Joining Kindred

Visit our website, livekindred.com, or navigate directly to the application at livekindred.com/onboarding, to submit an application to become a Kindred member. We accept qualified homes on a rolling basis based on where we're seeing the most demand.

Kindred is currently expanding across North America and Europe. If we’re not serving your city yet, hang tight – we’ll be sure to reach out as soon as we expand to your area.

Kindred accepts homes and apartments that are located in one of our active service areas and meet our minimum requirements for being safe, functional, and thoughtfully furnished.

1. Safe: Homes must have an active renters or homeowners insurance policy, must be secure and lockable, and cannot have any obvious health or safety hazards present. For a full list, please see the Property Requirements in our Terms of Service.
2. Functional: Given that the average Kindred swap is 5-7 nights, we seek to ensure all Kindred homes would serve as functional accommodations for an individual who may need to work remotely during the week. This means we require wifi, comfortable seating, access to kitchen appliances and basic cooking utensils, desk or tabletop space, and natural light.
3. Tastefully furnished: Kindred homes look and feel like real homes, not half-empty vacation rentals. We accept homes with tasteful and contemporary interior decoration. If you have art on your walls, mirrors, plants, window dressings, rugs, and a bed frame, you’re on the right track. We want homes with soul, and so please don’t feel the need to take down your family pictures or unique decor, or remove your socks from your sock drawer – we like the things that make your home a reflection of the creative, generous, kind person who lives there.

Kindred is free to join!

Members must apply and be accepted, but there are no hosting requirements or fees required to keep your membership active.

When accepted members decide to take a trip, they will then pay a service fee to book a stay. Members also have the option to purchase a Kindred Passport, which unlocks $0 service fees for an unlimited number of trips over a 1 year period.

If you have completed your application and have not heard back from us, you might be on the waitlist.

There are a number of reasons why your membership application may be waitlisted:

1. We are not yet operational in your city
2. We have too much inventory relative to demand for your specific city
3. Your home doesn’t meet our home guidelines
4. Your photos or video walkthrough were incomplete, or some of the information in your application was incomplete or unverified (for example, submitting a false phone number)

We review the waitlist frequently as we expand our service areas. You’ll receive an email as soon as we’re able to accept your home. You’re also welcome to submit new photos or re-apply if you feel your original photos may not have appropriately represented your home.

Yes, absolutely. Kindred welcomes both owners and renters, as long as their home is used as a primary residence. Kindred is for real homes, not short-term rentals. We find that home swapping can be a fantastic option for renters looking to travel more affordably.

Unlike subletting or rentals, home swapping involves no monetary exchange between members. Kindred helps members meet others and coordinate staying as houseguests, not as renters, in one another’s verified primary residences. Home swapping and house sitting in primary residences is generally considered by most jurisdictions to be distinct from renting or subletting, though this can vary.

While it's important to carefully review your lease agreement and any HOA rules that may apply to your rental property before participating, our members who rent typically find that neighbors and landlords are comfortable with them letting a trusted friend housesit when they are gone, as long as they are not turning their home into a rental.

Yes, although at this time Kindred only facilitates whole home swaps. This means that you and your roommates will need to all travel together on a swap, or otherwise all be out of the house for you to host a Kindred member.

There are no minimum hosting requirements for members. When, whether, and with whom to share your space is always entirely up to you.

Kindred is a give-to-get network, and we hope for all accepted members to be both guests and hosts at some point in time. However, home sharing is new to many people, and we understand some may want to “dip their toe in” to home sharing by going on a Kindred trip first before they host. To do this, we gift new members several starting credits to book a stay before their first time hosting.

In order to earn more nights, though, members will have to host other members.

You are welcome to list multiple homes as long as they are a personal place of residence, and not a full-time investment property.

To add additional homes on Kindred, you’ll need to apply separately for each home. Just go to livekindred.com, and with this information:

• Same email
• Same phone number

Let us know once the application for any new home is complete, and we'll expedite the review!