I just call those people hard
17:38
Speaker 1: to please, whether your house swapping or or just vacationing.
17:42
Speaker 1: But not only that, they like I would consider myself
17:46
Speaker 1: hard to please. But I don't see ever really going
17:49
Speaker 1: on to a site and posting a complaint it's more
17:54
Speaker 1: just like, well, you failed to please me, so I
17:56
Speaker 1: won't be back. But all that's going on in my
17:58
Speaker 1: head or I'm saying it to human, she's like, mm hmmm.
18:02
Speaker 1: I did do one Yelp post about a nameless restaurant
18:05
Speaker 1: here in Atlanta that served me a raw hamburger, like
18:09
Speaker 1: purple raw meat inside it was disgusting. Which one I'm
18:13
Speaker 1: not gonna tell you. I'll tell you after. And I
18:15
Speaker 1: did write a yelping for you, because all they basically
18:17
Speaker 1: did was say, oh, I'm really sorry that your burger
18:21
Speaker 1: would have killed you if you would have eaten it. Well,
18:22
Speaker 1: we won't charge you for it. And I said, oh, okay,
18:26
Speaker 1: how about like a three piece of cheese cake or something?
18:29
Speaker 1: And I complained in the name they they got in
18:34
Speaker 1: touch with me, though. The restaurant did from the Yelp
18:36
Speaker 1: review and said, we're so sorry, this is not our policy.
18:39
Speaker 1: Would like to offer you a gift card for an
18:43
Speaker 1: under cooked hamber It was only twenty five bucks. I
18:45
Speaker 1: thought was kind of lame. It was a nice place,
18:49
Speaker 1: oh was it. Okay you're eating hamburgers and five star
18:52
Speaker 1: restaurants now, well, but it was one of those you know,
18:53
Speaker 1: sixteen dollar hamburgers. Yeah, I can see that. Yeah, um, Chuck, Josh.
19:00
Speaker 1: We talked about some common complaints. We also mentioned the
19:04
Speaker 1: letter of agreement, right, yes, not a legal contract. Like
19:07
Speaker 1: you said, there's a couple of points that most people
19:10
Speaker 1: would make on a letter of agreement. Um, it's where
19:13
Speaker 1: you're saying you do this, I'll do this, or I'm
19:17
Speaker 1: gonna do this, and you're not gonna do that, and
19:19
Speaker 1: you just have it spelled out so that everybody's on
19:21
Speaker 1: the same page. Right. So what are some of the
19:23
Speaker 1: points in the letters of agreement? William Sapphire would call them.
19:27
Speaker 1: Like a hotel, you would want to know like the
19:29
Speaker 1: phone and internet deal if if all of a sudden
19:32
Speaker 1: you have a big long distance spill. Um, you want
19:35
Speaker 1: to get that pre range ahead of time. Now that's covered. Uh.
19:38
Speaker 1: You want to outline who can stay there, just like
19:41
Speaker 1: a hotel. Hotels say you can't have twenty of your
19:43
Speaker 1: friends in a room, and you can say I don't
19:45
Speaker 1: want twenty of your friends in my house, right, especially
19:48
Speaker 1: if they're a thrill kill colt into blood orgies that yes. Uh.
19:52
Speaker 1: You also want to talk about what will happen if
19:55
Speaker 1: something is damaged or broken down. Do you want to
19:58
Speaker 1: know immediately? You do not want to know? You have
20:01
Speaker 1: them called Jack Black, the neighbor what sure? Um? And
20:05
Speaker 1: uh also that you want to disclose whether or not
20:09
Speaker 1: you have homeowners or renters or auto insurance. Yeah, because
20:14
Speaker 1: the cool thing is is you can let somebody take
20:16
Speaker 1: your car because as far as the um auto insurance
20:20
Speaker 1: companies concerned, that's your friend and your friends covered by
20:23
Speaker 1: your insurance. Well maybe not always right, Well, yeah, I
20:27
Speaker 1: think as long as you're covered, yeah, as long as
20:29
Speaker 1: you yeah, well, I think one article I read it
20:32
Speaker 1: didn't spell out car insurance, but it did say that
20:35
Speaker 1: a lot of insurance companies, if you're gonna do the
20:37
Speaker 1: house swap, you should check with your homeowners insurance and
20:41
Speaker 1: just make sure everything because some of them have little caveats.
20:43
Speaker 1: That is a great point. That is a very very
20:45
Speaker 1: good point. And you should probably also do that with
20:47
Speaker 1: your car insurance just to be safe. Right, um chuck gosh.
20:54
Speaker 1: So we mentioned inter back, right, that was the one
20:56
Speaker 1: that was that started all this in ninety three. There's
20:59
Speaker 1: also a place called home Link that's big, and then
21:02
Speaker 1: there's tons of other sites. I went on inter back today.
