How Mutual Exchange Works
A simple, guided path from listing your home to arranging your exchange.
Mutual exchange lets social housing tenants swap tenancies directly with each other - council or housing association, no waiting list, no starting your search from scratch. Whether you need more space, less space, or just a different area, here's exactly how the process works from your first listing to picking up new keys.
Create your account
Sign up with your email and verify it — this keeps the community genuine and safe for every household.
List your home
Add bedrooms, bathrooms, rent, landlord details, photos, and pin your exact location using Google Maps.
Tell us what you want
Choose upsize, downsize or like-for-like, and set your desired area and search radius.
Get matched automatically
Our engine scores nearby homes on size fit, distance and tenancy type, and notifies you the moment a match appears.
Message safely
Chat with your match inside Mutual Home Exchange before sharing any personal contact details.
Request & exchange
Send a viewing or exchange request, then work with your landlords to complete the formal mutual exchange.
Know someone looking to move?
Refer a friend and give your own listing a boost - completely free.
1. Send an invite
Enter your friend's name and email from your Refer a friend page - takes a few seconds.
2. They join & list
Once they sign up through your invite and finish setting up their own listing, the reward triggers automatically.
3. Your listing gets Featured
Your own listing gets Featured for 14 days, giving it extra visibility in search - no limit on how many friends you refer.
Membership, simplified
Beyond finding your swap, your account is the control centre for everything else - here's what you actually get.
Your Dashboard
One place for matches, messages and requests - see what needs your attention the moment you log in, without hunting across separate pages.
Profile & Preferences
Update your contact details, opt in or out of MultiSwap, and control exactly how we reach you - all from one settings page.
Notifications, your way
Get told the moment a match appears or someone messages you, so you're never checking back and forth to see what's changed.
Your Subscription
See your current plan at a glance, and manage or upgrade it whenever you're ready - no digging through menus to find it.
The features that find swaps fastest
Tenants who use these regularly swap in weeks rather than months. Everything sits on one page, and the counters tell you what needs your attention today.
- Get your listing to 100%Photos, an honest description and your landlord's name. Complete listings get roughly three times the requests.
- Add the areas you'd move toType them on your listing or press "I'd move here" on any place guide. Matching uses them to find people heading your way.
- Check My matches every few daysEach match is scored on what you both want: size, area, tenancy type and adaptations. New homes are listed daily.
- Send a request, then messageA request tells the other tenant you are serious. Messages stay on the site until you both choose to swap numbers.
- Say yes to swap chainsNo direct match? A three-way chain finds a third home that completes the loop. Accept or decline from the overview.
- Save homes and set alertsSave any listing to compare later, and set an alert on a place guide to be emailed the moment a home appears there.
- Promote your exchangeShare your ready-written post to WhatsApp and Facebook groups, and refer a friend who is also looking.
Your dashboard does the homework for you
List your home and your dashboard fills itself with the things that actually get a swap done: who your landlord really is, what the places you want are like, and the quickest ways to get your home in front of the right tenants.
- Learn about your landlordRegulator grades, what tenants say, Ombudsman record and homes owned, plus the 42-day rules, so you know what to expect before you apply.
- Places you want to move toHomes to swap there, how many others want it too, what it's like to live there and the biggest landlords in the area, with their grades.
- Promote my exchangeA ready-written post and one-tap sharing to WhatsApp, Facebook groups, X and email. Most swaps are found by telling people, not waiting.
- Matches and swap chainsPotential matches scored on what you both want, three-way chains when no direct swap exists, and requests and messages in one place.