HomeExchange Review: How We Saved £1000+ in Copenhagen! 

We spent five nights in Copenhagen in June and stayed in a great apartment 40 minutes from the city centre. Using HomeExchange meant we didn’t actually pay with money on the platform, but Guest Points. Let me explain why it’s such a good way to travel in this HomeExchange review.

What is HomeExchange?

HomeExchange is a website that lets people stay in each other’s homes while they’re away. Sometimes that’s a direct swap, where you stay in their home while they stay in yours. But more often, it’s done using something called GuestPoints.

When you host someone in your home, you earn GuestPoints. You can then use those points to stay in other people’s homes around the world. It means you don’t necessarily need to find someone who wants to visit your home at exactly the same time you want to visit your destination – in this case, Copenhagen. 

To get started, you pay an annual membership fee, which gives you access to unlimited exchanges for a year. Once you’ve joined, you create a profile, add photos of your home, and start browsing places you’d like to stay.

There are homes available all over the world, from city apartments and family homes to countryside cottages and beach houses.

We used HomeExchange for our trip to Copenhagen and ended up saving around £1000 on accommodation. We also have another one planned for Valencia in October, which should save us another £700 on the five nights. 

Why we chose HomeExchange for Copenhagen

The cost of 5 nights’ hotel in Copenhagen for a family of three is astronomical – think £1000 easily. Using HomeExchange for our trip meant the cost of accommodation was sorted, and we had a bit more so we didn’t need to worry about the activities and food so much. 

Having an apartment rather than a hotel room also gave us more space in the evenings to relax once Reggie had gone to bed.

We wouldn’t have been able to afford Copenhagen if it wasn’t for saving money like this on the accommodation with HomeExchange.

How I found our Copenhagen home

After creating a profile on HomeExchange and uploading our home information it was time to look around and find our perfect home. 

I set the filters to three people and put in our dates. I emailed every property that suited – about seven, just so I would have a choice when they responded. Some didn’t want a child to stay, and one or two just didn’t get back to me. 

I chose the one we stayed in as it had two rooms – I always find it difficult to sleep when sharing with Reggie as I’m such a light sleeper and worry at all his grunts and squeaks. 

From her agreeing to let us stay it was all quite straight forward really. We were confirmed on the site so I booked our flights. HomeExchange would send emails during the process to remind you to confirm how to check in and out, and to make sure you knew all you needed to know about the trip. 

Our HomeExchange in Copenhagen

The apartment we stayed in had two bedrooms, a great sized bathroom, a kitchen and large lounge. It also had a small outdoor space with lots of pretty plants. It was the ground floor of a two-floor apartment block – although we didn’t hear a peep from upstairs.

It was in a neighbourhood called Hørsholm, an urban area on the Øresund coast about 15 miles from Copenhagen. It’s known as being one of the most beautiful towns in Denmark and I can support that claim with these pictures of the lake just a two-minute walk from our new home.

It was a lovely town for a wander around – Reggie particularly loved the toy shop. There was the high street which had a few designer shops, a sushi train restaurant, a NETTO and a few other clothing shops. Then if you went to the other side of town there was a lovely harbour filled with restaurants and of course, boats.

It took us about 45 minutes to get into Copenhagen from here. We could either get the 150S bus, or get the double decker(!) train. We did a mixture and they were easy, regular and cheap – although we had it included in our Copenhagen passes.

The train station was so quaint and we became regulars at the cute cafe there.

This was a great area for families travelling to Copenhagen. Reggie loved using all the different transport and it was a great spot if you plan to travel north in Denmark (which we originally did). I loved how green it was here.

What we loved about HomeExchange

We’ve already covered the fact we had more space than a hotel, two rooms is so good when you’re travelling as a family.

As well as saving money on the accommodation we found we saved on food too, thanks to the kitchen. We bought a few bits for breakfast and even had dinner in the house on the first night. I reckon this saved us over £300 thanks to the Netto down the road.

We also managed to do a wash using their washing machine, meaning we didn’t need to pack quite so much.

I think we also saved money on activities. Honestly we were worn out by the end of the day (7pm) and it was great to have a lovely space to go back to, rather than feeling like we needed to stay out so we weren’t stuck in a hotel room all evening. There was plenty of space for Reggie to play with the toys and books we’d bought.

It was great to be in a real neighbourhood. I loved running round the lake, farmland and forest – I even came across a baby deer one day who ran alongside me.

We really liked Horsholm town and had three of our four evening meals here (pizza, sushi and Thai) as it was so chill and nice to be able to wander ten minutes around a lake to get home. The perfect antidote to the craziness of the city.

The downsides of HomeExchange

As with anything I found there were a few things with HomeExchange that you need to get used to to have success on the platform.

I found it takes quite a bit of time to organise the properties with HomeExchange. Some people don’t reply and not every request gets accepted. I could get all excited about a place after doing the research and deeming it ideal, and then hear nothing.

I thought it’d be easier to get one in the centre, both for our Valencia stay and this Copenhagen one. But I didn’t manage it for either of them. I’m ok with this though, as it’s meant we’ve had the opportunity to explore just out of the cities for both. I loved the location of our one in Copenhagen, and I think it’s meant we’ve managed to get bigger properties too.

You need to have flexibility with HomeExchange, and be willing to live with other people’s stuff. The home in Horsholm had the owners things around – as you’d expect in someone’s actual home – rather than the empty cleanliness of your typical airbnb.

Is HomeExchange Safe?

You can look at the host reviews to get an idea of a property. You can also get verified on HomeExchange, meaning you’ve gone through extra checks and then you can either only accept verified people or stay at verified properties – which I’d definitely recommend if you’re travelling as a family.

HomeExchange Frequently Asked Questions

HomeExchange review 

We used HomeExchange hoping to reduce the cost of our Copenhagen trip and ended up saving around £1000 on accommodation and £300 on food. More importantly, we had a comfortable family base in a residential neighbourhood that gave us a very different experience from staying in a hotel.

HomeExchange is great for families as you can get more rooms and space, and sometimes even toys and books to play with depending on where you stay.

For us, it was a great travel decision and I’m looking forward to our Valencia HomeExchange in October.