21:06
Speaker 1: They have this place at Table Mountains, South Africa, because
21:08
Speaker 1: it was one of the most beautiful homes I've ever
21:10
Speaker 1: seen in my entire life. Pool everything just mod really
21:14
Speaker 1: sweet house. So they do have cool houses and apparently
21:17
Speaker 1: they have about ten thousand listings. Are you gonna go there? No?
21:21
Speaker 1: Did you offer up your place? No? I was just
21:23
Speaker 1: checking it out, you know, I'm want to do um.
21:26
Speaker 1: But apparently everywhere from like Craigslist for free to like
21:30
Speaker 1: these high end sites that charge you about a hundred
21:33
Speaker 1: bucks to be a member to list your house. Yeah,
21:35
Speaker 1: you can. Like there's a whole subculture out there that
21:38
Speaker 1: we weren't aware of. I'm men look into this. Yeah,
21:40
Speaker 1: I don't think my house is. I guess if you
21:44
Speaker 1: were a big golf fan the East, like golf tournament
21:47
Speaker 1: is like right across the street. If you want to
21:48
Speaker 1: rent my house for the weekend, which is actually this weekend?
21:51
Speaker 1: Oh is it? Yeah? I got home yesterday in their
21:54
Speaker 1: cars everywhere and in yep piece from the suburbs, so
21:57
Speaker 1: in their cores like cans in my yard and talking
21:59
Speaker 1: about dirt the neighborhood was. I could see you with
22:02
Speaker 1: the shotgun being like get off a mile along YUPPI here.
22:05
Speaker 1: It's kind of fun, but it's also kind of annoying.
22:07
Speaker 1: I'm with you. Are you gonna sell anything? I may
22:11
Speaker 1: sell some parking spaces. Oh yeah, okay, but nobody marries No. No,
22:15
Speaker 1: that didn't work out. A couple of last things, real quick, chuck, Uh.
22:19
Speaker 1: Intuition is huge, huge. Uh. If you start to get
22:24
Speaker 1: the impression that you don't really feel comfortable with this person,
22:27
Speaker 1: the more you talk to him, that's that. And since
22:30
Speaker 1: their house swappers and you're doing this and you're they'll understand. Uh.
22:34
Speaker 1: If you kind of are on the fence, you can
22:37
Speaker 1: feel free to ask them for references. Apparently is fine,
22:40
Speaker 1: although I'd be like, no, that's why another reason you're
22:44
Speaker 1: not a good housewapper. Uh. And then, um, if somebody
22:47
Speaker 1: seems a little controlling, like here are exact details of
22:51
Speaker 1: what you have to do every moment you're at the house,
22:55
Speaker 1: they're probably not going to be real comfortable. They're being
22:58
Speaker 1: forced into this, possibly by a thrill kill cult that
23:01
Speaker 1: they're a member of. I think I'd be okay with it, okay,
23:05
Speaker 1: except for my animals. I would be a little suspicious
23:09
Speaker 1: to let the stranger take care of my animals. I
23:11
Speaker 1: would have to really know that they had dogs and
23:13
Speaker 1: cats and they knew how to do it. And Emily
23:16
Speaker 1: gets real specific with the directions for the animals, which
23:20
Speaker 1: is a good idea. Oh. Another thing you should do
23:22
Speaker 1: is take the things you're really really love and or
23:26
Speaker 1: maybe valuable and either put them in a friend's house
23:30
Speaker 1: or lock them in a room in your house, just
23:31
Speaker 1: to be safe. It's not necessarily even thievery. Just if
23:34
Speaker 1: you have a really expensive ose, don't leave it on
23:37
Speaker 1: your kitchen counter. And that's just dumb, agreed. Mistakes can happen.
23:42
Speaker 1: So that is the sound that officially ends house swapping
23:46
Speaker 1: forever for the rest of our lives, will never talk
23:48
Speaker 1: about it again. Thank you, Thank you for bearing with
23:52
Speaker 1: us this far. UM. Hats off to you, tip of
23:55
Speaker 1: the hat, Chuck, just did it. Um. If you want
23:58
Speaker 1: to learn more about how swapping why, there's nothing else
24:02
Speaker 1: to know UM, you can type in h O U, S, E, SPACE,
24:07
Speaker 1: S W, A, P, P I n G in the
24:11
Speaker 1: search bar at how stuff works dot com and UM
24:15
Speaker 1: that brings up, of course Facebook questions. How about a
24:21
Speaker 1: quick announcement, Josh, okay, it kept very quiet here A
24:26
Speaker 1: silence fell yeah. Uh, the co ED Decoperative for Education. Yes,
24:31
Speaker 1: our our beautiful friends, um, who took us to Guatemala. Indeed,
24:36
Speaker 1: they are having a fall fiesta here in Atlanta, and
24:40
Speaker 1: we want to give that a little pluggage. It is
24:42
Speaker 1: October twenty one. It is at the Metropolitan Club in Alpharetta, Georgia.
