Swap Home, See World - March 1, 2005

It's a lot like another practice that has been revolutionized by the Internet—dating. You start by checking out someone's house photo. If there's interest, you e-mail. And down the road...if you both decide things are going well...you switch houses. In fact, experts say, you're best off approaching a house swap with the same perseverance, care and skepticism that you'd apply to Yahoo personals or Match.com.

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your hometown likely has a lot going for it. Veteran swapper John Mensinger lives in Modesto, Calif., a small city that's not an obvious tourist destination. But by selling his town as being less than two hours from San Francisco and Napa Valley, 2½ hours from Yosemite, Monterey and Carmel and near historic gold mining towns, he's come up with seven swaps in seven years.

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