More and more property owners are finding ways to earn extra money in the summer months. They do this by renting out their pools and terraces by the hour, a fast and secure business that gains followers every summer season. Its owners, willing to squeeze every corner of their properties, can generate an average of 1,000 euros per season and some even reach up to 10,000 euros. And this is just by renting out the pool. Other property owners are not looking to make money, but to save it. They are the ones who exchange their homes, a model that is also growing mainly due to the high prices of accommodation and the impact of inflation. Renting pools by the hour between individuals became fashionable during the pandemic and has since gained thousands of users. The French platform Swimmy, which has more than 6,000 pools and which this summer expects to reach more than 20,000 reservations and register at least 2,000 new installations, tells the story of an owner who has raised more than 62,000 euros since registering on the platform. “The most popular ones tend to be those that offer additional services such as barbecues, shaded areas and spectacular views. Sizes vary, but generally, medium and large pools are preferred, as they can accommodate events, groups of friends and families,” they say at Swimmy. The average rental time is around four or five hours. The three most popular pools at the French start-up are one in Cervelló, 20 kilometres from Barcelona, another in Madrid and the last in Las Rozas (Madrid), at prices ranging from four to six euros per person per hour. Penthouse rooftops are another object of desire these months. Even more so if they have views of a city. “The most requested are those in Madrid and Barcelona,” says Álvaro Vallespín, founder of HolaPlace, a space rental platform that launched in Spain in 2020 and whose business has tripled in the last four years. “In the summer season, the main applicant is looking for unique private spaces,” says Vallespín. It has more than 2,000, both professionals and individuals, in Madrid, Barcelona, Valencia, Málaga and Seville. Any house can be used at any given time to film a series, a documentary or an advertisement. It doesn't have to be a luxury mansion. This is what they say at Kuarere, which has been operating as a marketplace for renting spaces by the hour since 2021 and has already carried out more than a thousand audiovisual projects. Its main clients are audiovisual creatives who need spaces for filming or photo shoots. “For advertising, we are asked for a lot of normal middle-class homes, and now in summer houses have a garden and a swimming pool for sun cream ads, for example, or music videos,” says Belén Sola, CEO of Kuarere, which has more than 4,000 spaces in Spain. It is another way of earning a few euros by renting out your property for a few hours. Specifically, between 90 and 100 euros per hour. Among the most requested spaces recently are a designer house in Guadalajara for 200 euros per hour, a renovated penthouse with beams in Madrid for 90 euros, or a house in the centre of Madrid that maintains its intact construction from 1900, for 60 euros per hour.
Optimize your vacation
Home exchange is a formula that has gained ground in Spain in recent years, especially since the pandemic. More and more homeowners are familiar with this model that emerged in the United States three decades ago thanks to the idea of some teachers who were looking to optimise their holidays. The formula allows you to save money on accommodation, a very considerable amount if we are talking about expensive destinations such as Hong Kong, New York or Paris. On the HomeExchange platform, which has an 80% market share globally and more than 170,000 users, this saving is estimated at between 30% and 35% of the budget for a trip. “Savings is one of the factors that has led many people to try or consider this option,” says Pilar Manrique, spokesperson for HomeExchange in Spain. Another is the search for more responsible solutions when travelling. “It can solve some aspects of mass tourism because it is a more sustainable way of travelling by using existing resources and eliminating speculation,” believes Manrique. Elisabet Serelde, Pedro Jesús López and their daughter Shaila, known as Trotamundos Family, travel the world proving that you don’t have to be rich to travel. They have 307 exchanges around the world behind them and this year alone they have already exceeded 30. “Right now we are in Toronto, Canada, in a super luxury apartment in the city centre. We have linked four exchanges: Montreal, Ottawa, Quebec and Toronto. Then we have another one in Corsica, two more in Bergen and Stavanger, in the Norwegian fjords, and we finish with one more exchange in Ibiza,” says Elisabet, a HomeExchange user. On this platform, where you have to pay a fee of 160 euros per year to be able to travel unlimitedly, more than 5.7 million overnight stays were reached worldwide in 2023, surpassing the pre-pandemic record. “Just this summer, almost 2.8 million have already been registered worldwide, surpassing those of the summer of 2023 (2.5 million),” says Manrique. In Spain this summer, 420,473 overnight stays are going to be made, a figure that shows the momentum of this travel alternative, which has grown by 147% in the last five years. “Spain is the second most popular country for exchanges, behind France and followed by the USA. Currently, there are 26,175 members in Spain, 20% more than last year,” says Manrique. The most requested regions this summer are Catalonia, the Basque Country, Andalusia, the Valencian Community and the Balearic Islands. The cities where the most exchanges will be registered in these months are Paris, Barcelona, London and New York. Follow all the information on Economy and Business on Facebook and Twitter. Xor in our weekly newsletter