Real Estate Blog

ST. PETERSBURG (Bay News 9) -- With the instability of the housing market, some homeowners are turning to house swapping to keep from having to sell their homes and to avoid broker fees and bartering.

House swapping web sites are popping up that act as a sort of dating site -- except homeowners are the ones looking for a match.

Jan Moennig's is a homeowner looking to swap her house for a smaller one.

"You don't have to deal with trying to sell it, because we know everyone is in a major problem with that," she said.

Moennig is using a web site called "Pad 4 Pad."

Forty percent of Pad 4 Pad clients are from Florida.

Robert Glasser with Smith and Associates in Tampa said he did house swaps in the 1980s when the interest rate was 19 percent, but he's not sold on swapping in the current market.

"People are able to move," Glasser said. "Houses do have affordability, and there is financing out there. So it is possible to buy and sell without having to truly change equity by just trading homes.

He's said it could be difficult to do an even trade.

"There is some difficulty cause each has to evaluate the price of their home independently in order for them to decide what the value could be to make that swap equal," he said.

Moennig said she is hoping to swap with someone in the area. She said she's received two offers, but they are not from people in the Bay area.

She said she would hire a real estate attorney to oversee the transaction, once she found a swap she couldn't refuse.

"I think it will go over, especially in the times with the recessional times now," she said.

After a match is found, the normal process of buying and selling transpires except the offers are contingent upon them purchasing each other's homes. If the homes are paid off, then it can be an even trade.

House Swapping Web Sites

• www.pad4pad.com
• www.onlinehousetrading.com
• www.house4trade.com
• www.goswap.com
• www.domuswap.com
• www.craigslist.org
• http://www.daytonahometrader.com/