24:47
Speaker 1: Right and uh to seven, seven to ten pm. That's right.
24:50
Speaker 1: Twenty bucks to get in. But twenty bucks buys you food, wine,
24:54
Speaker 1: beer and entertainment. And by entertainment we mean Jerry won't
24:59
Speaker 1: be there. Jerry is going to be there in the
25:01
Speaker 1: flesh in her birthday suit. She'll be playing uh, drum solos.
25:05
Speaker 1: I'm not mistaken. I don't know if a room shot
25:09
Speaker 1: is a drum solo. Uh. And basically they're raising money
25:13
Speaker 1: for you know, they're awesome operation with like awesome prizes.
25:17
Speaker 1: You can win raffles, you can win a week long
25:21
Speaker 1: African Safari. Yes, sign brave stuff, which I know you
25:24
Speaker 1: would be into stuff, um and chuck. Just to give
25:27
Speaker 1: everybody quick rundown if you don't know who COED is,
25:30
Speaker 1: first of all, go listen to the two part Guatemala podcasts. Right, um.
25:36
Speaker 1: And they are a nonprofit that basically pulls together money
25:41
Speaker 1: to buy textbooks for schools in Guatemala, which in turn
25:46
Speaker 1: rent them and create the self sustaining system where every
25:48
Speaker 1: five years the schools have have saved enough money through
25:52
Speaker 1: these rental fees to buy new textbooks and much more. Yeah,
25:57
Speaker 1: and they do computer lives tune. It's just a really
26:00
Speaker 1: you and I thoroughly believe in this group, right, agreed,
26:03
Speaker 1: So we would encourage you, if you're in Atlanta to
26:05
Speaker 1: go to the fall Fest October twenty one and Alpharetta.
26:08
Speaker 1: And where can they get more? More information on the
26:11
Speaker 1: co ed site you think? If so, it's www dot
26:15
Speaker 1: co ed u see dot org. Right, you should go
26:18
Speaker 1: there anyway, c O E d U ce dot org concrete. Okay,
26:22
Speaker 1: so let's get to it. Yes, we're gonna cover a
26:25
Speaker 1: few of these real quick. Josh, I gave you a
26:27
Speaker 1: sheet there, right, Will you play along? Sean Ross hyphen
26:32
Speaker 1: favorite soda? Question Mark, what's your favorite soda? Oh Um,
26:37
Speaker 1: that's what I've been big on club soda lately, just
26:41
Speaker 1: playing club soda. They have it in the Brake croom now,
26:44
Speaker 1: the little Schwepps. I've just been drinking it in there.
26:49
Speaker 1: Remember we talked about in taste. We have taste buds
26:51
Speaker 1: for carbon dioxide. Yeah, yeah, yeah, my My carbon dioxide
26:55
Speaker 1: receptors are in heaven. I love that stuff too. I
26:58
Speaker 1: am not a big soda drinker, but I do love
27:01
Speaker 1: sun kissed and root beer, and I love Lacroix, which
27:06
Speaker 1: is the fizzy water with the natural flavoring. Very good, chuck, yes, excellent.
27:12
Speaker 1: Eric Sanchez says, would you fight a full three rounds
27:14
Speaker 1: against George Sampierre for ten thousand dollars? He's a UFC guy, don't.
27:20
Speaker 1: The question used to be would you get in a
27:21
Speaker 1: ring with Mike Tyson for ton thousand? Yeah, there's no way.
27:26
Speaker 1: This face is way too pretty for that. I don't.
27:29
Speaker 1: I just don't like pain, so no, thank you. Okay,
27:31
Speaker 1: answers that one. Uh, let's see Victoria Dugger. Their name
27:36
Speaker 1: sounds familiar if we is that Facebook buddy all the time,
27:39
Speaker 1: so it's like she might have been a New York person. Okay, Uh, well, hey,
27:43
Speaker 1: they're Victoria Dugger? Whose voice is that? Who introduces you
27:47
Speaker 1: on the podcast? Is that Jerry? It is not Jerry,
27:51
Speaker 1: It is roxand it is our head of the video department,
27:53
Speaker 1: Rock sand. She does a fine job and she's from
27:56
Speaker 1: North Carolina. People always say, what is that accent? It's
27:58
Speaker 1: a non regional dialect. Yes, it is studied in Roxanne.
28:02
Speaker 1: I went to high school with Zack Galafanakas. Yes, they
28:05
Speaker 1: know each other. It's small little tidbit there for you.
28:07
Speaker 1: Shannon Rink says, what do you see as the future
28:09
Speaker 1: of the podcast? You guys have been doing it for
28:10
Speaker 1: a couple of years. Now, do you see herself doing
28:13
Speaker 1: it for a few more years? God willing? Yeah, we
28:16
Speaker 1: were talking about how the magic has gone, but we're
28:18
Speaker 1: going to soldier on and make half good podcast. Oh.
28:22
Speaker 1: I think we both agreed to though that we love
28:24
Speaker 1: the podcast so much, even if bigger and better things
28:26
Speaker 1: are in our future, we would like to keep doing
28:27
Speaker 1: the podcast. Sure, but we'll see. Yeah, um, let's see
28:31
Speaker 1: we did this Shaun Ross's favorite soda one already? Yes? Uh.
28:35
Speaker 1: Jan Moffat asks do you use innuendo on purpose or
28:39
Speaker 1: is it just a consequence of talking about things like
28:41
Speaker 1: totem poles. I'd say both. Yeah, it depends. Like I
28:48
Speaker 1: think a lot of our humor is really accidental, but
28:51
Speaker 1: that just kind of makes it funnier. Don't you think
28:52
Speaker 1: it's also fairly scatological, and we do a good job
28:55
Speaker 1: at raining that in. Yeah. For example, you have in
28:58
Speaker 1: your signature of Pallas Nicolas. Actually his name is Nicolas.
29:07
Speaker 1: What has been the most difficult podcast to explain? I
29:10
Speaker 1: had a real hard time with the Sun podcast, as
29:12
Speaker 1: we all know. Wow, we did have a lot of
29:14
Speaker 1: trouble with the Sun, didn't we. That was I don't
29:16
Speaker 1: think that was a good one. It was UM large
29:19
Speaker 1: Hadron Collider for me. I think the one that I
29:22
Speaker 1: thought I was going to do well on but really
29:24
Speaker 1: didn't was UM Butterfly Wings Color Iridescence. That was so maddening.
29:30
Speaker 1: Do you have another one I do? Um is the
29:33
Speaker 1: in the Inevitable movie bio on Hippie Rob. Who do
29:36
Speaker 1: you think should play the lead? I never met the guy,
29:38
Speaker 1: so you tell me. I can't really envision anybody playing
29:42
Speaker 1: Hippie Rob, but Hippie Rob. So I think that if
29:46
Speaker 1: someone approached us to do a movie on Hippy Rob,
29:49
Speaker 1: we would have to launch like a national search for Rob,
29:52
Speaker 1: find him and pay him in like Milwaukee's Best Ice.
29:55
Speaker 1: It's funny that I don't know who he is, but
29:57
Speaker 1: I still have. You know, you get a mental picture
29:58
Speaker 1: when you hear about someone who you have who? I
30:00
Speaker 1: picture the guy in office space, the next door neighbor
30:03
Speaker 1: that had the big mullet and the big handlebar mustache.
30:05
Speaker 1: It's you're not too far off. Um. Rob was a
30:08
Speaker 1: little softer, a little more self aware than that guy.
30:12
Speaker 1: And with red hair. Oh really yeah, I just blew
30:17
Speaker 1: my mind. Yeah, reddish strawberry blonde hair and beard. Crazy. Uh.
30:21
Speaker 1: And I got one more? Um, I have one more.
30:24
Speaker 1: It's from Scott Fogg and he says American coke or
30:27
Speaker 1: Mexican coke. Definitely Mexican coke. I don't even drink coke,
30:32
Speaker 1: but when I see Mexican coke, I buy it because
30:35
Speaker 1: it's got a sugar. Yeah, the real deal. Yep. Um.
30:39
Speaker 1: If you want to ask us a question, you have
30:42
Speaker 1: to be our friend on Facebook. You have to go
30:45
Speaker 1: to facebook dot com slash stuff you should know. Uh.
30:49
Speaker 1: You can also follow us on Twitter. It's s y
30:52
Speaker 1: s K podcast. As always, you can send us an
30:56
Speaker 1: email at stuff podcast at how stuff works dot com.
31:00
Speaker 1: Mm hmm. For more on this and thousands of other topics,
31:06
Speaker 1: visit how stuff works dot com. Want more how stuff works,
31:10
Speaker 1: check out our blogs on the How Stuff Works dot
31:12
Speaker 1: com home page, brought to you by the reinvented two
31:18
Speaker 1: thousand twelve camera. It's ready, are you